Linked by Thom Holwerda on Mon 26th Nov 2007 21:18 UTC, submitted by JCooper
Get out your popcorn, boys and girls, this is geek soap opera at its finest. "Jeff Waugh is a psychotic failure, obstructive and destructive. He is poisonous people." GNOME's Murray Cumming blogging on Jeff Waugh, all in relation to the board elections. Cumming first detailed what he deemed good candidates, he then went on to lambast the only bad candidate (according to Cumming): Waugh. "His behavior is far beyond the acceptable and displays contempt for the people in GNOME who actually do work. We've tolerated it too long, lost several high-level contributors because of it, slowed down the work of other contributors, and made their work unpleasant. That cost is too high, and we receive almost nothing in return. Jeff Waugh's only aim is self-publicity and any responsibilities in GNOME are just a way to achieve that. As long as his abysmal destructive misuse of those responsibilities is tolerated then he will happily continue clinging to symbolic authority regardless of the effects on GNOME. He seems driven by paranoia that people seek his downfall, but he is not driven by any need to do the job. Inevitably, people soon do want him to get out of the way." The story continues on Planet GNOME, with people supporting Cumming, but also a lot of people demanding a retraction. Don't kill the messenger. Update: Waugh's response. "There's a layer of truth to some of what Murray has said, but his shockingly exaggerated, hateful message is not intended to resolve or heal. Murray does not accept or credit my commitment or contributions to the project, and he has sought to denigrate, disenfranchise and discredit me consistently over the years... Though this is obviously the loudest and most hurtful attempt."
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RE[2]: Will only hinder gnome
by theine on Mon 26th Nov 2007 23:43
in reply to "RE: Will only hinder gnome"
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It's not a personal attack when the issues discussed relate directly and exclusively to his actions within the Gnome organization, regardless of whether people think the criticism is overly harsh.
Clearly the poster has very strong and passionate feelings, and regardless of the etiquette or lack thereof, he seems to have done a remarkable job of keeping the rant and criticism on topic.
Politics is not, has not, and never will be a clean business. But there is a clear line between attacking someone's credibility and competency as to how they performed their job versus attacking their credibility and competency through unrelated or personal issues in some sort of a smear campaign intended to draw attention away from the core issues. That's when things get really ugly.
As an only slightly interested bystander completely unfamiliar with either the issues or the personalities involved, I don't see that the line was crossed.