Code of Conduct decision

[kbodwin]

Hi all,

As we work towards onboarding with NumFOCUS, a decision needs to be made about how we handle Code of Conduct violation incidents. We have three options:

Option A: We retain our current Code of Conduct, which specifies that incident reports are sent to and handled by the Contributors and the Community Organizer (me).

Option B: We adopt the NumFOCUS Code of Conduct. Incidents are reported through their site. The NumFOCUS CoC committee reviews/investigates and makes recommendations to us, but ultimately we decide how the incident is handled.

Option C: We adopt the NumFOCUS Code of Conduct. Incidents are reported through their site and are fully handled by the NumFOCUS CoC committee.

Personally, I favor Option C. The NumFOCUS people are trained in dealing with these sorts of issues, it reduces the workload for us, and I think there's value to having a third party handle issues.

Before moving forward, I'd like to make sure the Contributors and general community have a chance to weigh in.

@Rdatatable/project-members

[tdhock]

I agree with Option C.

[TysonStanley]

Same, let's go with what allows us to focus on the maintenance and give offload these kinds of things where we can.

[MichaelChirico]

I agree with offloading to NumFOCUS, but wonder about option B. Are there situations where we might be forced into a decision we disagree with when it conflicts with their recommendation?

Does the NumFOCUS team strongly recommend Option C? It's not clear concretely what sort of conflict we might have (if I had to guess, we'd take their recommendations in the large majority of cases, given their expertise), but I'm having trouble seeing the disadvantage of B. It looks like C while retaining some autonomy should any conflict arise.

[jangorecki]

Agree with Michael, B feels like less work for us but still we are the one to decide.

[tdhock]

b is ok for me too

[TysonStanley]

Works for me too. Assume we'll need to decide how we act on the recommendations (ie have a standard process we follow to determine the ultimate decision).

[kbodwin]

To me, the advantage of Option C over B is that in C we wouldn't have to convene a meeting and follow our own internal CoC process. We'd only need one person to liaise with the CoC from NumFOCUS and figure out next steps.

@MichaelChirico - I don't have the impression that they are strongly recommending one choice over another.

[MichaelChirico]

Thanks Kelly! My sense is that such violations will not be common, so that the overhead will not be too much a burden.

Can we easily change to Option C later when we get some experience under our belts?

[kbodwin]

I imagine it's pretty flexible once we are up and running, as long as we are on board with accepting their Code of Conduct and reporting process.

We'll talk to them Thursday and make sure everything is fully clear; but it sounds like for now we have a consensus on Option B.

Thanks, all!

[kbodwin]

Okay, we've talked to NumFOCUS and essentially we can define our own custom procedure! So we can ask for a structure where NumFOCUS handles these issues and reports to us, and we can choose to either go with their decision or convene to review ourselves.

Sometime soon we'll have an onboarding meeting with their CoC team to establish exact procedure - let me know if you'd like to attend that, or if there's anything specific you want me to bring up.

@TysonStanley , I think you can merge #7017 and #6979 now.