Re: Re: looking for Jugg--is this the right place?

Thanks, chris,

Actually, I'd love to see your long email.

Important topics benefit from the nuances that can be introduced in
longer posts. Short is sweet for routine transactions, but it seems
nowadays that a lot of people spend a whole lot of time sending short
messages that obviously are misunderstood by everyone (probably
including the sender!)

What's next. . .

The place I've been trying to move (in my own head) is a feeling for the
ideal LiteStep.

By that I mean that LiteStep will always have its weavings and loose
threads, new hot areas of interest and seasons of routine. But if I
could take a step back and look at the whole big picture, what would the
direction look like?

That is an important--probably *the* important outcome.

If we can describe that in a way that resonates with the people we want
to come play and that allows us to every now and again take a quick look
to make sure we aren't straying too far off course, we will avoid a
whole lot of argument, stepped-on-toes and wasted work.

There are many, many projects that benefit from the ambiguity--or even
equivocality--of an unstated core, but it is clear to me this LiteStep
community isn't one of these.

Most people I've heard from here have real lives that demand a bunch of
time and . . .presence. I'm not seeing a solid core of people who have
the luxury of an 8-hour work day that is so mind-numbing boring that
"playing in the heads" pretty much all day long is an option.

I get a much more focused feel. While there are some significant
differences, those seem more in the "application" phase than the "what
are we here for" phase. No one's talking about contests, or tables at
trade shows/cons, and there is a much stronger "I'll use stuff that
looks interesting to me, play with it a bit and incorporate it into my
workspace" than a "my LiteStep is hotter than yours!" ethos.

The next step would be to "test this out" a bit through the community.
Different people will do that different ways, I'm sure, but we will
benefit from a bit of road testing before we start making statements
that sound too authoritative about what LiteStep is and what it isn't.

What I'm hoping to see from this expanse of sitting around and talking
rather than doing it (and I do realize this is a frustrating
experience--I really do), is the confidence that this core of the
LiteStep community will have in what emerges. Enough of a confidence
that most anyone would be able to say "well, that's cool and I'm glad
you love it, but that's just not what LiteStep is about. . ."

If we move ahead too far before we get there, if we are always in the
"maybe we'll see something tomorrow that will change everything" mode,
there won't be an opportunity for anyone to "speak from the center" of
the community. This would allow for a great amount of diversity, sure.
But if we don't really know what LiteStep is down deep, it will never
amount to more than a plaything for a handful of devotees.

Please don't read any criticism of anyone into that. I'm only trying to
make a case for pushing one another a bit so we can see what emerges,
knowing it's the product of a community and not something one individual
(even one at a time) plops down on the table in front of everyone with a
"here it is, do with it what you want" over-the-shoulder comment as they
leave the room. LiteStep, I believe (based on what I have heard so far)
is considerably more humble than that. Not in the "lower quality" sense,
but in the "nothing is so perfect it can't be improved upon with a new
eye from a different perspective, or even some mutually respectful
collaboration.

Perhaps I'm looking for people to help locate us on a multi-dimensional
spectrum somewhere among and between a technology fair/convention, a LAN
party, greeting-and-orienting someone newly hired into your
technology-focused department, and an after-hours well lubricated bitch
session about just how crappy a particular piece of software that has
just been dropped on your group to somehow fix and make work (somehow)
really and truly is and how your collective genius and talent could
start creating something from the ground up that would take less time,
run smaller and faster, and do exactly what people wanted--but instead
it has to be a series of fixes, one-line-at-a-time band-aids on
carcinogenic code.

Now with these different points floating in a multi-dimensional space,
where should the LiteStep community be? That is, when we're at our best,
what will we most look like, and what will we least look
like--specifically from your (as in, each community member's) perspective?

The reason this is important for us, now:

LiteStep is a product with a lot of potential.

[Please re-realize that I'm not a programmer in any way or through any
stretch of the imagination; what I am saying about "us" and "the
LiteStep community" comes from what I've heard from various members of
our somewhat loose and "just floating for awhile" community. So when I
talk about LiteStep's potential, I'm basing that on the fact that some
folks who can do quality work find it worth sticking around for. I see
some great potential, as well, but that's a step or two removed from
making it work.]

