As someone who resists on Ruby and Rails for livelihood, I agree strongly that the issue of governance needs to be addressed for the good of the community
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Well said. It is important that Rails keeps on thriving and innovating.
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I’ve been a rails developer for the past 9 years and I do not want this community to die. I’ve generally found the Rails community to be super welcoming and inclusive with events like RailsCamp and Ruby For Good. It’s one thing for Basecamp to continue to contribute to Rails in the same way that GitHub, Shopify, and others do, but it shouldn’t be its home.
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The personal annocdoatal evidence I have: • nobody under 30 uses Rails at all • people under 30 do not have any interest in Ruby or Rails, they don’t care about it • if you look at lists of programming languages, Ruby and Rails are usually ignored or left off • If you do a search for “Rails” on LinkedIn you’ll see far fewer positions for Rails than nearly every other modern technology
I am under 30, and have not had any issue finding work as a Rails engineer. I also just started my own venture with other people under 30, and we chose to use Rails for our project.
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I’ve been hearing this same type of thing… basically my entire career. Rails is a smaller community than something like Java, but it’s not dying. It’s just not rapidly growing. And that’s ok. Part of me doesn’t even want to dissuade people from saying this because the more people who decide not to look for Rails jobs, the less competition there is for me 
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Thanks for posting this, and I fully agree with all of your points. These changes are long overdue for what is now a mature piece of open-source software that is used in many critical applications around the world.
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On the topic of: why does this have to be a crisis, I don’t understand the crisis, what is the problem, etc., etc.
That’s not the point. If Rails were already set up with an OSS governance model other than BDFL, then there wouldn’t be a crisis to begin with. Any company/individual who contributes to Rails could go through some crazy situation in their own world and it wouldn’t need to jeopardize the Rails ecosystem itself. But instead, now we’ve seen that it does because—MIT codebase aside—Rails as a brand and an org is owned by DHH/Basecamp.
These sorts of things are never a “problem”…until they become a problem. That time is now.
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Let me recap for a moment, and correct me if I am wrong:
basecamp: “at basecamp we offer you a very very well paid job, benefits and shit. you have paid holidays and you should work 40 hours per week, actually 32 in summer. This will give you enough personal free time to spend with your family, or whatever you want”
potential employee: “can I do political activism?”
basecamp: “yes, of course, just not in the internal company discussion workspace. we keep this only for work-related topics”
potential employee: “this sounds like a big limitation to my freedom. You company does not seem really inclusive”
I don’t see a risk for Rails, I don’t see a risk for the community and I don’t see how the changes at Basecamp should have any influence on the inclusion and diversity topic.
Ruby On Rails is one of the most welcoming, friendly, and open communities I have ever been part of. 
I think we should all stop for a minute (maybe two) and realize that a company simply asked their employees to use a different space for political discussion. That’s it. That’s all it happened. And let me also say that this is totally fine. It has nothing to do with being inclusive or not towards marginalized people, discrimination, harassment and so on…
That’s the reason why I don’t see a reason to discuss about a new Governance in Rails. I think I’d rather focus on contributing and making the framework even better.
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If you’ve read anything about this issue, then you know what you just wrote is not the case at all. It’s not about political activism. It’s about how societal issues affected their work at Basecamp. Banning political and societal discussion makes it so a Black employee can’t talk about how they are struggling at work because of a recent shooting, a trans employee can’t mention that they are concerned after recent anti-trans legislation is passed in their home state, or even a cis woman talking about how she doesn’t feel like the company is treating her fairly as a woman. All the Basecamp employees that have spoken out made it clear that the political discussions that happened at Basecamp were purely about issues that were happening at Basecamp.
From the Platformer article:
Interviews with a half-dozen Basecamp employees over the past day paint a portrait of a company where workers sought to advance Basecamp’s commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion by having sensitive discussions about the company’s own failures. After months of fraught conversations, Fried and his co-founder, David Heinemeier Hansson moved to shut those conversations down.
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Based on the importance of Rails as a project, both to all the posters, myself, and to companies who rely on this infrastructure, I agree healthy governance is very important.
