Who is empowered to set Vaniver or anyone else as the BDFL of the site? It would be great to get into a discusion of “who” but I wonder how much weight there will be behind this person. Where would the BDFL’s authority eminate from? Would he be granted, for instance, ownership of the lesswrong.com domain? That would be a sufficient gesture.
I’m empowered to hunt down the relevant people and start conversations about it that are themselves empowered to make the shift. (E.g. to talk to Nate/Eliezer/MIRI, and Matt Fallshaw who runs Trike Apps.).
I like the idea of granting domain ownership if we in fact go down the BDFL route.
An additional additional point is that the dictator can indeed quit and is not forced to kill themselves to get out of it. So it’s actually not FL. And in fact, it’s arguably not even a dictatorship, as it depends on the consent of the governed. Yes, BDFL is intentionally outrageous to make a point. What’s yours?
Who is empowered to set Vaniver or anyone else as the BDFL of the site? It would be great to get into a discusion of “who” but I wonder how much weight there will be behind this person. Where would the BDFL’s authority eminate from? Would he be granted, for instance, ownership of the lesswrong.com domain? That would be a sufficient gesture.
I’m empowered to hunt down the relevant people and start conversations about it that are themselves empowered to make the shift. (E.g. to talk to Nate/Eliezer/MIRI, and Matt Fallshaw who runs Trike Apps.).
I like the idea of granting domain ownership if we in fact go down the BDFL route.
that’s awesome. I’m starting to hope something may come of this effort.
An additional point is that you you can only grant the DFL part. The B part cannot be granted but can only be hoped for.
An additional additional point is that the dictator can indeed quit and is not forced to kill themselves to get out of it. So it’s actually not FL. And in fact, it’s arguably not even a dictatorship, as it depends on the consent of the governed. Yes, BDFL is intentionally outrageous to make a point. What’s yours?
The person who owns the website doesn’t need consent of the people who visit the website to make changes to the website.
Funny how I didn’t notice anyone become outraged.
And, of course, BDFL’s powers do NOT depend on the consent of the governed—it’s just that the governed have the ability to exit.
As to the point, it’s merely reminding of the standard trade-off with dictator-like rulers. They are like a little girl: