Hi,

Ludovic Courtès <ludo@gnu.org> writes:

> You write that “the difference between the beginner and the experienced
> is a construction”.  I sympathize with your rejection of the
> student-professor domination.  However, I think newcomers can and should
> benefit from guidance by the experienced; that’s the only way we can
> truly blur the experienced/beginner distinction.  As an “experienced”
> person in this project, I consider it part of my work to help others.  I
> believe knowledge sharing can be achieved without it becoming a
> domination relation.  That is at least what I think most people here
> strive for.

I have been wanting to raise this issue for a while, so maybe now is the
right time! :)

On the educational level, I fully agree with Ludo.

I wonder, however, if this educational hierarchy does not transpire into
political hierarchies.

In other words, if we certainly need experienced users to teach and help
newcomers, do we need experienced users to take more executive decisions
than newcomers?

At the moment, it seems that the right to police others is reserved to a
privileged group.  Should it really be this way?  It does not seem
obvious to me that this separation benefits the community, maybe there
would be an interesting discussion to have here.

For instance, if a long-term, experienced contributor misbehaves (be it
with commits or communication), can they be policed?  The same way that
less experienced users are policed?  By whom?
Can a less experienced user police an experienced one?

There is a lot to discuss here, including transparency of communication,
class of privileges, protocols for exclusion, etc.

I don't know if these issues have been raised and addressed in the Guix
community; maybe there is room for improvement.  Anyhow, discussing more
about these things can only help organizing ourselves better and
building a stronger community! :)

Cheers!

-- 
Pierre Neidhardt
https://ambrevar.xyz/