[Python-Dev] Python-dev signal-to-noise processing question (original) (raw)

Ben Finney ben+python at benfinney.id.au
Fri Jul 23 02:59:32 CEST 2010

Steven D'Aprano <steve at pearwood.info> writes:

We don't need to make excuses for why we don't give the answer here. It's enough to give the reason -- it's off-topic for this list, which is about the development of Python. That and a pointer to the right list is, in my opinion, all we need to say. We don't need to sugar coat it -- we're all adults here.

That's fine for people who already feel they are part of this particular community. The concern, as I understand it from earlier in the thread, is the regular only-one-opportunity-at-a-first-impression response given to someone new to this community, who clearly doesn't yet know the mores and expectations.

In that case, it's not enough to say “we're all adults”, because we're also all human: the perceived tone of a first response we receive will strongly influence our impression of the wider community, despite any appeals one might make to the irrationality of that reaction. Asking about how Python works is a likely first step to becoming a valuable contributor later on (even if most such steps never go beyond the first), and a poor impression will surely kill most of that potential.

So I do think it's worth this discussion about how to achieve the conflicting goals already mentioned — efficient communication and welcome to newcomers — and that “we don't need to sugar coat it” is incorrect for this purpose.

-- \ “Working out the social politics of who you can trust and why | `\ is, quite literally, what a very large part of our brain has | o_) evolved to do.” —Douglas Adams | Ben Finney

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