I recall a time, not long ago, when the O'Reilly-Net sites: OnLAMP.com, Perl.com, LinuxDevCenter.com, etc. used to carry weekly or close-to-weekly in-depth articles about various IT-related subjects, that tended to be high-quality and provided a lot of good information. But lately, it seems there were only a few blog posts on OnLAMP.com about open-source in Windows and other such relatively low-interest or low-quality topics (and practically nothing on Perl.com or LinuxDevCenter) and no new articles. The latest article on OnLAMP.com is from 20-May this year (over two months ago) and there were huge gaps between the latest articles there.
Now, I recently sent a suggestion for an article, with an outline, to the Perl.com editor (chromatic) and to the OnLAMP.com editor (James Turner), and received no reply. I sent it again, and again received no reply. I sent the second message on 9-July. Now, even if they didn't like the outline, then the right thing to do would be to promptly reply saying that they're not interested in it and that I should seek other venues of publication. I'm pretty sure that at least chromatic is alive and has some spare time, because I've seen him active on use.perl.org and on @perl.org mailing lists.
I submitted some articles to O'ReillyNet in the past and encountered a few delays in response, which I suppose is expected, but such a long delay is no longer acceptable. My guess is that I'm not the only one who sent such suggestions to O'Reilly-Net and received no response.
If the O'Reilly-Net sites would like to keep their edge, they should make sure they don't turn into another one of the dime-a-dozen blog sites, and instead start offering high-quality articles and essays again. But this will require a better responsiveness on the part of the editors. Would chromatic and/or Mr. Turner care to comment about that?
Would chromatic and/or Mr. Turner care to comment about that?
On a random website I just happened to read during non-work hours, on behalf of someone who apparently hasn't read Perl.com today? No, thank you.
Re:That'd be a No
Shlomi Fish on 2008-07-26T17:30:24
Hi! Thanks for your reply.
Hmmm.... interesting: It seems that this Perl.com feed, which I was using to keep track of what's new in Perl.com hasn't been updated in a while, despite several new additions to the site. Please fix it (I'll also email the webmaster.)
As for reading Perl.com - I expect such sites as Perl.com to announce their new features in their web feeds, and have no time or patience to visit half-a-gazillion sites everday to see what's new. That's what RSS/Atom are for. Obviously, the Perl.com RSS (and possibly the LinuxDevCenter.com one) went out-of-date which caused a communication problem. Also see what Jennifer Slegg said about it.
In any case, feel free to comment about my complaints in any medium you wish. I wrote it here as a last resort. And I don't think it's any "random website", but that's a matter of taste.
Re:That'd be a No
chromatic on 2008-07-26T18:01:11
I wrote it here as a last resort. And I don't think it's any "random website", but that's a matter of taste.
I have no time or patience to visit half-a-gazillion sites every day in the remote possibility that I might stumble across feedback from people who know how to send a message to the webmaster at perl dot com. Complaining in public is hardly a last resort when you didn't even try to ask anyone in private.
I'm sure you feel perfectly justified in your own mind about the efficacy of complaining in public before you attempt to talk to the people involved, but this behavior makes me not want to work with you ever again. It is not helpful.
I'm sure you believe you have many helpful suggestions for how I can do my job much more efficiently or effectively, but honestly, you know very little about what I do, the resources I have, the constraints I manage, my schedule, or the schedule of the other editors with whom I work, so it is neither useful nor helpful. Perhaps if you asked and then thought about the answer before you made demands you'd get better results -- but I've spent long enough typing this, on my weekend, after a very busy work schedule, and it's very much not a worthwhile use of my time to try to explain all of this to you.
Re:That'd be a No
rjbs on 2008-07-27T17:21:07
Complaining in public is hardly a last resort when you didn't even try to ask anyone in private.
No kidding. I, too, got "called out" this week on a public list, for no clear reason. It carries the same rude stink of sending an email to a coworker that says, "Have you finished that thing we talked about yet?" and carbon copying the CEO.
Re:That'd be a No
Shlomi Fish on 2008-07-28T15:06:41
Hey, if I had received replies to the two emails I sent (over a month ago), I would not have posted it here. But I didn't. I figured out an email to the webmaster would similarly be lost in confusion, if not even more so.
I admit I don't know your job constraints, but if you've listened to the Perlcast interview with Tom Limoncelli about his "Time Management for Sys Admins" book (published by O'Reilly, who is your employer and the parent company of the O'ReillyNet sites), or read the transcription which I spent several hours of my time transcribing - then you'd know that when people send you an email, and you're too busy to deal with it on the spot, it is a good idea to send them an email saying "I've got your email, I registered it and and I'll return to you soon.". But I didn't even get that.
So what could I do? E-mail does not seem to work with the O'Reilly-Net editors in regards to these matters. At least you've replied to this blog and acknowledged and registered it.
I apologise that I had to make this complaint public, but it seemed to me that I did not have any otherwise choice. I don't know why you didn't promptly reply to my emails with the article suggestions, but it was irresponsible on your part. You reap what you saw.
I now sent an email to the perl.com webmaster, about the broken RSS feed, during the weekend, and hope it will be fixed.
