Eclipse tells ex-community director to 'go away'

Mike Milinkovich

(Credit: Eclipse Foundation)

Open-source communities are founded on trust. It's therefore disappointing but not surprising, to see the Eclipse Foundation's executive director, Mike Milinkovich, rip into former Eclipse Foundation director of community Bjorn Freeman-Benson and tell him to take his "steady acid drip of negativity" and "go away."

Milinkovich, a steelie, hockey-playing executive, didn't mince words in a blog post:

Your former colleagues at the Eclipse Foundation have tolerated your public abuse quietly because we are professionals, and we honestly thought that you would tire of it. Apparently we were wrong. But the time has come to say it: You are a jerk. Please go away. You quit the Foundation, you have zero commits since April, and we tire of your sniping from afar.

Not the most diplomatic but better than a body check against the glass any day.

Given Freeman-Benson's constant carping on the foundation and his former colleagues, it's understandable that Milinkovich went on the offensive. In a variety of posts, including the one that prompted Milinkovich's post, Freeman-Benson has sought to undermine the Eclipse Foundation, which has successfully managed one of the industry's top open-source projects.

His criticism may have been fragmenting the trust that held together the Eclipse community.

Indeed, as Eclipse Foundation director of marketing Ian Skerrett told me, "There is a long history of troll-like blog post[ing] that built up to this point; yes, it is harsh, but it was hurting the community."

Call it tough love for the open-source set. Given the existence of poisonous individuals in many open-source communities, it may be "love" we see more often.

[NewsReader_]

Can't we all just get along?

[dennisheadley]

Freeman-Benson or Freeman-Mason?

[WDS2]

In a project I am involved with we have a guy like this. Everything anyone else does he rags on. Nothing is done the way he wants it and it's all crap yet he hasn't contributed in a long time.

[Jack K1]

And Man continues to evolve.

[jjjjoy]

Talk about an echo chamber. A post in which you report on what appears to be a food fight between ex colleagues. And then you take the high road by piling on to one side of the story.<br /><br />Slow news day over there Matt?

[bnfb]

It's "Bjorn Freeman-Benson" and many people can attest that I'm not a jerk :-) <br />Anyway, as @jjjjoy surmises, there's more to the story than you've been told.<br />In spite of this post, I like your column - keep up the good work!

[Matt Asay]

I'll correct the name problem. Sorry about that, Bjorn. <br /><br />Would you be willing to write a post giving your side of the story? No pyrotechnics. Just looking for details. I'll happily report it. It's true (as jjjjoy says) that I really only reported Eclipse's side of this. I'd like to give equal time.

[Philips]

"""In a variety of posts, including the one that prompted Milinkovich's post, Freeman-Benson has sought to undermine the Eclipse Foundation, which has successfully managed one of the industry's top open-source projects."""<br /><br />Uhm. I've read the post. So what's the problem here? I see nothing what could have prompted the response above.<br /><br />Unless of course what the Bjorn Freeman-Benson guy say is true. And I easily believe him as most (if not all) high-profile open source projects are "suffering" from political agendas of commercial companies, who often employ many active community members. At the point, claiming to be a "community member" is already hypocritical: if you are paid to do the job, then it the bias is obvious. There is nothing wrong about it, but everybody simply has to stop pretending. (Take a look at Linux and openly commercial agenda of RedHat, largest contributor: as long as everybody knows about it and understands that, it's OK. Everybody gotta feed their families.)

[mik_kersten]

The "everybody has to stop pretending" point in the comment above resonates with what's going on here. Open discourse is key to open source ecosystems like Eclipse, even if it occasionally results in conflict: http://tasktop.com/blog/eclipse/eclipse-ecosystem-open-discourse-conflict

[PACSferret]

Seems to be an unfortunate choice of words to express a (quite possibly justified) loss of patience. Despite having nothing but good intentions, sometimes people need to be told: Lead, follow, or get out of the way.

[ZUrlocker]

Matt, good posting. <br /> <br />Sometimes you just gotta call a spade a spade. Kudos to Mike for pointing out that Eclipse doesn't welcome jerks. I wish more open source communities and companies operated according to a "No *******" rule. It's just not worth the energy drain to deal with some people. <br /> <br />--Zack