Things That Matter Most

Things That Matter Most

Open Letter to the Democratic Party of Washington County

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Dear Washington County Dems,

I write to inform you of my resignation as a Precinct Committee Person (PCP) for Precinct 428, effective immediately.

Being elected to represent my precinct in 2016 was exciting. I was given opportunity to better connect with my neighbors and coordinate on policy recommendations with other Democrats in the county. Everyone was respectful, polite, and organized. I was incredibly dismayed when this proved to be a facade that quickly faded over the next several months.

Committee meetings quickly devolved to infighting. My formerly respectful peers were reduced to literally screaming at one another. The party of which I’ve been a member for over 16 years did not turn out to be the example of civility it’s claimed to be.

Our meetings purport to follow Robert’s Rules of Order but frequently depart from the rules and drag on as no one knows what to expect. Meetings are frequently filled with moral grandstanding and debates that turn into classist and ageist arguments rather than respectful discussions.

I will not continue sacrificing my time in service of a party that cannot respect one another.

On a national level, the party has also proven to be in decline. Democratic politicians speak with a level of arrogance and always presume the moral high ground. Even after being proven in the minority, they refuse to cooperate across party lines. An election that switches the alignment of the majority is a sign of constituent disappointment, not a call to resist.

While I will still vote for and donate to Democrats, it will be on the merits of their character; not their party affiliation. I cannot remain with a clear conscience as a member of this party.

This letter will be copied to the Washington County Clerk in accordance with ORS 248.024.

Sincerely,
Eric Mann

Missing: Diversity in Tech

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I attend a lot of tech conferences. I once attended at least 14 events over the course of twelve months. Large events at professional conference centers. Small events at local churches. Events that required driving. Events that required passing through customs.

Every event is unique. Every organizing team is unique. Every attendee is unique.

Still, there is very much a lack of diversity at these events.

php[tek]

The php[architect] team is, in my opinion, one of the best event groups on the planet. They put together several excellent events each year and I'm proud to have been a part of several. This is in no way a critique of that team; just an observation of something I witnessed at an event.

The first day of php[tek] 2015 featured a summit on open source. It was a promising event, bringing the leaders of several different open source projects together on stage to answer questions about their tools, their passion, and the future of open source as a whole. In short, this was a fantastic way to help highlight the "giving back" we know and love in the PHP community.

The only problem with the summit … was filling the stage with nine white men and suggesting it was a fair representation of "the open source community."

Two Reasons Diversity Matters

Diversity matters for more reasons than I can enumerate. There are, however, at least three key reasons the tech community needs to focus on it:

Representation is Empowering

There's a certain amount of pride you experience when you see yourself succeed. That same pride extends to when you see someone like you succeed. Seeing someone you can identify with take the stage, lead a project, or showcase a magazine is profoundly empowering.

Growing up as a white man, it was easy for me to find examples and role models to whom I could look up. They were everywhere. Politicians. Athletes. Entrepreneurs. Astronauts. As a kid, I heard frequently that I could be anything I wanted to be as an adult and I saw a huge amount of evidence to that statement.

Your Perspective is Limited

I once wrote an essay about the importance of diversity in a college setting: Diversity is in the Discourse. I had intended it to be a fun play on the phrase "the devil is in the details," but that wasn't really the point.

My point was that diversity becomes the most valuable when it's personally experienced. You and I each have our limited perceptions of the world around us; we can only see the world through one set of eyes. It's when we share our perspective with others – more importantly, when we listen to and appreciate others' perspectives – that we truly grow and build a fuller sense of the world.

I went to a predominantly white high school. I was in marching band. My favorite event was the annual Festival of Bands we'd travel to around Halloween. It was a great event, and we even had t-shirts printed to commemorate the event. Plain white t-shirts emblazoned with a giant "FOB."

Much later, when my circle of friends began to grow that I wore my shirt to an unrelated event. One of my newer friends immediately yelled at me for "being such a blatant, unabashed racist." I discovered then that "fob" was also short for things like "fresh off the boat" and was a slur that had been used repeatedly after his family moved into the area.

WordPress

I love WordPress. The product is fantastic and the community around it even more so.

I love WordCamps. It's refreshing to meet up with other WordPress users and talk about the different ways we're all using our favorite platform. Some use it as a blog. Some as a corporate landing site. At least one used it as a fantasy football coordination tool. The skies are the limits.