Re:That'd be a No
chromatic on 2008-07-28T16:20:22
I apologise that I had to make this complaint public, but it seemed to me that I did not have any otherwise choice. I don't know why you didn't promptly reply to my emails with the article suggestions, but it was irresponsible on your part. You reap what you saw.
Shlomi, this attitude is why you get banned from so many Perl communities. You don't read or listen (or perhaps you don't comprehend), and you come across as a stubborn, arrogant twit who loves to lecture people about how very simple the world would be if everyone did exactly what you say.
Approximately zero people in the world want to hear that, even if you're right (and again, you know precious little about my work and my constraints, so the likelihood of you being right is very small).
You're a smart guy, and you do some good work, but it is very difficult and draining to deal with you and your complaints and lectures and demands and justifications and oversimplifications. I don't want to hear from you again, in public or private, until you fix your attitude. Can you understand that?
Re:That'd be a No
Shlomi Fish on 2008-08-01T19:50:18
Hi chromatic!
Thanks for your comment. See below for my response.
Shlomi, this attitude is why you get banned from so many Perl communities
You are right that I tend to get banned a lot. However, I'm not sure about the exact reasons why I am, or if they are what you describe. Can you please elaborate and exemplify these problems?
You don't read or listen (or perhaps you don't comprehend), and you come across as a stubborn, arrogant twit who loves to lecture people about how very simple the world would be if everyone did exactly what you say.
You are right in the sense that I may like to tell people how to improve. Do you mean the "the Mountain will come to Muhammad" fallacy?
Approximately zero people in the world want to hear that, even if you're right (and again, you know precious little about my work and my constraints, so the likelihood of you being right is very small).
Right.
You're a smart guy, and you do some good work, but it is very difficult and draining to deal with you and your complaints and lectures and demands and justifications and oversimplifications.
Thanks for the compliment regarding me being a smart guy who does some good work. As for the reasons for me being "difficult and draining" - I'm not sure I got to the bottom of what you meant. Anything more specific you can say would be appreciated.
I don't want to hear from you again, in public or private, until you fix your attitude. Can you understand that?
Well, fixing my attitude will take some time and effort. I have my share of psychological deficiencies (including a mental illness), and improving myself takes time. I cannot stop working on FOSS and articles until all my problems are gone, partly because I need the practice. I can try to stop complaining and preaching from now on, but like I said - these things take time.
Do you have any concrete advice for Do's and Don't?
Re:That'd be a No
petdance on 2008-08-01T20:25:16
You are right in the sense that I may like to tell people how to improve.
Since you asked about how you can improve, I'll point out that what you describe is called "unsolicited advice," and it's rude. Here's a fabulous few paragraphs from Judith Martin on the topic (also at http://xoa.petdance.com/Unsolicited_advice)
It is rude to call people's attention to their shortcomings, no matter how much you have their welfare at heart. It is rude to assume that anyone other than minors in your custody is less capable than you are of making minor and major decisions about how to live. No, it doesn't count if you prepare the way by attempting to convince people who don't realize it just how badly in need of help they are. In the etiquette lexicon, the statements necessary to break down a person's self-satisfaction to the point where he admits that he was in worse shape than he had fondly imagined are still called "insults."
There have been times you've IMed me and immediately corrected me on how I responded to you. How do you suspect that affects my desire to talk to you?
Now consider that in the large, where you presume to correct people, in public, who don't do what you want. What do you suppose the effect will be?
If there's anything I'd like to suggest, it would be asking yourself "What do I expect the result of this communication to be?" before making that communication. Not "what would I do if I got this email?" but rather "what do I expect the recipient to do with it?"
Re:That'd be a No
Aristotle on 2008-07-26T18:08:24
The feed is fine. The extra items that show up on the front page of Perl.com are weblog entries that are merely syndicated on Perl.com. They are not Perl.com articles – the last of those was, in fact, in May.
(FWIW, I think this is perfectly fine. Those weblogs get syndicated to a lot of O’Reilly Net sites, most of which I have subscribed; I wouldn’t want lots of posts to show up in four or five different feeds.)
Re:That'd be a No
chromatic on 2008-07-26T19:05:12
The feed is fine.
We're in the process of revising our feeds, and at some point in the near future, the Perl feed will include everything tagged as "perl". That requires some infrastructure changes, which won't happen overnight, which is why they haven't happened overnight.
Re:That'd be a No
Aristotle on 2008-07-26T21:26:17
Ack! I hope there’ll also be “just the articles, m’am” feeds for all the sites?
I really like the current setup, which has per-site feeds for articles and one feed for each and every weblog entry posted anywhere on them. Or at least that’s how it was until O’Reilly News showed up, which has its own separate feed that I didn’t notice forever. I also dislike FeedBurner, but that’s my own bias.
(Maybe there should be a “stuff we’re doing on O’Reilly Net” feed that includes postings whenever sites or feeds get added, when new features appear, and the like. That way I wouldn’t have to stumble into changes accidentally and belatedly.)
Re:That'd be a No
chromatic on 2008-07-26T23:33:35
It's unlikely we'll keep a distinction between articles and weblogs; our syndication feeds will reflect that. One big problem with the previous system was the static, editor-created list of topics -- it wasn't easy to publish new topics.
I like the idea of a "What's happening" type of feed, but it'll be a low priority until we can complete the migration to the new system.
