Introduction emails (was Re: BugZappers Meeting Recap for 2009-03-03)

[Adam Williamson]

On Tue, 2009-03-03 at 15:42 -0500, TK009 wrote:

> * (SOP) Standard Operating Procedures - General discussion began on 
> creation of SOP's for the BugZappers, and that they should be created 
> concurrently with the wiki update. Then focused on SOP for joining/new 
> members of the BugZappers. Specifically the "introduction e-mail". No 
> decission was reached during the meeting regarding procedure.

This is an area which came in for some contention during the meeting.
Let's have some follow up :)

To recap for people who weren't at the meeting:

Myself and John would like to make it a standard requirement for new
triagers to post a short mail to the mailing list just to introduce
themselves. The intent of this is multiple. First, it acts as a basic
bot check - this is important, as joining fedorabugs group gives you
wide Bugzilla powers, so we don't want bots to get it.

Second, it's a good way to make newcomers feel involved right away, and
make sure the rest of the group knows about them. We actually had about
ten new members in the fedorabugs group last week, but most current
triagers wouldn't know that because there's currently nothing that has
them introduce themselves to the rest of the group.

Chris objected on the grounds that he wouldn't have felt comfortable
sending an introduction email when he joined and he worried that there
would be others in the same situation. He felt there should be no need
to disclose any kind of personal information to become a bugzapper, and
people should be judged on work, not personal qualities or reputation.

I and John clarified that the introductory mail could be pretty
free-form, and wouldn't need to include any personal information like
name or location if the newcomer didn't feel comfortable providing that
information.

So, what does everyone think? Would introductory emails be a worthwhile
idea or not? Does anyone have a modification or alternative suggestion?
Thanks!
-- 
Adam Williamson
Fedora QA Community Monkey
IRC: adamw | Fedora Talk: adamwill AT fedoraproject DOT org
http://www.happyassassin.net