In my career, I've established enough credibility that people will reach out to me as an expert on various topics. The latest request, though, caught me off guard. I was asked to participate as a featured expert on the future of WordPress and how it relates to diversity.

…

I am a huge proponent of encouraging diversity in our community. I will gladly talk to anyone one-on-one about the different things we can do to encourage the participation of people belonging to under-represented demographics. But I am perhaps the last person you want to highlight as a "featured expert" on the topic.

Don't Ask Me

This isn't the first time I've been asked to participate in such an event. It won't be the last, either. But the fact remains, hearing a white man talk about diversity is a zero-sum game. As much as I care about the topic, it makes more sense to have someone more directly affected by the promotion of diversity in technology speak.

Asking a white man to talk about racial diversity or female empowerment or equality in the workforce is fundamentally misguided. We need to have a more diverse community in IT, but the way to get there is to empower those with diverse life experiences and raise them up as role models.

It's empowering to see yourself on stage speaking at an event. Make an effort to cultivate a wide representation of races, religions, orientations, and genders among your speakers.

It's powerful to hear from a broad spectrum of perspectives when making a decision, building a product, or nurturing an idea. If everyone involved in a conversation looks the same, thinks the same, and votes unanimously for an idea without debate you probably need to look outside your circle for a few more voices.

I see enough of myself on TV. I see enough of myself in politics. I see enough of myself in tech. I long for the day when I can look around in the tech community and see a reflection not of myself, but of the diversity of the world around me.

Statistics, Facts, Opinions, and Bias

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I was never that good at statistics in high school. I was great with other forms of math, but stats and probability didn’t really click with me until later in college. My statistics teacher was always frustrated when, after giving up on a problem, I’d answer: “It’s 50%, it either happens or it doesn’t.”

That answer wasn’t necessarily wrong, but it definitely wasn’t right.

I tried to frame my answer in the right way such that it would seem like I was getting to the right solution, even though I was nowhere near correct. It’s sad, but this is happening more and more in every field – politics in particular.

Another Aside

I knew a really interesting start up years ago that suffered from this phenomenon. They were focused on a direct-to-consumer product offering and trying (it turns out erroneously) to emphasis word-of-mouth referrals above all other forms of sales. The result: they had a great product that no one knew existed.

At one of their annual investment meetings, though, I watched the CEO explain this to his backers in the most bizarre of ways:

Well, we’re still working hard to reach out, but the past 6 months have seen tremendous growth! We’ve increased our customer base by 100%. For those who aren’t numbers geeks like me, that means we’ve doubled our customers in the past 6 months. Things are going great!

There is nothing in that statement, numbers-wise, that is untrue. His framing of the statement as “tremendous growth,” however, is one of the most blatant lies I’ve ever witnessed in person. The company had grown. The company had doubled its customer base over 6 months.

The secret: they only had 2 paying customers.

Two. Consumers. Paying $5/month for a subscription. Yes, the CEO was accurate in explaining the growth rate, but a $10/month revenue stream doesn’t go very far to pay the bills. His investors, however, were in the dark. They just had his statistics (again, accurate numbers) to go on and the tone with which he framed things.

Politics

I was told when I was younger that the easiest way to see if a politician is lying is that his mouth is moving. Now, I don’t always expect politicians to lie on purpose, but I do expect them to spin otherwise objective facts to fit whatever subjective narrative best supports their position. Take this tweet and counterpoint as an example.

The fact: new jobs would have been created under any president to win the election by the very nature of how our economy works and the fact that it’s been growing with a somewhat consistent rate over the past few years.

The spin: this growth not only due to the current president in office, but is also somehow better than the growth it would have been otherwise. 1

The counter-spin: while there has been growth, the rate of growth has slowed since the election, likely in a way related to the president, his policies, or some other economic uncertainty triggered by either.

All that matters here, though, is the fact. The spin is meaningless: growth would have occurred with or without President Trump. The counter-spin is meaningless: while a decreased growth rate could be due to the president, there are hundreds 2 of other factors at play as well.

The Problem

We’ve come to a moment in our history where people readily confuse facts with the narrative surrounding them. It’s become increasingly difficult to discern if a statement or report is delivering a cold, hard fact or if it’s conveying an opinion or “deeply-held belief.” The mainstream media is partly to blame for this. So is social media. So are celebrities (political and otherwise) opining in public through either of those (or other) channels.

It is a fact that the Earth is round. That the Earth orbits around the sun. That America landed men on the moon. That the average temperature of the Earth is increasing at a rate far more dramatic than in any recorded history (through either human observation or fossil evidence).

