[FFmpeg-devel] GSOC 2011 politics

[Stefano Sabatini]

On date Saturday 2011-04-30 01:10:57 +0200, Michael Niedermayer encoded:
> Hi
> 
> FFmpegs GSOC 2011 timeline:
> 
> February 28:
> 19:00 UTC
> Mentoring organizations can begin submitting applications to Google.
> (http://www.google-melange.com/document/show/gsoc_program/google/gsoc2011/timeline)
> 
> 
> February 28 or 29
> Ronald Bultje registers FFmpeg with himself as admin
> 
> 
> Tue, 12 Apr 2011 [see below for mail]
> Ronald says he requested a new mailing list for soc-mentors from the roots
> I reply that i as root of the new ffmpeg server have not received any
> request and that i object to the list being moved to libav.org
> 
> 

> Fri, 15 Apr 2011 [see below for mail]
> Roanld explains that the list has been moved to libav.org and that to
> subscribe one has to agree to a complex license from google.

This is not entirely correct. soc-mentors at libav.org is not bound to
the Google system for managing GSoc tasks (named Melange), so yo may
ask Ronald to subscribe you, even if you're not enlisted as a GSoc
mentor. That was done in the previous years when you acted basically
as ubermentor, so it would make sense for this year as well (that was
not done probably in order to avoid hostility/flames on list).

As for the Melange EULA, this is a problem which should possibly be
directly discussed with Google admins.
 
> April 25:
> 19:00 UTC
> Accepted student proposals announced on the Google Summer of Code 2011 site.
> 10 Projects for FFMpeg/libav are being accepted
> 10 choosen by libav
>  0 choosen by ffmpeg
> 2 of the students are libav developers, 1 of them has never written C
> code before. 0 students are ffmpeg developers
> 8 of the mentors are libav developers
> 2 of the mentors are ffmpeg developers

While I see that the way GSoc was led this year has been somehow
unilateral, I want to remeber that most changes in Libav are directly
pulled in FFmpeg, so that work is also benefitting FFmpeg altough
indirectly, and the disparity in the number of tasks/mentors mostly
depends on the unavailability of mentors amongst the FFmpeg
developers.

> Has the ffmpeg side been shown the student applications? no
> Had the ffmpeg side had any say in which are accepted? no

This was discussed on soc-mentors, and the list of students/tasks was
available through the Melange interface. The acceptance of students
was based on a voting/ranking system (mentors could express a vote for
each task/student).

Please let's try to avoid more flaming now, which is not doing any
good to the project nor to the involved students, so I suggest to keep
this discussion private.
-- 
FFmpeg = Fundamentalist Fascinating Mortal Plastic Earthshaking Game