- Ben rudely reverted a commit and rudely chided Isaac
- Joyent rudely chided Ben
- Ben explained that there had been a misunderstanding and expressed that his feelings were hurt
Although Joyent's post rubbed me the wrong way, I have trouble seeing why you'd hate them forever for being rude to a contributor when you won't hate Ben forever for being rude and flippant toward multiple contributors. I don't think defining Ben by this incident the way Bryan did is reasonable, but I don't think defining Joyent by this incident is any more reasonable. It's one incident in the past, not a trend in either of their cases. People are imperfect.
Ben didn't rudely reject the commit, he rejected a trivial commit to docs as per maintainer guidelines, he explains the thoughts behind his actions in his response: https://github.com/joyent/libuv/pull/1015#issuecomment-29568...
As an active contributor he has to deal with hundreds of commits / pull requests / comments / etc. As a result, his actions are instinctive where he actually thought he was following the project's maintainers policy.
Joyent's actions were pre-meditated, they took to their company's blog to publicly crucify him, labelling him an Asshole and that they would've fired him on the spot if he were only working for them (sadly he was in the unfortunate situation where he was only donating his OSS efforts for free). Whilst they were quick to classify this a fireable offense, they stopped short of saying they would no longer be accepting free OSS contributions from him in future.
I can sympathize with Ben's response in that he thought he was doing the right thing in rejecting a trivial change, I can't however sympathize with Joyent's treatment in their public PR crucifixion, instead of what should've happened and dealt with any criticisms of their core contributors privately, and if one should be required, (although it really wasn't necessary) they could've made a joint statement on how future pull-requests like this are now welcomed.
They have yet to recant their post, or admitted any fault or overreaction. Unlike Ben who in hindsight, wouldn't have reverted Isaac's commit.
It's not only about the historic events, it's also about respect and perceived appreciation of valuable OSS contributions which they now seek to attract. AFAICT Joyent is the same company who stands by their post.
- Ben rudely rejected a commit
- Ben rudely reverted a commit and rudely chided Isaac
- Joyent rudely chided Ben
- Ben explained that there had been a misunderstanding and expressed that his feelings were hurt
Although Joyent's post rubbed me the wrong way, I have trouble seeing why you'd hate them forever for being rude to a contributor when you won't hate Ben forever for being rude and flippant toward multiple contributors. I don't think defining Ben by this incident the way Bryan did is reasonable, but I don't think defining Joyent by this incident is any more reasonable. It's one incident in the past, not a trend in either of their cases. People are imperfect.