These are all provable facts.

Still, there are people who legitimately believe the Earth is flat and that anyone stating otherwise is voicing an alternative opinion. There are those who believe the sun orbits the Earth. Some who hold on to the belief the moon landing was faked. Those who believe global climate change is a hoax perpetrated by China 3 meant to trick American into losing money and bankrupting the economy.

These are biased opinions, some of which leverage real statistics and try to paint a new narrative in support of, often, idiotic and selfish agendas. And they are legion in today’s world. They are so numerous, in fact, that we’re taught to offer these opinions the same level of respect we do the facts they pervert.

I will never lose respect for someone who takes stances like this, but I will question whatever “facts” they attempt to espouse from that point forward. A fact is either provable or disprovable. An opinion is a belief about the significance of a fact. Confusing the two is extraordinarily dangerous.

I have opinions. I will happily share them with you if asked. I will also continue to explain that they are my opinions first, most likely based on some objective fact. Some of these opinions I treat in my personal life as if they are fact, but I recognize they’re debatable and will readily explain and defend them as such when necessary.

And if/when my opinions start to shift to be contrary to provable facts, while I won’t ask you to quietly respect them, I will ask you to respectfully challenge them.

Notes:

  1. The latter part of the spin is implied. It’s rarely explicit, except for when the president voices the opinion himself. ↩
  2. If not thousands … ↩
  3. And, after the president’s remarks when announcing America’s withdrawal from the Paris Accords, many nations in Europe. ↩

What S.J. Resolution 34 Means For You

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If you’re reading the news, you’ve probably seen hoards of tech journalists up in arms about S.J. Resolution 34. In a nutshell, this is an agreement by Congress to overturn a rule passed late last year by the FCC. The rule itself prohibited Internet service providers (ISPs) from collecting and sharing data about their customers without said customers’ consent.

The Congressional resolution nullifies that rule.

What happened

Last October, the FCC published a rule aimed at protecting consumer privacy. It dictated specifically that ISPs were required to:

  • notify customers about the data being collected
  • explain for which purposes that data will be used and shared
  • identify the parties with which that data will be shared

The rule identified ISPs as, effectively, telecommunications services. This means that ISPs would fall under the same laws that require other communications agencies to protect their customers’ data. It requires that customers “opt-in” for the sharing of data and further blocked ISPs from refusing service to those who refused to share their information.

The rule was passed in October, published in December, and became effective in early January.

Congress – specifically Republicans in Congress – felt this rule went too far. They elected to void the rule using their power of “Congressional disapproval” as granted through the Congressional Review Act:

The [Congressional Review Act] empowers Congress to review, by means of an expedited legislative process, new federal regulations issued by government agencies and, by passage of a joint resolution, to overrule a regulation. Once a rule is thus repealed, the CRA also prohibits the reissuing of the rule in substantially the same form or the issuing of a new rule that is substantially the same[.]

As soon as President Trump signs the joint resolution into law, the FCC’s rule will no longer exist.

OK … So what now?

The media outcry about the new resolution is a bit misleading. Though the FCC’s rule took effect in January, it hasn’t actually changed anything yet. The new FCC chairman, appointed in the early days of President Trump’s administration, has never been a proponent of this or any other FCC rule enforcing net neutrality.

Though the rule exists and has been “effective” most of this year, it hasn’t been used to change anything about our ISPs behavior. It was still so new, no one had used it for anything yet.

The Congressional resolution rolling things back effectively just said a rule that wasn’t being used cannot be used. In other words, nothing is substantially different today than it was at the end of last year.

Wait, the sky isn’t falling?

Media coverage of the issue has, thus far, neglected to highlight much of the above. The FCC rule is regarded as a long-standing law that protected consumer privacy; unfortunately, this isn’t true. The rule would have protected our privacy, but is being culled from our way of life before it had a chance to effect any change on the way ISPs do business.

Again, nothing is different today from the way things were three months ago.

And that should terrify you.

Happening right now

Rescinding the FCC rule means that ISPs are legally allowed to collect your data without your knowledge or consent. This includes:

  • IP addresses from which you access the Internet (potentially translatable to physical addresses)
  • A list of websites you visit
  • The pages and content on insecure (non-HTTPS) websites you visit
  • The content of forms you submit over non-HTTPS connections
  • And potentially much more

They are also legally allowed to use this data for advertising or even sell it to third parties, again without your knowledge or consent.

