OpenThreads: The Community of Mailing Lists presented at FOSS4G-NA
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The document discusses the importance of increasing diversity and community involvement within open-source software development, highlighting the gender gap in technology and addressing the reasons behind the current disparities. It emphasizes the need for both men and women to contribute and suggests methods to improve engagement, including mentorship and targeted initiatives. Finally, it outlines a methodology for analyzing mailing list interactions to better understand participant dynamics and influence in the community.
![Hello.
From awright at opengeo.org
From georgia at opentechinstitute.org
Thu May 23 1:00:18 2013
Subject: [openthreads] hello?](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/foss4g-na-openthreads-final-130530094355-phpapp02/85/OpenThreads-The-Community-of-Mailing-Lists-presented-at-FOSS4G-NA-4-320.jpg)
OpenThreads: The Community of Mailing Lists presented at FOSS4G-NA
- 1. OpenThreadsthe community of open source mailing lists @alyssapwright @georgiamoon
- 4. Hello. From awright at opengeo.org From georgia at opentechinstitute.org Thu May 23 1:00:18 2013 Subject: [openthreads] hello?
- 5. Hello Community. Together we create software of value.
- 6. Hello World. Together we bring that value to a global community.
- 7. We Get That.
- 8. “Increase involvement of the community” “Increase the number of code contributors” deegree: 2010 report OSGeo Annual Report
- 9. “Need more community feedback” More volunteers for documentation, manuals and tutorials OSGeo Annual Report mapbender: 2010 report
- 10. “Need more people to advocate for OSGeo” and help translate documentation! OSGeo Annual Report francophone chapter: 2010 report
- 11. Where is our “Community”?
- 12. mailing lists!
- 13. Who is our community? The specifics of the gender gap
- 15. % of women in technology?
- 16. 27% % of women in technology?
- 17. % of women in wikipedia?
- 18. % of women in wikipedia? 9%
- 19. % of women speakers at this conference?
- 20. % of women speakers at this conference? 7%
- 21. % of women in VGI?
- 22. % of women in VGI? 3%
- 23. % of women in FOSS?
- 24. 1% % of women in FOSS?
- 26. Is this a problem? (We have been asked this question.)
- 27. “Maybe girls don’t like math,
- 28. or maps,
- 31. is a man’s field,
- 32. like construction work - @alyssapwright
- 38. Maybe we all accept (deep breath)
- 39. This is a problem.
- 40. We want our tools to continue to grow and add value.
- 41. We want our software to reach new populations.
- 42. We want our solutions to be even better.
- 43. We need more men and more women.
- 44. The collective intelligence of diversity
- 45. not only expands the reach of our community The collective intelligence of diversity
- 46. but the sustainability of our tools.
- 47. Because technology is created in a certain context, in certain conversations. Lam et al 2011 | Callahan & Herring 2011
- 48. The future of our work depends on attracting more white males
- 49. and more other under- represented groups.
- 50. OK. No big deal. We fix problems all day.
- 51. So let’s look at why. Why the FOSS discrepancy?
- 52. There are many possible reasons...
- 53. Maybe women have different communication styles than men. Judd Atkin, 2012
- 54. Maybe the few restrictions on how people treat each other creates permission for discrimination. Reagle, 2013
- 55. Maybe there is inertia. I mean, this was a community started by a lot of men, with a particular ideology...why fight old men? Judd Atkin, 2012
- 56. Maybe there’s a incentive and motivation gap. (e.g., Women and men relate to competition differently.) Judd Atkin, 2012
- 57. Maybe there’s active hostility towards difference. Wikipedia, 2012
- 59. % of women who reported being assaulted, attacked, or treated poorly by colleagues on projects?
- 60. 30% % of women who reported being assaulted, attacked, or treated poorly by colleagues on projects?
- 61. -----that’s a lot of hounds-----
- 63. and we are all responsible.
- 64. Too many of us have witnessed:
- 65. The mailing list temper tantrum.
- 66. The joust for technical supremacy.
- 67. The snub of a newbie.
- 68. And many more have simply hesitated... to ask for help, to participate, to engage, to question.
- 69. We all know that are online communications are complicated spaces, full of complicated relationships,
- 70. and cats.
- 71. OpenThreads looks at those relationships
- 72. OpenThreads looks to structure that context
- 73. and leaves the cats alone.
- 74. Methodology
- 75. 00 Assemble the Team Seamus Tuohy Tech Lead | Rhetorical Analysis (Open Technology Institute) Georgia Bullen Creative Lead | Data Visualization (Open Technology Institute) Alyssa Wright Product Manager | Professional Nagging (OpenGeo)
- 76. 01 Frame the Problem Open Government Memorandum for the Heads of Executive Departments and Agencies
- 80. 03 Structure the Data Participant author of an email Message body of an email Thread series of messages posted as replies to each other
- 81. 03 participant participantID totalPosts averageReplies starter : threads started / total # engagement : Average number of replies a user has per thread response : replies/ total control : # of replies / # threads started by participant timeSpent : total time spent name list gender entryTime lastPost messages threads type: participant
- 82. 03 message msgID list minutes : time spent metric - words per email (given a words per minute count) msgType : message type, categorical (forward, question, reply, ...) date : sent timedate gender : gender of the sender threadID participantID type: message
- 83. 03 thread threadID writingTime : minutes spent list start timedate end timedate calendarTime: total calendar time of the thread genderBalance : count of gender participants messages type: thread
- 84. 04 Parse the Mailing Lists Types discussion | user | developer Format pipermail | mailman Technology couchDB | python | d3
- 86. 04 discussion: libtech user: talk-us developer: postgis-dev Initial Mailing Lists
- 88. Technical Challenges People use multiple e-mails/names identifying the identity behind a voice can be difficult Gender is difficult to parse requires community review Headers: Standardized Bodies: Not Standardized Email dates varies in format 05
- 89. 06 What’s Next? Scores activity | influence | relation Lists your lists | google groups Community understand behavior patterns across communities
- 90. 06 Activity Score Quantity of initiated messages Quantity of responses Time taken to respond
- 91. 06 Influence Score Initiated conversations Ratio of initial poster vs others in the thread Dialogue with new people
- 92. 06 Relation Score Male > Male | Female > Female Male > Female | Female > Male
- 93. 06 Google Groups can’t export data from google groups. can only retrieve messages one-by-one.
- 94. 06 Join us! more lists + more questions + more visualizations + more analysis + more awareness + more self-reflection + more focused initiatives = more diversity + better software
- 95. Tactics of Inclusion The party bag
- 96. GNOME
- 97. Internship for GNOME project 10 OSS project involved Success
- 98. Address women directly. Accept non-students and non-coders. Connect women with mentors. Require a contribution No pressure for really ambitious projects. Approach
- 99. Etsy
- 100. GNOME attracted 500% more female engineers Success
- 101. GNOME Invest trained junior women for hiring Partner alliances with other organizations Make a Public Stand success breeds success Approach
- 102. Recommendation Address Gender Make gender an explicit part of any intervention. Increasing gender increases representation of other groups as well.
- 103. Personal Recommendation Consciously come from a place of trust. Do not attack. Make a public commitment. Talk openly about what’s not working. Use research to focus on action.
- 104. Appendix
- 113. random images maybe for later
- 114. technical challenges People use multiple e-mails/names identifying the identity behind a voice can be difficult Gender is difficult to parse requires community review Headers: Standardized Bodies: Not Standardized Email dates varies in format
- 115. our methodology
- 116. our methodology
- 119. our
- 121. breaking. mailing lists can be