LiteStep will only reach it's potential if there is an active community
standing full behind the product and not afraid to contribute, to
evaluate, to make suggestions in an "I'm on your side" way.

When LiteStep gets rolling as a fully moving, evolving, re-inventing
force again we will attract a lot of attention. This attention will come
from a variety of people, some of whom will fit well into our community
and some who really would be happier elsewhere. There will be a wide
range of "could we do this" and "let's do this" (which usually means,
"will you do this") contributions.

If the core LiteStep community knows where LiteStep's center is, then we
can act like a community to invite in and encourage to stay those who
seem most likely to fit comfortably within our community, and to
politely and helpfully redirect others elsewhere. I'm not thinking of
this as a bat with which we can smack testosterone-poisoned kids--but
rather more like suggesting that if a small group of folks really want
to do hackey-sack sorts of things with the ball, they would probably be
more at home in a pick-up soccer game than in a softball league.

I'm thinking here of a basic description of the center, rather than as
either a word-smithed "mission statement" (which will get debated,
argued, resolved over some dead bodies and then forgotten) or an
advertising slogan "hey, this is what we do best!"

So it doesn't have to be (probably shouldn't be) something written out
as a digital entity (this is what is, what is not this, is not), and
will most usefully be restated by everyone in the frameworks each loves
best. They don't all have to match, but they really do need to have
family resemblances.

If you go to a family reunion, you can often tell the "blood" family
members from the "joined" family members. It's not because cute cousin
Krissie looks like old Uncle Joe, nor is it because there is one person
who is the "perfect" representative of this bloodline. When you get them
all together, though, you can tell (mostly) who belongs together. There
is a constellation of factors. It's not just a set of
characteristics--more often it is more how those characteristics are put
together.

When we get down the road a bit with this step, Chris and Wendy and
Tobbe and many, many others will each have their own ways of visualizing
and of describing what LiteStep is and what it isn't. That's great--as
long as they all fit in the family trait pool.

Then we can start writing a bit of a "family biography", or at least
enough of one so that new people will see how all the bits work
together. And this will help keep us together at least enough that we
won't wake up some morning and discover that there isn't anything that
really is LiteStep, because there isn't anything that really isn't
LiteStep.

Does this make sense?

I guess the summary version:

With the things that people have already posted here in the last couple
months (or longer) what really and truly definitely *IS* LiteStep and
what is really and truly NOT?

How would you describe the territory in between? (The edges are often
the most important places)

It might be so anti-inclusive of me, but the hard fact is that if there
is nothing that is categorically NOT LiteStep, then there is nothing
that really and truly is LiteStep. At this juncture, we have a chance to
intentionally pick a few boundaries within which we will move ahead,
together, always reminding one another that this is an ongoing, living,
communal enterprise; what works today may be clumsy tomorrow. (I can't
believe I just saw a $109 cassette tape deck to fit in a 5.25" drive. I
really can not imagine. . .)

As always, you folks should feel no hesitation at all at telling me "um,
well, you missed it completely--we aren't sure what you were trying to
hit, but whatever it might of been doesn't make any sense to the rest of
us!" This is a community, and a community effort. Unless something
dramatically different occurs within the LiteStep development/sharing
ethos, LiteStep will rise or fall on the strength of the dynamic
community standing in front, behind, above and all around it.

That's what I'm trying to see. . .that everything that has, and that
will, shape the products/tools.

chris wrote:
> I had a long email all composed in response to this thread... then
> realized, it wasn't significant beyond me posing the following:
> 
> Roy, what do you need to take the next step in your propositions?
> 
> I'd love to see the community brought together under a common branding
> and focus.  At this point in time, I think it would be beneficial.  In
> the future, out of this, perhaps variety could once again thrive.
> 
> The LSDev team would love to have people join up who are also interested
> in this. From core hackers to theme developers to webmasters to
> motivational writers, and anyone else who is interested in improving
> LiteStep, and cares about its future.
> 
> So if you want to work with myself and Ilmcuts in the presentation and
> literature for communicating what LiteStep is, we'd be pretty happy to
> work with you (and anyone else).
> 
> Myself and ilmcuts site in #lsdev on irc.freenode.net most of the time.
> 
> chris (jugg)
> 
> 
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