thanks graham. But you see I think that this all discussions killed my fun. I'm getting sick of Smalltalk. Sad isn't. And marcus probably too. I probably spent too much time pushing this community. Stef > Hi All > > Reading the thread, I just wanted to add my .02 worth. > > I have no problem in ESUG sponsoring Pharo Consortium, like it has sponsored many other worthwhile Smalltalk related projects. > The history of decisions taken by the board is comforting as it shows impartiality across dialects and initiatives. These facts speak more loudly than > principles and discussion. > The quantum of sponsorship mentioned is very reasonable in the light of other assistance given to much more focussed projects. > I believe that all dialects of Smalltalk have benefitted from the work on Pharo and its use as a platform to evolve products like Seaside, Magritte, Fuel and many others > which flow into the broader Smalltalk community. > > I would like to publicly thank all volunteers on the ESUG board and the Pharo group for their work and efforts which have made and are making major contributions. > Please don't be discouraged by the discussion on this thread. C++ has users, Java enthusiasts, and Smalltalk zealots! People are passionate and want to see good things - > lets harness the positive energy. > > At a technical level, I have had experience over 20 years of working in various Smalltalks and attempting projects in C++, Java, Java Script and various other languages. > Every time I come back to the comfort zone that is Smalltalk. It is simply more "right", better and consistent than the other environments. I have looked at Python, Ruby, Coffee Script, > Objective C, Erlang.... etc. There is still nothing with the breadth of capabilities, purity, accessibility and openness (in the sense that an average developer can get at the internals and implementation of the language and libraries) of Smalltalk. Yes, it is old and there are some messy bits and frustrations. Alan Kay himself has said he is frustrated that there is not something better to replace Smalltalk. What I see in the Pharo space over the last two years gives me hope that this could be it. There is a critical mass of innovation and community activity that is generating a very dynamic, capable system and eco-system. I would hate to see the very good work of many towards this dissipated when we are close to realisation of a really great environment. We should give every encouragement to those pushing things forward. > > Go, Stef, Damien, Luc, Marcus, et al.... > > Best > Graham > > Damien Cassou wrote: >> On Thu, Jul 5, 2012 at 9:25 AM, Michael Haupt <mhaupt@gmail.com> >> wrote: >> >>> How long are terms? >>> >> >> as far as I know, we don't have such a thing: >> >> - the board has no minimum/maximum size >> - anybody willing to help seriously is invited to send an email to the >> board to offer his free time. Then we ask the community during the >> conference if they accept this new board member. >> - when somebody wants to quit to take back part of his free time, he >> just does so (as Noury recently did after years and years of handling >> ESUG's money, a job that requires a lot of effort and rigor). In this >> case we ask all board members who is willing to take some more work to >> replace the leaving member (and Luc accepted to do that, thank you >> Luc). >> >> You are right, we should improve our communication and probably have a >> dedicated web page, let me add that to my todo list :-). >> >> > <mcleod.vcf>_______________________________________________ > Esug-list mailing list > Esug-list@lists.esug.org > http://lists.esug.org/mailman/listinfo/esug-list_lists.esug.org

> > Personally I'd like to see GST, VW, GemStone ... "people" on the board > some time. Don't you think that we are not welcoming people from other dialects since years? When we started to move esug the board was large but nobody was doing much: there was ***NO*** promotion actions. So now people should show their real willingness to act. Stef > It would make ESUG's broad intentions more obvious. I'd > also love to be able to contribute more directly myself, which I can't > at this time. > > Best, > > Michael > > _______________________________________________ > Esug-list mailing list > Esug-list@lists.esug.org > http://lists.esug.org/mailman/listinfo/esug-list_lists.esug.org

>> If there's a conflict, can someone tell me, what will be direct >> personal benefit(s) for ESUG board members if they will decide to >> sponsor Pharo? > > Because we are quite "opiniated" community it is clear what is a > personal benefit in that case :) Money is not the only thing someone can > benefit from… are you serious? Do you know that in the board nearly none of us earn one euros based on Smalltalk work? > What counts is how evenly ESUG is spreading its sponsorship around > Smalltalk projects. Because if ESUG sponsor Pharo, it can and it is > already sponsoring others too. So, is there one who asked for ESUG > sponsorship and was denied? No but even the board has the right to not accept a sponsoring. > > Let me ask directly (I'm a direct man, as those who know me, know very > well :) Is Squeak community asked for ESUG sponsorship recently? No. Then can I ask you a question? Who managed the money of the squeak foundation during 4 years? ESUG but probably people forgot. What is the point you want to make? > > Best regards > Janko > > > -- > Janko Mivšek > Aida/Web > Smalltalk Web Application Server > http://www.aidaweb.si > > _______________________________________________ > Esug-list mailing list > Esug-list@lists.esug.org > http://lists.esug.org/mailman/listinfo/esug-list_lists.esug.org