Even more chilling, they were already allowed to do this and might have been doing so all along. The FCC rule tried to protect us by preventing this behavior; S.J. Resolution 34 has highlighted the fact that this behavior was already the way of the world and will remain so for the foreseeable future.

What can you do about it?

As always, call your representatives and explain to them why they should care about protecting your privacy. Also, take what steps you can independently to ensure you’re protected even if they do nothing.

  • Use tools like ad blockers and Privacy Badger to block tracking scripts on the sites you visit
  • Always ensure you’re visiting sites over secure, HTTPS connections – your ISP can see the name of the server you’re visiting, but not the individual pages or the content thereof
  • Find a reputable VPN provider and browse the web over an encrypted Internet connection

If you’re a web developer, do everything you can to make sure the websites you build and maintain serve content over HTTPS. You are the first line of defense for your customers, your neighbors, and even yourself. SSL certificates are free, and many hosts will even set them up for you.

No one is more responsible for your privacy than you. No one will fight more for your privacy than you. Not Congress. Not your ISP. You owe it to yourself to understand the world around you, the data being collected about you, and how to proactively protect the privacy of that information.

Intentions – Real and Imagined

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On January 8th, Meryl Streep was honored with the Cecil B. DeMille award at the Golden Globes. She used her time on stage accepting the award to talk about the importance of art, the importance of diversity in art, and to publicly criticize president-elect Donald Trump for his resistance to and animosity towards the media. She specifically reflected on how, during his election campaign, Mr. Trump appeared to mock a journalist with a physical disability.

Let me come back to that.

First, a story …

My fourth year in college saw me working for the university Housing department, attending various planning committee meetings and managing people for the first time. It was a powerful and rewarding experience that helped me grow and showed me first-hand many of my limitations.

I had the privilege of sitting on a diversity committee with one of the women on my staff. We usually made it to every meeting together, but occasionally one of us would be busy and miss the meeting.

Usually, I’d be the one absent – one week, though, it was my teammate. Her absence slipped my mind and, during a later all-team meeting I called on her to give a status report.

“I wasn’t able to make it this week.”

“Oh, well I was. This week we discussed …”

Those of you smarter than I was at 22 can see immediately what I did. I singled out a woman who reported to me for failing to attend a meeting. In front of her peers. Then glossed over it as if she were unimportant and moved on with other business.

That wasn’t my intention, but it’s how my words and actions were received. That meeting damaged our working relationship and, ultimately, cost me several friendships where people were now convinced I was a calloused misogynist.

Let me come back to that.

But first, Donald Trump …

Donald Trump is an interesting man to watch. He says whatever is on his mind, whether appropriate or otherwise, and moves forward with no thought to the impact or repercussion of his words. Many people voted for him exactly due to this quality.

He also likes to mock people. Not directly, but with a vague “I’m going to flail about for a moment in caricature of my opinion about ___.” He did so on the campaign trail with Marco Rubio. He did so with Ted Cruz. It’s a source of laughter for many, and the unfiltered nature of his impersonation his opinion of individuals’ competency is a defining characteristic.

When he did so with Serge Kovalesk, though, everyone saw something else. They didn’t see Mr. Trump flailing in mockery of apparent incompetence. They saw Mr. Trump flailing in mockery of a man with a physical disability.

Another story …

In 2012, ESPN ran an article about NBA star Jeremy Lin titled “Chink in the Armor.” Honestly, when I read the article I saw nothing wrong with it. In my world, this particular phrase is a reference to medieval knights and a “chink in the armor” is a reflection on how their battle dress isn’t as powerful or invulnerable as it used to be.

But that’s not how everyone took it, and very understandably.

“Chink” is also a racial epithet – toward people of Chinese descent like Mr. Lin. Many readers were, rightfully, outraged by the column. Their outrage ultimately cost the ESPN writer his job.

In his apology letter, the writer both explained his intention and apologized for not thinking things through:

I wrote the headline in reference to the tone of the column and not to Jeremy Lin’s race. It was a lapse in judgment and not a racist pun. It was an awful editorial omission and it cost me my job.

I owe an apology to Jeremy Lin and all people offended. I am truly sorry.

This writer owned his mistake. He never denied that it happened, but explained what he had meant and apologized all the same.

The Bottom Line

I never intended to humiliate my coworker in college. I never intended to call her out in front of her peers for missing a meeting. I never intended to imply she wasn’t doing her job. I never intended to criticize her.

But that’s what happened.

