@penguinpbx When I was leaving Sangoma, I advocated for @lgaetz to take on a leadership role managing the community. I trusted his judgment and believed he would make decisions in the best interest of the project, for sure I since I left, I irritated Lorne a time or two with some post, but he would reach out and we would have a conversation and work it out.
I understand that you feel attacked, but the reality is, we’re trying to share our experience with you. Did we make mistakes while running the project? Things we would do differently, if we wanted to do it again? Absolutely. But we also achieved 16 straight quarters of growth during our tenure at Sangoma. We took a project from its infancy to becoming the world’s most popular open-source PBX. That experience gives us a unique perspective, and yes, we are speaking from it. I’ve said before open source people are passionate, if one is going to advocate for open source, you have to be ready for that.
From Tony, my and James times working directly for FreePBX, We recognize the leadership of the project has changed—it’s a change we ourselves helped bring about. But when we see things going sideways or nearing the edge of a cliff, we feel compelled to point it out.
On your current approach of implementing bans and manual trust level adjustments. These actions seem to be creating more division than resolution, and that’s not the path to a stronger community.
Let’s look at some concrete data points regarding contributions to this community:
Metric | Preston Joined 2010 | Tony Lewis - Joined 2007 | James Finstrom - Joined 2007 | Chris Maj - Joined 2012 | Mike White - Joined 2020 | Combined @penguinpbx & @mwhite |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Days Visited | 2,000 | 3,600 | 3,000 | 244 | 418 | 662 |
Read Time | 7 days | 23 days | 19 days | 3 days | 23 hours | 4 days |
Topics Viewed | 5,800 | 23,500 | 11,700 | 1,000 | 869 | 1,869 |
Posts Created | 883 | 6,300 | 3,800 | 377 | 42 | 419 |
Topics Created | 99 | 111 | 156 | 20 | 2 | 22 |
Post Read | 32,300 | 131,000 | 60,200 | 5,900 | 4,600 | 10,500 |
Hearts Received | 153 | 935 | 1,300 | 78 | 59 | 137 |
Solutions Provided | 8 | 79 | 89 | 3 | 0 | 3 |
Hot Links (300+ clicks) | 23 | 29 | 22 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Famous Links (1,000+ clicks) | 6 | 9 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Popular Links (50+ clicks) | 97 | 98 | 188 | 50 | 0 | 50 |
Contributions Matter: Tony and James have thousands of posts, hundreds of solutions, and significant engagement through links and likes. These contributions far exceed the activity of any existing moderators, including you and Mike White, whose combined stats still don’t match those of Myself or Tony individually. It’s not just viewing and posting, look at Famous, hot and popular links well, the numbers don’t lie.
Code of Conduct and Site Guidelines: While referencing the Code of Conduct and Site Guidelines in all of your post outlining why these actions were taken, it’s worth noting that both you and Mike White only read these guidelines for the first time in September 2024—Mike on September 10th and you on September 9th. I was among the first 10 users to read the guidelines nearly 10 years ago, in December 2014. To date, only 388 people have read them, with Mike White ranked as the 367th and you as the 368th reader. It’s hard to justify heavy enforcement of rules when the moderators themselves have only recently familiarized themselves with them.
Manual Trust Adjustments: My trust level was downgraded from TL4 to TL2 (although I don’t show Leader at all, Just Member) despite high engagement. Metrics like days visited, read time, and topics viewed are objectively among the highest in the community, my my links with over 1000 clicks are also at the top of the charts. This manual adjustment raises concerns about fairness, especially when decisions are made without clear justification. Unless changed, to be moved out of TL4 would require a moderator to make that modification, there is nothing automated about it. This is an issue of transparency.
Context and Misinterpretation: The verbiage you are speaking about was hidden by you, so the community cannot see that context, the “Dictator” verbiage and threats you speak of, are from an email exchange with Tony, not a forum post that was hidden by you, as best I can tell. Tony showed me that email he sent, and Tony’s email, while strongly worded, typical of Tony, reflects frustration with how moderation is being handled, you had locked his account, with no communication so his only recourse was to email. His comment about “not lasting long” clearly refers to the sustainability of the community, not a physical threat. If there is no community involvement, then is there a role for an open source advocate? Taking it out of context and banning him escalates the situation unnecessarily.
Open Source Values: Criticism and questioning of leadership or sponsors are natural in open-source communities. Suppressing dissent creates distrust and damages the project. Open dialogue—even when uncomfortable—strengthens the community. Bans and silencing erode that foundation. We had our detractors while running the project, and apparently still have a few but we would have those conversations in public, you can just look at our post history to prove it.
The bans and trust level changes create the appearance of silencing disagreement rather than fostering collaboration. This community’s strength has always been its passionate and knowledgeable members. Actions like these risk alienating the very people who have contributed the most to its success.
If the goal is to foster a collaborative and thriving community, moderation should focus on promoting transparency, encouraging contributions, and addressing criticism constructively—not silencing key contributors. Without this, you risk isolating yourself and alienating the very people who built and supported this community and Project for years.
I hope these points are received as constructive feedback. My goal, like yours, is to see this community flourish—not fragment further.