General policy on polls and democracy in FreeOrion
Posted: Sat Dec 04, 2004 8:56 pm
Hi,
This is more for the benefit of new people, since those of you who have been here for a while know this. It hasn't been a problem, particularly, but we don't really come out and say it anywhere so I thought I would post here rather than having to explain it in every thread where this happens.
So:
FreeOrion is an open source, community-driven project. It is not a democracy or a plutocracy. While we make every effort to reach a consensus on just about every major issue (at least in the design team), 'officially' speaking, FreeOrion is run by a group of benevolent dictators who realize that, without the support of lots of other people, they will have to do all the work themselves, and so we bend over backwards to accommodate the public more often than not.
Consequently, there is really no point to creating polls to gauge public support for an idea. Even in the instances where we are looking for community consensus, we are going to read the entire thread and weigh arguments. We never count heads. The fact that you voted on something doesn't mean you were at all involved in the discussion or even in FO. It just means some user pressed the submit button.
Furthermore, even if you had a hundred friends, all of whom at PhDs in Computer Game Design with special foci in Games Like Master of Orion, and you got them all to sign a petition saying that some feature we passed really sucks, it doesn't make a difference. We value input from people who are dedicated to the project and who show their dedication by taking part in the official (and often messy) discussions. This is not to say that we are so rules-bound that we will never revisit something once we've passed it. But you should not expect to alter the course of any of the FreeOrion development teams through application of a Forum Poll. If you really think we've screwed up, and you can argue your case without regurgitating the contents of the official discussion on the subject (translation: you really have something new that we didn't consider the first time), then by all means, email myself and Tyreth (or one of the other leads, if it's for the graphics team or the programming team or the music/FX team).
Just don't, for the love of Spathi, make a poll.
If this sounds heavy-handed to you, try and appreciate that we are always doing a balancing act between remaining a very public project that welcomes outside participation and actually getting things done. These two are not always antithetical, but at least for the design team, I think 'design by committee' generally carries a negative conotation for good reason. We do, in fact, do quite a lot of our design by committee, but as those of you who have been with us from the beginning know, when the time comes to make a call, we don't hesitate. From my perspective, my job is to do my part to see FreeOrion through to v1.0, because when that happens, a lot of the things people complain about (there should be no starlanes, there should be sliders, whatever) can be addressed via handy plug-in modules that seem a bit far-fetched for our currently limited resources, but will be much less of a pipe dream by the time we reach v1.0. Think about it: a completed MOO-esque project, open to the Internet and all of the modding capabilities of people like us with too much time on their hands.
I think there's a lot to be said for choosing different paths than the ones we've chosen for FO, whether it be for starlanes, the tech tree, the story, or anything else. But as we can't accomodate everyone and we do have to make these choices, please respect that we do agonize over each and every one of them (see the design archive if you don't believe me). I hate having to email somebody and say 'nice idea but no' because I don't want to be the bad guy, but ... okay, who am I kidding, I love being the bad guy. MuahAHaHAAHAHahAh....
-Aq
This is more for the benefit of new people, since those of you who have been here for a while know this. It hasn't been a problem, particularly, but we don't really come out and say it anywhere so I thought I would post here rather than having to explain it in every thread where this happens.
So:
FreeOrion is an open source, community-driven project. It is not a democracy or a plutocracy. While we make every effort to reach a consensus on just about every major issue (at least in the design team), 'officially' speaking, FreeOrion is run by a group of benevolent dictators who realize that, without the support of lots of other people, they will have to do all the work themselves, and so we bend over backwards to accommodate the public more often than not.
Consequently, there is really no point to creating polls to gauge public support for an idea. Even in the instances where we are looking for community consensus, we are going to read the entire thread and weigh arguments. We never count heads. The fact that you voted on something doesn't mean you were at all involved in the discussion or even in FO. It just means some user pressed the submit button.
Furthermore, even if you had a hundred friends, all of whom at PhDs in Computer Game Design with special foci in Games Like Master of Orion, and you got them all to sign a petition saying that some feature we passed really sucks, it doesn't make a difference. We value input from people who are dedicated to the project and who show their dedication by taking part in the official (and often messy) discussions. This is not to say that we are so rules-bound that we will never revisit something once we've passed it. But you should not expect to alter the course of any of the FreeOrion development teams through application of a Forum Poll. If you really think we've screwed up, and you can argue your case without regurgitating the contents of the official discussion on the subject (translation: you really have something new that we didn't consider the first time), then by all means, email myself and Tyreth (or one of the other leads, if it's for the graphics team or the programming team or the music/FX team).
Just don't, for the love of Spathi, make a poll.
If this sounds heavy-handed to you, try and appreciate that we are always doing a balancing act between remaining a very public project that welcomes outside participation and actually getting things done. These two are not always antithetical, but at least for the design team, I think 'design by committee' generally carries a negative conotation for good reason. We do, in fact, do quite a lot of our design by committee, but as those of you who have been with us from the beginning know, when the time comes to make a call, we don't hesitate. From my perspective, my job is to do my part to see FreeOrion through to v1.0, because when that happens, a lot of the things people complain about (there should be no starlanes, there should be sliders, whatever) can be addressed via handy plug-in modules that seem a bit far-fetched for our currently limited resources, but will be much less of a pipe dream by the time we reach v1.0. Think about it: a completed MOO-esque project, open to the Internet and all of the modding capabilities of people like us with too much time on their hands.
I think there's a lot to be said for choosing different paths than the ones we've chosen for FO, whether it be for starlanes, the tech tree, the story, or anything else. But as we can't accomodate everyone and we do have to make these choices, please respect that we do agonize over each and every one of them (see the design archive if you don't believe me). I hate having to email somebody and say 'nice idea but no' because I don't want to be the bad guy, but ... okay, who am I kidding, I love being the bad guy. MuahAHaHAAHAHahAh....
-Aq