Comment by littlecranky67
9 hours ago
You are making assumptions about a future that hasn't happened yet. It is open-source, so whatever move the person might do in the future, you can fork it anytime.
9 hours ago
You are making assumptions about a future that hasn't happened yet. It is open-source, so whatever move the person might do in the future, you can fork it anytime.
I suppose the community around a product is also a reason to bring up an influential character's character. You can't fork the community, only fragment it. "I don't want to join a club with that guy in it" is a time when an ad hominem becomes a valid argument.
It is a self-fullfilling prophecy. If the community would adopt the style of not juding the person but only the product, that community would not care for that person. So the "I don't want to join a club with purpose X because of guy Y" leads to the problem that you are describing. If everybody would just "I join the club because of its purpose X achieved by means Z", that community split won't happen.
Yes, if the community would not be influenced by the guy, he wouldn't be influential.
You can fork, but will you want to fork and spend time and effort, potentially in huge amounts, on that fork? There are reasons to be wary. Choosing an alternative, where that particular reason for forking might not exist, is a valid choice to make.