As a boardmember of Ruby Together for the last several years, I can tell you that it’s hard but worthwhile work. Trying to get the community to solve some of the problems as a group which have been funded/managed by private companies and individuals, while the code itself is open-source, is… complicated.
That being said, I support this discussion and would like to help however I can.
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I think they are saying that there is so many other places that already facilitate those conversations and if it is internal issues don’t they still have an HR department to handle those issue right?
There has to be something crazy that is not out yet because all of this seems like a overreaction to just not allowing these convos on company forums.
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Mod note
I enabled slow mode here to enable a slow and measured discussion. Tempers are high, taking a very deep breath between posts can help reduce tensions.
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If you are remote, what other locations are there to facilitate those conversations? There is no watercolor and it seems like their company Basecamp instance is where they have these conversations. At my company, it’s Slack. Often, it’s not really productive to just have a single one-on-one conversation with HR. I understand where you are coming from, but I trust the many employees who are saying this is coming out of nowhere over the two founders. When over 1/3 of your workplace quits, it’s definitely an issue.
But this is almost beside the point… it shouldn’t matter what Basecamp does because Basecamp != Rails. Or at least it shouldn’t.
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Thanks for the help @samsaffron!
Since it’s late and I’m on my phone, this may be a bit messy, my apologies.
I really want to encourage folks to step back from your personal viewpoints of Basecamp if possible to see the situation as it applies to Rails. Here is the facts and some risks based on those facts as best I can see them. I honestly feel we should be able to agree on these facts and these risks regardless of the views of Basecamp.
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People strongly associate Rails with DHH and Basecamp.
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When people strongly associate Rails with DHH/Basecamp, controversial actions by DHH/Basecamp reflect on the Rails community.
As an example, I’ve seen multiple people say things on Twitter that both condemn DHH and Basecamp and condemn Rails. Some of the clearest were replies to some DHH tweets which said “Fck DHH. Fck Rails”.(the exact tweet may have been slightly different but it was basically that)
To be clear, the controversial action in the future could be something viewed as more left-wing leaning. An example might be if Basecamp took actions in support of the Boycott Divestment and Sanction campaign in support of Palestinians. The problem, in some ways, is quite similar: the association with controversial actions by Basecamp reflect on the Rails community.
- A notable portion of the the tech and business community is extremely angry about these actions by Basecamp. The anecdote about 7 VP level executives trying to scrap Basecamp is a perfect example of that. Removing such tools is not cheap, it’s not a tiny problem. Additionally, plenty of orgs and individuals have said they are leaving Basecamp and Hey over this. If people are willing to spend the money and take the time and effort to scrap such a tool, I think we can conclude there is a risk thst they will avoid Rails if they feel it’s too associated with Basecamp.
To be clear, you don’t need to agree with the outrage to acknowledge it exists. I happen to agree with it but others may not or have mixed feelings. Our opinion on whether it’s justified is irrelevant to the facts: there is outrage, it is very substantial and people are making decisions against using Basecamp software becuase on the outrage. This endangers our community because of the tight association with Basecamp.
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Diversity and inclusion is vital to Rails and strengthens our community. Our community is stronger when people from a diverse set of backgrounds can participate fully and work together for the common good.
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These actions by Basecamp are perceived as being anti-inclusion and anti-diversity. This has been a common refrain over the last week from all kinds of people. As before, it should be possible to see this fact regardless of your personal opinion.
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A small but significant portion of the tech community views these actions as anti-inclusion and sees that as a good thing. If they do so, and they associate them with Rails like many people already have, it may attract them to the project. This is a group of people we do not want involved and through specific actions, like the Code of Conduct and outreach to marginalized groups, the Rails community has generalky kept them out.
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When a FOSS community gains more people who are anti-inclusion, people from marginalized backgrounds leave. This has been shown time and again in FOSS communities who have struggled with a lack of diversity.
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When a community becomes less diverse and unwelcoming, it becomes brittle and can totally collapse. I think the recent situation at the FSF illustrates how bad such a situation can get.
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These risks can be traced back to one fundamental issue: Basecamp and DHH are viewed as tok strongly associated with Rails.
