Re:GitHub, fuck your name change
by freddie_mercury on Wednesday March 17, 2021 @05:08AM
(#26488325)
No, he's complaining that they didn't ask him specifically. It really easy to find black developers who were consulted and agree with the change.
Here we go (this took under 5 seconds for me to Google)
https://dev.to/afrodevgirl/replacing-master-with-main-in-git...
Now there's duelling anecdata and the OP provides no suggestions on how to reconcile them.
Re:GitHub, fuck your name change
by gebruikersnaam on Wednesday March 17, 2021 @05:33AM
(#26488584)
From the article:
"So if this change did not really even attempt to involve the black developer community..."
They could simply rename their own branches.
...yes? No one is forcing anyone to do anything.
I don’t think anyone expects “main” (“develop”, “default”, “trunk”, ...) to ever become the default branch name.
It is already the default branch name... That's the point of this whole fluff. Nobody would care about people changing their own branch names.
Are you sure about that though? They didn't publish anything about their internal decision making. It is an assumption that they didn't talk to any person of color. The idea of using so called neutral terms is not new: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3243656.stm
Re:GitHub, fuck your name change
by gebruikersnaam on Wednesday March 17, 2021 @05:35AM
(#26488615)
See my other comment, the author says the change didn't involve the black developer community. I have no knowledge either way, just emphasizing their point.
Sure. I'm just calling their point into question because I see a lot of people of color that are actively engaged in the evolution of language in the context of slavery. The Rijksmuseum in The Nederlands has changed most occurrences of 'slave' to 'enslaved person' and trying to find out the actual name of the person depicted, among other things. The commission that was responsible for this change was headed by a person of color[0]. This isn't a movement that we are only seeing in Silicon Valley.
[0]: https://www.parool.nl/ps/hoofd-geschiedenis-rijksmuseum-ik-w...
Re:GitHub, fuck your name change
by DetroitThrow on Wednesday March 17, 2021 @05:30AM
(#26488556)
As far as I know, most of the changes happening at large companies regarding this have been driven internally primarily by people of color - at MSFT, which owns GitHub, some of these changes were being driven by Employee Resource Groups (affinity groups) which are made up of those who would be affected by the language, for example
You're missing the point, the author concludes that the companies decide that the language is offensive without asking the people who are supposedly the offended party.