My take on the Mark Shuttleworth LinuxCon keynote controversy

There's been a virtual storm brewing about Canonical/Ubuntu founder Mark Shuttleworth's LinuxCon keynote speech (video available) and whether his remarks were sexist and/or belittling to women. I did make a couple of comments in one of the LXer threads, and I'll repeat them here just to let my 10 or so readers know where I stand:

First comment (before I watched the video):

Scott Ruecker (LXer editor in chief) wrote: So my question is, is there anything positive that can be taken from these threads? And my challenge to all of you is, is there something worth keeping? There needs to be a real dialogue begun on this and I am not sure if this is it or not.

Scott, I think the thread should remain. This is an important topic.

There are without doubt many instances of sexism, racism and other derogatory actions in many parts of the tech world, not just FOSS.

But in the FOSS world, we expect things to be better, more enlightened and more inclusive. And they should be.

Yes, this is about attitude and perception. But it's also about hero worship, putting FOSS "rock stars" on a pedestal and thinking they can do no wrong, especially since what they're supposed to be doing -- coding and supporting and promoting free, open-source software and liberating the world from dependence on a few companies and those companies' expensive, closed and proprietary offerings -- is so important to this community and its members.

I guess I'll have to watch this Shuttleworth keynote, at which time I'll probably have more to say, but from the tenor of the discussion above, I'll just say that if people are offended by what a particular person says, attention must be paid.

Just because the speaker doesn't think he's out of line doesn't mean said speaker and the community around him shouldn't listen to and acknowledge the thoughts, feelings and perceptions of others.

If Shuttleworth is belittling woman with his words, tone or context, or is perceived as such, he should clarify his remarks and issue an apology to those offended by those words.

But the fact that he's Mark Shuttleworth, space traveler and richest man in FOSS, creator of the one distro to unite them all, is buying him a whole lot of defenders when, as I say here, he should be addressing this all too large elephant in the room.

From what I see, and I could be way off the mark, one of the problems with the FOSS community is that it's extremely developer-centric. Yeah, there are those of us who don't code, who do everything from work on documentation, create and maintain packages (and Ubuntu is very big on packaging, which is still development, though not C and C++ hacking), to helping users who have questions and problems in forums, blogs and elsewhere, and work on the all-important but often ignored marketing and promotion of FOSS solutions.

But it's still all about developers, most male by a very long, long shot. Not that there aren't female developers involved in FOSS, because there are, and there should be more.

I'll talk about a project I know: OpenBSD. It's extremely developer-centric, and those who get involved in the community and are not developers pretty much know that they're along for the ride and won't have much say in anything. That's the way the project works, and nobody involved in it is trying to hide anything. The attitude is that if you don't like it, you're free to go elsewhere. And yes, everything Theo says is pretty much gospel and is taken as such.

But in Linux in general and Ubuntu in particular, inclusion and promotion are key to c continued growth and adoption of the project.

FOSS is very comfortable in the international arena. Just about all of the "big" projects have a community all around the world, in dozens of countries.

And as a potentially inclusive force, FOSS should be reaching out and encouraging everybody to participate. And there should be major initiatives to bring in those who are under-represented in the FOSS world, and that includes women.

So even if Mark Shuttleworth thinks he said nothing wrong, for the good of Ubuntu and FOSS he needs to get out there and lay down his cards.

Here's the deal: While developers on all software might be overwhelmingly male, users of computers in general are not. Just about everybody uses a computer, and hence everybody can and should benefit from (and contribute to, if they can) free, open-source software.

And we need to be better than the rest. In all ways.

If FOSS were a true Shangri-La and absolutely nothing was wrong, this discussion wouldn't have hit the 100-post mark.

Mark Shuttleworth is clearly a leader in this game. Time to do that.

Second comment (after I watched the video):

OK people, I watched the speech.

I'm an American, and yes, in this country a group of people is often referred to as "guys," as in "you guys," when it includes both men and women.

And yes, he was going for the laugh at a conference with a lot of hard-core geeks, mostly men, with the "explaining to girls" comment/joke.

I think all of us who use FOSS know that it's not "girls" who don't know what Linux and other free software is all about. It's pretty much everybody -- men and women of all backgrounds, in all countries -- who haven't a clue about what we're doing.

He did say "people" instead of "guys" at one point, and he used "guy or girl" at another (albeit in a slightly negative context about "trampling on" one's project).

And in the speech it's always a grandma who needs her geeky grandchild to set up a PC for her that just works. Presumably all grandfathers know how to maintain their own Unix boxes.

I see an unfortunate choice of words here. A change in attitude and language would only help Shuttleworth further his cause.

Yeah, I get that he feels he has to win over a predominantly male group of developers, but there's the rest of us out there who aren't comfortable with this sort of thing.

And the way he says design and usability are so important (and I wholeheartedly agree), he should also acknowledge that perception in the overall community -- as well as outside the community to potential users and participants -- is equally important, especially on a project with the ambitions and resources of Ubuntu.

I've seen Canonical's Jono Bacon speak a few times, and there's nothing belittling or derogatory in what he's said.

And since I've been looking at the latest blog posts on this controversy, I've seen more than a few individuals and groups that are very supportive of women working on and with FOSS. We need more of that.

I haven't seen any reaction from Shuttleworth (his blog has been dead since April).

Saying "somebody's always offended" is no cover here, in my opinion.

As the face of what is probably the biggest Linux distribution at this time, the community deserves better from Shuttleworth.