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The best way to assess this issue is to change the Rails governance to make the project less associated with Basecamp and DHH. Through that, we will also gain a number of other benefits.
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Thank you for initiating this important conversation, and doing so with a lot of thought and consideration.
I, too, have been thinking about this intensely since the imbroglio began, and came to the same conclusion as you. As you stated, this is not about any specific political viewpoint of any one company or individual, it is the tight coupling of said entities to the framework that we all invest so much of our professional and personal lives in.
There comes a time where organizations mature beyond the charismatic founder, where the sum is greater than any individual part. A moment like what we have all witnessed now makes evident when that time has arrived.
I am very willing and available to lend my hand in support of a new foundation. Prior to making the career switch to software, I worked in the non-profit sector for quite a while, and I have a good amount of experience with boards, bylaws, and the development of institutional processes.
The Ruby and Rails communities have always been my home since I started this journey years ago to software. It is filled with good people, who are welcoming of both the newcomer and the long-timer. It is imperative to me that we create the structures for the long-term that ensure the continuation of this work.
Please count me in with any next steps!
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@jmkoni If you’ve read anything about this issue, then you know what you just wrote is not the case at all.
I’d appreciate if you would consider the fact that I read at least “something” about the issue and I simply reached different conclusion than yours. If you think that I write and make an opinion without informing myself, shows a very little respect for my person, that I don’t deserve.
That, being said, in the posts from the founders, next to the banning sentences, I also read:
People can take the conversations with willing co-workers to Signal, Whatsapp, or even a personal Basecamp account, but it can’t happen where the work happens anymore.
We encourage you to continue these difficult discussions with willing colleagues on other systems. Signal is an excellent choice that provides end-to-end encryption and group support.
We also encouraged you to exercise your right to activism and political engagement outside of work. It’s none of Basecamp’s business how or whether you choose to spend your time, money, or voice to support charities, causes, or political action groups.
Bring all your political advocacy to whatever personal spaces you have. Twitter, Facebook, your local advocacy group, all of it. Just don’t bring it into the internal communication platforms we use for work, unless it directly relates to our business. which to my personal work experience is a totally fine deal.
It does not seem to me that this bans employees (willing to do so) to have a new basecamp group and keep discussing things as they were doing before…just in a separate space.
Also at the physical (non-remote) workplace, we don’t discuss about politics at the desk, because it would distract other colleagues, we simply take it to the coffee machine and continue there. There’s a space and time for each topic.
That’s why, I do not feel the need of detaching my name or the name of my company from Ruby on Rails. I don’t find any of this toxic.
@wwahammy I think we cannot step back from our personal viewpoints about Basecamp because that’s what the whole topic is about. Is not a coincidence that your proposal (which I deeply appreciate and respect, although I disagree with), came in right now.
The whole topic is “DHH and Basecamp have a bad reputation now. We should detach the name of Rails from it”. And I deeply disagree with this, sorry.
I don’t think the premises are true: Basecamp (Jason & DHH) did too much good in the past to this industry for everything to be forgotten so easily.
It would be totally unfair! I am really astonished about how easily people forget the good you did, to focus on the single one bad thing that you have (supposedly) did.
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dear @samsaffron - thanks! that is a sensible thought, and I completely agree. We need to also give this whole thing a while to settle down.
Also, irrespective of where things go, thanks for what you’ve done for the community so far!
Best wishes, Mohit,
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While I would like to see this happening as well, I ask myself how exactly?
There are 2 things:
- Dhh status as the main decision maker in the framework
- Rails the trademark (name and logo|) as most of us know belongs to dhh.
Changing either of those things without dhh agreeing to it (which he likely won’t if I may speculate) is basically a fork of the project, which (if I may speculate again) most of the community does not want, regardless of the emotions running high now.
So my point is - we can try persuade dhh to make these changes and hope for the best, but that’s about it. A fork is gonna be really bad and the worst outcome possible. Anyone fearing the health of the project should fear a fork the most. This is a pretty good read on why a fork is really bad
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I would prefer sticking to proven models.
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I don’t think this arguable unusual event is really a thread to the community. I would wait and see how it plays out. If it continues, we can just fork and continue our own way. ¯_(ツ)_/¯
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