Two rather interesting reads explaining "how it all went wrong":
The Iceland article is long, but like the Ireland article is worth reading to the end - one of the most memorable exchanges illustrating the naïveté that caused it all is on the seventh and last page.
Hi nicholas!
I've been subscribed the use.perl.org feed for a while now to follow up on all the interesting perl news. But one thing I don't like are political posts, especially those that you've posted recently, several in a row.
Now I respect you as a programmer and a large contributor to the Perl core and other Perl projects, but I still don't want to read such disturbing blog posts.
I suggest that you (and everybody else) refrain from posting political posts here. If you still wish to write them, then start a political blog (or a personal blog in general) somewhere. Otherwise I'll have to filter your posts from the use.perl.org feed, because I find them too disturbing.
Re:What's with all these political posts?
autarch on 2009-05-11T20:41:28
It's a blog, it's full of opinions. Deal with it.
Re:What's with all these political posts?
parv on 2009-05-12T07:16:06
Please do continue your postings, political, or otherwise. I read use.perl.org mainly for the non-Perl content.
Re:What's with all these political posts?
bart on 2009-05-12T08:26:32
To me, use.perl.org journals is "blogs by Perl people". It offers a window to their personality, turning a name into a human. I don't want an arbitrary restriction on what they want to talk about.
Re:What's with all these political posts?
nicholas on 2009-05-12T10:12:38
There will be only one blog. It will contain random thoughts that are currently on my mind, that are sufficiently interesting to be published, and sufficiently uninteresting so as to remain publishable. There is a reason why there's so little here about Perl or Perl related matters.
There are a lot of political entries just recently because it's on my mind. If you don't like my blog, you really won't like Guido Fawkes' blog. Whereas I'm finding it quite amusing.
For example, the most recent entry is:
Margaret Moran, Labour MP for Luton South, has announced she will pay back £22,500 claimed to treat dry rot in the house in Southampton (100 miles from her Luton constituency) that she shares with her partner as a result of “constituents’ anger at the current fees regime”. Constitutents anger with her more like.
and I find I agree with this one completely. (But no, I don't agree with a fair amount of what he writes, or sometimes with how he writes it). And I really like the Yes Minister inspired Guido’s guide to the lies you will be hearing.
Re:What's with all these political posts?
Shlomi Fish on 2009-05-13T11:16:19
You say you only want to have one blog where you'll post about everything, including political posts. In that case, let me tell you a story from my own experience.
I used to have only one blog - first at Advogato and then at LiveJournal. I posted everything I wanted there whether technical or non-technical. At one point I received some important input that said that this particular reader was not interested in my technical posts (like vim tips, Linux bugs, etc.), and would rather have them separated. I commented (later in the link) that I agreed, and so started a separate blog for technical matters. I also mention (in the previous link) the fact that a blog I used to read and enjoy deteriorated after its owner became a mother, and started posting exclusively about her motherhood experiences. As a result, I unsubscribed from that blog's feed.
The separation of blogs proved fruitful afterwards, because several planets have opted to syndicate only the technical blogs (or in the case of Perlsphere, only the Perl subset of them).
Moreover, when I discussed blogging with a certain famous blogger, he said that he reached the conclusion that specialisation of blogs was the key to success, and that people will only subscribe to blogs that concentrate on topics that interest them.
My point is that in blogging, you need to meet your readers' expectations. I am subscribed to the feed of all of use.perl.org's blog entries, because I'm interested in reading what Perl enthusiasts say. I don't mind the personal posts (or otherwise posts that are tangential to Perl) but I find political posts disturbing and annoying and would rather not read them.
So far your blog has received no special treatment as I read it along with all the rest of the posts. But if you don't guarantee that you're not going to post political posts here anymore, I will filter it out, and stop reading everything you have to say, including the Perl-related, and other non-political posts. So you'll lose me as a reader and possibly some other people who will opt not to read your blog.
It's your blog and you can post what you want to it, but I hope you understand that your subscribers may opt out of it, if they feel your blog no longer meets their expectations.
Re:What's with all these political posts?
nicholas on 2009-05-13T11:30:16
I hope you understand that your subscribers may opt out of it, if they feel your blog no longer meets their expectations.
It's a blog, dammit. It's there to meet the expectations of the author. In the case of this particular author, he's not doing it to maximise readership, or maximise feedback comments. So he's not overly concerned whether the second, first or zeroth derivative of the number of subscribers is positive, negative, real, complex, or even so wacko that it's only accurately measured using quaternions.
Re:What's with all these political posts?
drhyde on 2009-05-12T13:32:27
Ho ho ho. What's this, Shlomi complaining about stuff being "off topic"? Could this be the same Shlomi who thought it would be OK to post his crappy Star Trek fanfic to a perl mailing list?Re:What's with all these political posts?
nicholas on 2009-05-12T14:00:18
Ah yes. That message. With this reply from this well known phone spotter.
Re:What's with all these political posts?
Shlomi Fish on 2009-05-12T14:01:53
Hi drhyde!
