Thanks for the update, Jordan. The updates are important and appreciated. Truly. I look forward to the good news of the next one.
I have one small quibble regarding outward appearances and unexpressed timelines. This frequent use of the word "staff", that's obviously meant to distinguish a small group from the rest of us, is a little itchy under the apparent circumstances.
As far as I understand it, and as far as anyone newly arriving here would understand it, there's one guy (Toby), and there's another guy (Franz) who got on board, and they take volunteer contributions and occasional donations from the community. In fact, the most I've seen made public, is a "Core Team":
- Toby Zerner – Core Developer
- Franz Liedke – Core Developer
- Dominion – i18n Lead
- Daniël Klabbers – Community Manager
That doesn't outwardly suggest a legal structure having a revenue stream to pay support staff, whether full-time or not. Don't get me wrong, if the team is more than just a dedicated group of volunteers, and you're getting paid for your efforts, then more power to you. It gives me some assurance that my time/effort invested learning this tool is not entirely misplaced, and that using it for my own community of people being migrated off Google+ is not a lost cause. But if what appears on the surface is true — that it's just two guys tinkering in their spare time (which isn't much) on software, with some other volunteers moderating a forum — then maybe using terms like "emergency staff meeting" is over-inflating the reality of the situation; giving mixed messages, if but unintentionally.
The thing is, "staff" has an implicit ring to it. Its appearance and regular use basically gives the impression this operation is well-structured and supported, serious, dedicated, responsive, on track, and so on — in short, professional. And it may well be. In that case, you should be able to give your "customers" some straight answers about when a milestone of the product/service will arrive, even if it's a guess-timate. Be honest about it. People are forgiving when you're honest, even if you're inaccurate, but at least give something. A ball-park point in time is all that's needed. It shows that you are serious and will make a little extra effort to meet that milestone.
But you never give a time, not even an approximation, which, let's be honest, get's developers off the hook. It buys them more time they don't have to explain. I understand that. Things happen and timelines shift and you don't want to give dates that end up changing. But in that case, maybe it's better to adopt a dialog that better suits the garage operation it is right now. Take off the business suit and put on the AC/DC tee-shirt. When the website footer reads "Copyright Flarum, Inc.", then don the suit and use the dialog again. Or at least update the "Team" list, along with the rest of the website content, so it's current and shows that support staff are truly on the job.