The writer at ESPN never intended to use a racial epithet in the title of his column. He never intended to offend the athlete about whom he was writing or any of his readers.

But that’s what happened.

I will give Mr. Trump the benefit of the doubt when he says he never intended to mock Mr. Kovalesk’s disability. But make no mistake – he absolutely intended to mock the man.

That’s what happened.

It’s up to you and no one else to own your words and actions. If they’re taken to mean something hostile, hurtful, or hateful you need to own that, too. Not intending to offend someone doesn’t make what you’ve done any less offensive.

No one can apologize for my words in that meeting but me.

No one can apologize for writing that article but the writer.

No one can apologize for mocking Mr. Kovalesk but Donald Trump.

Going Negative

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Every summer throughout college, I had the opportunity to work as a counselor at a Boy Scout summer camp in the Oregon coast range. It was a fantastic gig for me. I got to spend time in the woods, build campfires, hike to my heart’s content, and invest time teaching outdoors skills to youth.

It was also a hard job where I worked long hours for little pay. That said, working there has always been one of my fondest memories and the camp still holds a special place in my heart. 1

The last summer, though, things were a bit rough.

The Boy Scouts’ popularity grows and diminishes on a fairly regular basis. When it starts to wane, the organization starts making cuts to save on budget. Our council (regional body) maintained four overnight resident camps in the area: Mine, one at the beach, a horse camp on the other side of the mountains, and another leased facility closer to the center of the state. When push came to shove, we knew that two of the camps would stay open: One had the beach, the other had horses.

But the last two camps always seemed to compete for “who is more relevant?”

Making Our Case

We spent the summer doubling down on program. Our high adventure course was second to none, we offered lifeguard courses at the lake, expanded our tomahawk throwing range. I even added an art class and a course on the history of space exploration to the curriculum. We wanted to do everything possible to differentiate ourselves and keep the proverbial doors open.

Then we got news that the other camp started having plumbing issues.

And by pluming issues I mean they had a river a of crap running down a trail through the center of camp.

It would have been incredibly easy for us to jump all over that and make it central to the “which camp stays open” issue. Admit it, between a small camp in the coast range and a larger one with a river of excrement below the dining hall, where would you rather stay.

But we didn’t do that.

I’d like to say it was because we universally had more class than that. Alas, it was our boss 2 who kept us all on the right path:

If “at least we don’t have a river of poo” is the best thing we can say about our camp, none of us are doing our jobs.

Going Negative

It’s often easier to point out the flaws in your competition than it is to highlight your own selling points.

The “I’m a Mac/I’m a PC” commercials of yesterday are funny because of their wit. However they spend as much or more time on the frustrations of a PC as they do the values of a Mac.

Car advertisements still spend a fair amount of time promoting the wide array of awards given to various models and brands. At the same time, commercials are more often delving into “unlike so-and-so” territory.

Political campaigns are the worst of all.

The 2016 presidential election is currently neck-and-neck between the two leading candidates; either one is ahead by 1-3 points, depending on which poll you read. How popular they are isn’t an issue – the issue is how they are treating their competition.

Both campaigns have invested millions of dollars tearing the other down. Between their name calling, scandal highlights, and outright lies about one another these candidates have done more to tarnish one another’s reputation than they have to build their own.

 

Out of the roughly 46% of Americans voting in favor of either candidate, 3 many aren’t voting that way because they thing it’s the best choice for America. They’re voting that way because they’re convinced voting the other way is the worst choice for America.

Ultimately, only one candidate will win.

Instead of fighting a campaign to promote herself as the right person for the job, Hillary Clinton has spent equal time trying to convince America that a Donald Trump presidency will spell the end of America. Likewise, Donald Trump has spent as much time, energy, and money putting his name forward for president as he has convincing his supporters a Clinton presidency means sure disaster.

Whomever wins, they will inherit a divided America. An America where some thing they’re the best choice, where some think they’re not the worst choice, and where almost half of the country has been beaten over the head for 15 months with the message that any action they take will mean the end of life in America as we know it.

Both major candidates’ campaign has boiled down to, “well at least I don’t …”

As my boss once said, if that’s your best selling point, you’re not doing your job.

Notes:

  1. I get the chance to volunteer up there every year and still, even 10 years after my last summer on staff, go back time and again to visit. ↩
  2. This particular supervisor will go down in history as, hands down, the best human being I have ever worked with. ↩
  3. The polls are in a dead 46-46 heat at the moment, with the remaining few percent either undecided or in a third party camp. ↩