> Hi guys, > > One concrete proposal: let the ESUG board write a short report after > every meeting and decision like sponsoring some project. Like Squeak > board is doing regularly: http://squeakboard.wordpress.com/. we do not work with regular meetings talking. We take decision voting over emails. And frnakly I do not have the time to write report. I'm not payed for that. And the results of our decisions are presented at each ESUG. Take the ESUG presentation of each last years and you will see the summary of our actions. > I'm pretty sure with such simple act most of suspicions expressed in > this thread will vanish immediately. Don't worry I do not think that I will stay in the board because I'm fed up with such kind of emails. > > Best regards > Janko > > > > > > On 05. 07. 2012 09:42, Marten Feldtmann wrote: >> Stephane, >> >> I see here more and more over-reactions and I quite do not understand >> these reactions. >> >> I can not believe, that posters here do not like the success of ESUG or >> behave jealous in some way. >> >> But ideas/contributions like the ones Paolo (and others) posted here are >> still valid and I am more than surprised, that people are angry about it. >> >> But you answered many questions and that is ok - and I've seen NO >> posting here so far saying, that the ESUG members are doing their job >> badly. ESUG has been done quite a good job in the past promoting >> Smalltalk in various ways. >> >> Marten >> >> _______________________________________________ >> Esug-list mailing list >> Esug-list@lists.esug.org >> http://lists.esug.org/mailman/listinfo/esug-list_lists.esug.org >> > > -- > Janko Mivšek > Aida/Web > Smalltalk Web Application Server > http://www.aidaweb.si > > _______________________________________________ > Esug-list mailing list > Esug-list@lists.esug.org > http://lists.esug.org/mailman/listinfo/esug-list_lists.esug.org

On Jul 5, 2012, at 2:24 PM, Igor Stasenko wrote: > On 5 July 2012 11:42, Steven Kelly <stevek@metacase.com> wrote: >> I think there's a misunderstanding about what "conflict of interest" means. It doesn't mean that person is bad. It doesn't mean they are abusing their power. It doesn't mean they would get money through it. All it means is that they have an interest in the matter at hand, in addition to their role on the board. >> >> In academic circles, often you can't review a paper if you have been a co-author with one of its authors in the last N years. That's a similar kind of thing - nobody's saying that because of that, you'd accept the paper, or would be incapable of being objective, or the paper's authors would pay you(!). It's just agreed that it's better if you don't review it. >> > > You miss an important detail: an academic circles is a competitive > environment, and that's why it is completely reasonable to have such > rules and watch for potential conflict(s) , because most of those > rules were developed by taking competition in mind. > > ESUG, in contrast, does not operates in competitive environment, and > based solely on the good will and enthusiasm of the people. > So i actually wondering why we blindly applying the principles from > competitive environment to something which is not? :) Thanks igor you are so refreshing…. >> One of the reasons why people with "conflicts of interest" don't get to vote or take part in the discussion, is that people with an extra interest are likely to get annoyed with the discussion. That's bad for the community - those people may be demotivated, and the rest may feel less trust in their board. >> > > Every decision made will divide people on those who fine with it and > those who not.. You cannot make everyone happy. This is fact of > reality :) > The only way how to not make new enemies is to not do anything.. Yes this is what we should have probably do over the years. >> In any case, as far as I understand it, the ESUG board makes decisions about sponsorship - not the ESUG membership. They've heard our opinions, both for and against, and they can go ahead and make their decision. I for one will support them, whatever they decide. Not because as individuals they've done so much for Smalltalk, for so little reward, but because they're smart people who we've trusted to make ESUG decisions on our behalf. >> >> All the best, >> Steve >> >>> -----Original Message----- >>> From: Igor Stasenko [mailto:siguctua@gmail.com] >>> Sent: 5. heinäkuuta 2012 12:22 >>> To: Steven Kelly; ESUG Mailing list >>> Subject: Re: [Esug-list] ESUG considers sponsoring the Pharo Consortium >>> >>> On 5 July 2012 10:35, Steven Kelly <stevek@metacase.com> wrote: >>>> Since I didn't really see an answer to Michael Haupt's question, >>> about what is the main Smalltalk dialect of the board members, I did a >>> quick Google on their home pages, looking there or on CVs for which >>> Smalltalk is mentioned. Obviously this is not an accurate method, and >>> I'd much rather the board members answered the question - please, >>> please don't get annoyed because Google says this, just tell us what >>> the real situation is. But for what little it's worth: >>>> >>>>> here are the members of the ESUG's board: >>>>> >>>>> President: Stéphane Ducasse <- Pharo >>>>> Treasurer: Luc Fabresse <- Pharo >>>>> Damien Cassou <- Pharo >>>>> Jordi Delgado <- Pharo >>>>> Marcus Denker <- Squeak, Pharo >>>>> Alain Plantec <- Pharo >>>>> Serge Stinckwich <- none on home page, adding various >>> Smalltalk names to the search terms shows several, with Pharo giving >>> most hits >>>> >>> >>> Just one little note: >>> AFAIK, none of the above people real job directly related to Pharo. >>> Nobody pays them for contributing to pharo not a penny. >>> I am hired for work on Pharo, so strictly speaking i would be the only >>> with conflict here, but i am not a member of board, >>> and obviously not the one who stays behind this.. I was not aware of >>> that, and actually was quite surprised to see such decision. >>> >>> As from the mission of ESUG - promote smalltalk, supporting Pharo is >>> consistent with that.. or i miss something? >>> >>> If there's a conflict, can someone tell me, what will be direct >>> personal benefit(s) for ESUG board members if they will decide to >>> sponsor Pharo? >>> They will get what? Another countless not paid hours in their life, >>> which they would rather spend with their family? >>> >>> >>> As a tangent, a first question what we should ask, IMO is: is there >>> other project/activities, which to our thinking will help better >>> promoting smalltalk >>> than sponsoring pharo? If there's one and it is clearly have higher >>> priority according to ESUG mission, then board's decision >>> should and must be argued. >>> But if there's none, do you think it would be better to just hold >>> money on bank account? Because then ESUG would fail with its mission.. >>> >>> I am of course unaware by what the board decision was directed to such >>> decision.. but in my opinion it cannot be directed by anything else >>> than: promoting smalltalk. >>> >>>> If that's the impression a casual web browse gives, then even if it >>> is totally and utterly incorrect, hopefully the board can understand >>> why it seems reasonable to members who don't know all the details to >>> mention potential conflicts of interest. >>>> >>>> So, what does it mean that if so many on the board have a Pharo link? >>> First, it's brilliant that these people are active in doing something >>> for a Smalltalk, as well as their great work in ESUG. Second, it's >>> brilliant that Pharo people are active in wider promotion of Smalltalk >>> in general. And third, it's going to be rather difficult to have a >>> sensible vote on the board, and discussions on the members email list >>> may be a little tense :). >>>> >>>> No worries from me, though. I think it's great what ESUG are doing, >>> and great what Pharo is doing. Personally I'd rather not have ESUG >>> sponsor Pharo, but that's just one person's opinion, and hopefully >>> nobody gets upset about it. >>>> >>>> Go Smalltalk! >>>> Steve >>>> >>>> _______________________________________________ >>>> Esug-list mailing list >>>> Esug-list@lists.esug.org >>>> http://lists.esug.org/mailman/listinfo/esug-list_lists.esug.org >>> >>> >>> >>> -- >>> Best regards, >>> Igor Stasenko. > > > > -- > Best regards, > Igor Stasenko. > > _______________________________________________ > Esug-list mailing list > Esug-list@lists.esug.org > http://lists.esug.org/mailman/listinfo/esug-list_lists.esug.org