First of all I should note that I never used the term "off topic" in my original post. So you're paraphrasing what I say, and not really accurately. I haven't complained about these political posts being "off-topic". I know some people post about various not-entirely-Perl-related matters to use.perl.org and I can tolerate most of these posts. But I find political posts disturbing and would prefer not to see them in the feed of posts from all the use.perl.org journals, that I wish to follow. My post was a warning to Nicholas, that I (and possibly others) did not like this, and that he should refrain from doing that in the future, if he doesn't want me (and possibly others) to explicitly filter his journal (which I'd prefer not to do). It would ultimately be his choice.
As for me posting my Star Trek fanfic to "a Perl mailing list", I should note that I didn't post it to just any Perl mailing list, but to London.pm where off-topic discussion is considered acceptable. I still haven't completely understood what kind of off-topic discussion is acceptable or not there (and even what kind of on-topic discussion is acceptable or not), but I no longer care too much since I'm not subscribed.
As a general rule, I have not posted off-topic messages to Perl (or otherwise technical) mailing lists, which have a policy against off-topic messages. At least not as thread starters. So this case of posting to London.pm is not indicative at all.
Even if I posted an off-topic message once, then you have made the "Pot Calling the Kettle Black" fallacy, which is a variant of the ad hominem fallacy.
So please stop trolling.
Re:What's with all these political posts?
chromatic on 2009-05-12T18:14:06
My post was a warning to Nicholas, that I (and possibly others) did not like this, and that he should refrain from doing that in the future, if he doesn't want me (and possibly others) to explicitly filter his journal (which I'd prefer not to do). It would ultimately be his choice.
It's possible to read this as a public passive-aggressive threat -- with or without the Hint of a Silent Majority fallacy. That never goes well, because approximately no one cares if you unsubscribe.
Re:What's with all these political posts?
Shlomi Fish on 2009-05-13T11:52:12
Well, it's not a threat - it's a warning, and he won't be harmed much by acting against my advice. A threat is something like "Stop posting political posts or I will burn your house, rape your wife and daughters, banish you to the middle of Antarctica, convert all your Perl code to PHP, and then post it on thedailywtf.com."
Regarding what you say that "no one cares if you unsubscribe", then this reminds me of what Fred Brooks says in The Mythical Man-Month: "How does a project gets late? One day at a time.". If you're not careful, you might lose a large percent of your blog's readership, one subscriber at a time.
Re:What's with all these political posts?
chromatic on 2009-05-13T15:23:24
Well, it's not a threat - it's a warning....
Getting all definitional is often the last refuge of someone who's already lost an argument, but a threat is a warning of intent which may affect future action. It's cause and effect. If Nicholas doesn't stop doing you don't like, you and a bunch of anonymous people who may or may not exist will stop reading him.
If you're not careful, you might lose a large percent of your blog's readership, one subscriber at a time.
I don't speak for Nicholas, but I'm happy to tell you that if people don't like what I write, they're more than welcome to exercise their right not to read what I write. I'm sure I could personally get more readers if I commented on US political pop culture, but I write about Perl -- which turns off a huge potential audience.
I can't bring myself to care, until navel-gazing metadiscussion starts, in which case I care enough to say "I don't care. Please stop suggesting that I should."
Re:What's with all these political posts?
davorg on 2009-05-12T14:20:02
It's useful to know how easy it is to get you to stop following a blog. Thanks for sharing that information.
Just for clarification, would you start filtering even more quickly if someone started posting about Middle Eastern politics?
Re:What's with all these political posts?
Shlomi Fish on 2009-05-13T11:42:01
It's good to know you think it's desirable that I won't follow your blog. Thanks for sharing that information.
;-) Re Middle Eastern politics: if someone starts blogging about Middle Eastern politics in their blog, which I have enjoyed so far, and I don't find these posts of merit, I will also warn them that I may consider to unsubscribe, and give them a chance to reconsider that. But mid-eastern politics is not going to get special treatment than that of any other politics in this regard.
disturbing?
moritz on 2009-05-12T14:53:25
Why do you find these posts disturbing?
It's a programmer thinking about real life. Yes, real life *is* disturbing, but you'd better be familiar with it now.
Re:disturbing?
Shlomi Fish on 2009-05-13T11:37:33
First of all, as a general rule, I don't find real life disturbing. Sometimes it is, but as a general rule, real life has been pretty good to me so far.
The reason I find them disturbing, is because I'm subscribed to the use.perl.org master-feed to read what people write about Perl. I also tolerate some tangential discussion that people post from time to time. However, I find such political posts (and such that are not of very good quality) disturbing because politics is, well, annoying and disturbing. As a corrolary, I can tell you that Freenode's #perl tolerates a lot of off-topic discussion, but has a strict policy against discussing most political stuff.
So I find these posts disturbing. Sorry, but that's how I am.
Re:disturbing?
nicholas on 2009-05-13T13:03:12
I'm subscribed to the use.perl.org master-feed to read what people write about Perl.
I've written about Perl on here‽ Never!
Oh gosh. That claim. It was all within the rules.
Er, I mean, I'll back immediately.
Vote for me!*
* The Spitting Image excerpt, I believe is
- Interviewer
- What do you say, Mr. Kinnock, to all those people who accuse you of blatant electioneering?
- Neil Kinnock
- Vote for me!
