While I ultimately side with Avdi and co, I think the whole thing wound up coming across as a bit self-righteous ... unfortunately.
Dealing with something like this requires a lot more tact than it seems was brought to bear, exactly because it is such an explosive issue. Its very difficult to be on the receiving end of something like that and not feel very personally attacked, no matter how logical the arguments ... the air of negativity surrounding something they worked so hard to bring to fruition would be too much to take. So I do empathize with BritRuby on some level.
I think in the future, it might not be a bad idea to try to try to handle something like that a little more privately and only move to twitter when it is clear there is a concerted effort to exclude people.
This 'public shaming' ideal that the rise twitter seems to have encouraged, just seems to be a little lazy (it doesn't require a lot of thought to be snarky) and counter productive in most situations, as it automatically puts the target on the defensive.
Dealing with something like this requires a lot more tact than it seems was brought to bear, exactly because it is such an explosive issue. Its very difficult to be on the receiving end of something like that and not feel very personally attacked, no matter how logical the arguments ... the air of negativity surrounding something they worked so hard to bring to fruition would be too much to take. So I do empathize with BritRuby on some level.
I think in the future, it might not be a bad idea to try to try to handle something like that a little more privately and only move to twitter when it is clear there is a concerted effort to exclude people.
This 'public shaming' ideal that the rise twitter seems to have encouraged, just seems to be a little lazy (it doesn't require a lot of thought to be snarky) and counter productive in most situations, as it automatically puts the target on the defensive.