>> >> >> I hardly see how supporting Pharo can be seen as unfair. Improving Pharo will help the whole Smalltalk community. It looks like clear to me. > > Here is how it is unfair: If I understand the basic process of selecting and supporting projects by ESUG, then the distribution of projects supported by ESUG is roughly equivalent to the popularity of the various communities. This seems entirely fair and reasonable to me, and ESUG is doing a good job with the various projects it supports. > > However, once ESUG starts giving chunks of money to particular dialects directly, then first of all that money is no longer spent across the various dialects. So for an approx. 3000 EUR Pharo membership the board could sponsor 20 students with 150 EUR each. And while it may be that 15 of those are indeed Pharo related, there is still sponsorshop done for the remaining 5 which would fall under the table if the money went directly to Pharo. That's seems obviously unfair. what argument! you could find better. We sponsored students from HPI do attend the talks of eliot, we payed eliot trips and we did not asked them if they were using Squeak or Pharo. > Secondly, the membership in Pharo is perpetual; if some other project raises in popularity there will *still* 100% of the money be going to Pharo. For eternity. That's just as unfair. ESUG can decide to stop anytime. So your augment is just for the sake of argumenting. Well done. But not recevable. > There is nothing wrong with sponsoring Pharo projects by ESUG. What's wrong is giving the money, which would otherwise be spent in some relation to the popularity of each dialect, to one dialect only. Fun you never complained when Squeake.v. promoting etoy was sponsored, nor when most of the summer talk projects were done in Squeak. You did not complained when ESUG payed John mcIntosh to clean the mac squeak vm. Of course it was helping pharo too. For ESUG it was pushing the Smalltalk community. Stef

