I’ve been stewing on this all morning.

https://twitter.com/mairin/status/1094653366624501761?s=19

There’s two issues here.

The obvious one is, of course, that Máirín is a design powerhouse who does the work of 4 mortals, and this blowhard doesn’t know who she is. The disrespect here is stunning.

(For whatever it’s worth, I can’t find any mention of you on any of the Fedora mailing list archives. Are you sure *you* aren’t the no-name rando?)

But there’s – to me – the larger issue. Even if Máirín was a “no name”… even if she wasn’t brilliant and talented, this would STILL be incredibly inappropriate.

This kind of dismissal of new contributors is what leads to dead projects. Every project – every language, every nation, every company – is one generation from extinction. Failure to nurture the next generation is suicide by arrogance.

So the question here is, what do you even mean by “community” when you make statements like this? Do you mean that you want a comfy place for you and your 3 friends, or do you actually want to build something amazing that goes on after you are no longer involved? ‘Cause it sure sounds like you don’t have any clue about what it takes to foster a sustainable culture.

I’d also ask you, Thomas Alps, whoever you are, to cast your mind back to when you, too, were a “no-name rando”. If you had received this kind of hate at that moment, would you still be here?

Today’s no-name randos, as you so charmingly call them, are tomorrow’s core community. Or, more likely, not, if they receive this kind of welcome.