it's all up to you users (was: Please forget LM MG NR IR SL AU)

[Graham Percival]

My goodness, how time flies.  Is it really time for our yearly "we
want more for nothing" argument?


On Wed, 13 Aug 2008 09:18:36 +0000
David Bobroff <address@hidden> wrote:

> Nicholas Wastell wrote:
> > Don't patronise me, don't make excuses for Graham and I stand by
> > what I wrote.  I'm sure that he's busy and annoyed rather than rude
> > and unfriendly and I certainly didn't expect him to answer it.
> > Neither do I expect a rush of messages agreeing with me.
> 
> Well, I agree with you, Nicholas.

I'm busy and pissed off at the amount of time I've spent on
lilypond.  Approximately three thousand hours now... and I stopped
composing and arranging *FOUR YEARS* ago.

What does three thousand hours mean?  Well, if I was paid minimum
wage (in my province), that would give me an extra $24,000
dollars.  If I got my graduate student TA wage -- which is a
better judge, given that there's always a need for more computer
science TAs at my university (so I could have been working extra
hours), and given the amount of technical and leadership ability
that was required of me -- that would give me $60,000.  Since I
live on less than $10,000 per year, including tuition and
textbooks, that's a *lot* of money to me.

Sometimes I really wonder why I bothered.  I mean, it would be one
thing if I actually used lilypond myself during this period.  But
since I don't, I'm really left wondering why I didn't leave years
ago and devote more time to helping open-source projects I *do*
use.


> > The Lilypond lists have an air of exclusivity which is already very 
> > intimidating to newcomers.  Overtly abrasive attitude and widespread
> 
> In a general way I'll go along with this, too.  I've felt rebuffed at
> times when I'm asking what I believe to be a reasonable question.

Here we ago again... I've tried honey, I've tried pleading, I've
tried carrots... so this time I'll try the stick.  I doubt it'll
work, but I've tried everything else over the past two years.

Besides, I'll be gone in a matter of days, so it really doesn't
matter if I piss off some people now.


The lilypond-user list will be whatever you, the USERS, want it to
be.  You want friendly, bend-over-backwards polite explanations of
material that's covered in the tutorial?  Fine -- SO DO IT.  You
want to explain to the 10th person that lilypond doesn't have a
gui?  Fine -- SO DO IT.  You want to explain the material that we
spend dozens of hours writing in the docs?  Fine -- SO DO IT.

I wince whenever I see Trevor or Valentin write a long detailed
explanation of something.  It's such a waste.  "oh, but it gives
newbies a nice fuzzy feeling!  You're such a meanie, Graham!"  I'm
not saying that it's a waste to give people fuzzy feelings.

It's a waste because, 7 days from now, there will be precisely
half a dozen people who are updating the documentation.  There's
at least 50 people who can answer simple questions here.  To be
efficient, those six people should spend their time updating the
docs -- better docs help everybody in the future, whereas writing
a detailed and polite email only helps one or two people right
now.  (no, nobody will read the messages in the archives.  That's
pure wishful thinking)





So... you want to write polite, friendly emails?  THEN MAOING DO
IT.  I recognize the names of both "Nicholas Wastell" and "David
Bobroff", so you must have been around for at least a few months,
if not years, and have been asking non-stupid questions (because I
really don't remember stupid questions).  I bet that between the
two of you, you could handle at least half the questions on -user.

Will this mean that you'd have to spend an hour a day dealing with
stuff on -user?  Yes.  Every single day, including Christmas,
birthdays, in the middle of exam periods, two days before your
thesis deadline, etc?  Yes.  Welcome to my world.  So... do you
actually want to make -user a friendlier place, or are you just
whining about the *volunteer service* you get (or don't get)?

Mao, you could even turn it into a game.  Keep track of how many
questions you answer, and Valentin could give out prizes in his
Lilypond Reports.  Fame, gratitude, and... well, maybe cute little
gif animations; I don't know what he might come up with... await
you!  Throw off your shackles, fellow workers!  You have nothing
to lose but a lot of time and energy!


Meh, who am I kidding?  80% of the questions will continue to be
answered by the same 7 people; 6 of whom will be taking valuable
time away from doc-writing in order to do so.  The inefficiency of
it really bugs me, but I'm not going to be around to be bothered
by it.  And who really cares how busy the programmers and doc
writers are?  I mean, that's the whole point of open source,
right?  The users get free software, documentation, and email
support.

As I said, I've tried polite recruitment.  Take a look at the email
archives; probably about six, twelve, and eighteen months ago.  It
seems to have worked for doc writers, but it hasn't worked for finding
(and keeping) -user support people.

I know that at least two people are going to be offended by this email,
but I don't care -- if it results in just ONE person "taking ownership"
of being a polite -user email responder and making an honest effort at
replying to everything they can -- just **ONE** person who isn't already
part of GDP -- then I'll accept any amount of hard feelings the rest of
you throw my way.

- Graham Percival