sorry andreas but apparently you do not know what is to take the risk to organize a conference and get broken Now it happens with ESUG certain years and >> I would agree with you if ESUG was spending 100% of the money it has. I don't. Because it would kill ESUG. >> Sponsoring Pharo won't affect other potential sponsoring (unless we >> get 5 times more sponsoring requests than last year in which case we >> might not positively answer to all of them). I invite all >> representatives of other dialects to send the board sponsoring >> requests. But we can't wait for all dialects to ask for money before >> spending part of it. > > Which is fine. And perhaps there is a really simple answer then: First, sponsor all the projects that apply to ESUG. If, at the end of year, there is money left, donate it based on the relative distribution of projects over the year. No we did not work like that and we will not work like that. People send their requests and we evaluate the impact for the community. > So for example: > > ESUG budget: 15k > Projects: > 5 Pharo projects x 1k = 5k > 2 Squeak projects x 1k = 2k > 1 GST project x 2k = 2k > 2 high profile papers x 500 = 1k > > > Squeak e.V. is not about developing Squeak as such you can't compare it membership in the Pharo consortium (it would be more like sponsoring a book or so which ESUG certainly does). As for the Squeak VM, first of all I have no clue who got sponsored by ESUG. Probably John Macintosh because I know neither me, nor Ian, nor Eliot, nor David, nor Dan, nor John ever got any support from ESUG. It was officially announced by john > Secondly, (and I'm guessing here since I really don't know who got sponsored for what) I would think that the scope was probably rather specific, i.e., support for this or that Mac feature or somesuch, rather than "oh, just do some Squeak VM development we don't care what it is" which is the style of support for the Pharo consortium. I think sponsoring specific projects is good, it's handing out money without specific goals and targets that I don't like. I will not continue this nice discussion because you like too much to twist our arms. Bye Stef > > Cheers, > - Andreas > > _______________________________________________ > Esug-list mailing list > Esug-list@lists.esug.org > http://lists.esug.org/mailman/listinfo/esug-list_lists.esug.org

Steven I would be really curious to see if cincom wants this kind of press and marketing. It would be really funny. VisualWorks the Smalltalk flagship sponsored by a free association to develop better product. I'm not sure that it will make laugh a lot of people but at least I would laugh a lot. Stef On Jul 5, 2012, at 5:30 PM, Steven Kelly wrote: > Maarten Mostert wrote: >>> And except from the difficulty of who to give the money >>> to in the case of VW, >> >> The case for VW is easy you should give it in person to Holger >> Kleinsorgen for having written the Windows 7 Look and feel !! > > Great idea! > > I hadn't been aware of the 100-150€ that ESUG gives out for each research paper or article published on Smalltalk, or about a product made with Smalltalk (http://esug.org/wiki/pier/Promotion, YourArticle, YourPublication). Another category in a similar vein might be YourCode, for things like Holger's Windows 7 Look and Feel. That would be different from YourProject, where you apply for the money beforehand, and different from the Innovation Technology Awards, in that YourCode would be for things that are useful to a large number of Smalltalkers - a framework or similar rather than a complete product. > > Cheers, > Steve > _______________________________________________ > Esug-list mailing list > Esug-list@lists.esug.org > http://lists.esug.org/mailman/listinfo/esug-list_lists.esug.org

http://www.esug.org/wiki/pier/Promotion/PastActions

I propose that we/you talk at ESUG about this point. BTW here are the old list of actions done by ESUG. http://www.esug.org/wiki/pier/Promotion/PastActions We should refresh it because we have done much more since then. Like lectures in the temple of the type systems: university of Turino ;D - it was fun. Stef On Jul 4, 2012, at 5:01 PM, Damien Cassou wrote: > The ESUG board currently considers sponsoring the Pharo Consortium > (see http://lists.gforge.inria.fr/pipermail/pharo-project/2012-June/066881.html). > We believe that Pharo is important for the Smalltalk ecosystem. > > Note that ESUG is promoting Smalltalk in general and this action is in > the same vein as previous actions such as sponsoring local Smalltalk > groups (FAST, Catalan, Russian, …), Smalltalk dialects > (SqueakFoundation, etoy), development projects (Mars, DBXTalk, DrGeo > II, SqueakVirtual Machine cleaning), and books (Seaside and GNU book). > > Before deciding, the board would like to gather feedback from the > community. We want to be clear that there is a strict distinction > between ESUG and Pharo (both consortium and association) even if some > people are involved in both. > > What do you think? > > -- > Damien Cassou > http://damiencassou.seasidehosting.st > > "Lambdas are relegated to relative obscurity until Java makes them > popular by not having them." James Iry > > _______________________________________________ > Esug-list mailing list > Esug-list@lists.esug.org > http://lists.esug.org/mailman/listinfo/esug-list_lists.esug.org

BTW since people are reading this nice thread I would like to take the advantage to get the following message: ESUG would like to get some lectures done in Afrika. If you happened to know good university that would be interested we would like to sponsor a lecture. Stef