17c5574c32
Change-Id: I04c39cdbd79340871d4732bead5d5a8eaa1827bf Signed-off-by: Jeremy Stanley <fungi@yuggoth.org>
70 lines
3.8 KiB
Plaintext
70 lines
3.8 KiB
Plaintext
Most of you probably know me as "that short dude in the Hawaiian
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shirt and long hair." I'll answer to "Jeremy," "fungi" or even just
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"hey you." I'm starting my third cycle as PTL of the Infrastructure
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team, and have been a core reviewer and root sysadmin for
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OpenStack's community-maintained project infrastructure for the past
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four years. I've also been doing vulnerability management in
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OpenStack for almost as long, chaired conference tracks, and given
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talks to other communities on a variety of OpenStack-related topics.
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I help with elections, attend and participate in TC meetings and
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review proposed changes to governance. I have consistent, strong
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views in favor of free software and open/transparent community
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process.
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https://wiki.openstack.org/user:fungi
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I see OpenStack not as software, but as a community of people who
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come together to build something for the common good. We've been
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fortunate enough to experience a bubble of corporate interest which
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has provided amazing initial momentum in the form of able software
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developers and generous funding, but that can't last forever. As
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time goes on, we will need to rely increasingly on effort from
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people who contribute to OpenStack because it interests them, rather
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than because some company is paying them to do so. The way I see it,
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we should be preparing now for the future of our project:
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independent, volunteer contributors drawn from the global free
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software community. However, we're not succeeding in attracting them
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the way some other projects do, which brings me to a major
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concern...
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OpenStack has a public relations problem we need to solve, and soon.
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I know I'm not the only one who struggles to convince contributors
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in other communities that we're really like them, writing free
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software under transparent processes open to any who wish to help.
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This skepticism comes from many sources, some overt (like our
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massive trade conferences and marketing budget) while others
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seemingly inconsequential (such as our constant influx of new
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community members who are unfamiliar with free software concepts and
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lack traditional netiquette). Overcoming this not-really-free
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perception is something we absolutely must do to be able to attract
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the unaffiliated volunteers who will continue to maintain OpenStack
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through the eventual loss of our current benefactors and well into
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stabilization.
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Prior to OpenStack, I worked for longer than I care to remember as
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an "operator" at Internet service, hosting and telecommunications
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providers doing Unix systems administration, network engineering,
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virtualization and information security. When I first started my
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career, you couldn't be a capable systems administrator without a
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firm grasp of programming fundamentals and couldn't be a good
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programmer without understanding the basics of systems
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administration. I'm relieved that, after many years of companies
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trying to tell us otherwise, our industry as a whole is finally
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coming back around to the same realization. Similarly, I don't
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believe we as a community benefit by socializing a separation of
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"operators" from "developers" and feel the role distinction many
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attempt to strike between the two is at best vague, while at its
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worst completely alienating a potential source of current and future
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contributions.
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What causes software to succeed in the long run is not hype,
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limitless funding or even technical superiority, it's the size and
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connectedness of its community of volunteers and users who invest
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themselves and their personal time. The work we're doing now is
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great, don't get me wrong, but for it to survive into the next
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decade and beyond we need to focus more on building a close-knit
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community of interested contributors even if it's not in the best
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interests of industry pundits or vendor product roadmaps.
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OpenStack is people. If we lose sight of that, it's over.
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