Why The ALT.NET Community Needs To Change Their Ways
Posted by Davy Brion on August 25th, 2008
Since its inception, the ALT.NET community has grown a lot. A lot of people have joined the mailinglists and all over the world local ALT.NET communities have been created, with most likely a lot more on the way. That is definitely a good thing. At the same time though, the ALT.NET community has probably put off as many people (if not more) than it has attracted in the first place.
Now, just so everyone is clear on this: i consider myself a part of that community and i definitely want to see it become successful. But for that to happen, i think we need to make some changes. The biggest problem is that we are often perceived as being elitist, and according to some people closed-minded. And honestly, there’s a lot of truth to that. Just read our mailinglists, our blog posts, our ‘tweets’ (i don’t use twitter so i don’t know if that’s the correct way of referring to it but you know what i mean) and a lot of the material we put out there in general. Not everyone in this community is guilty of it, but a lot of us (myself included) are.
In general, we are extremely opinionated and we often state our opinions with a “our way or the highway” kind of mentality. We often outright dismiss approaches or solutions that do not follow our principles and values. And we usually do it in a manner which comes across in a very negative way. And it’s really not hard to see why that puts a lot of people off. When someone simply tells me i need to do something in a certain way, my natural reflex is to question it. Why should i do it that way? If i don’t get a sound response to that (and one-liners usually don’t cut it), the person (or company or whatever) who made the claim immediately loses credibility in my book. I can definitely see how some people have felt that way after hearing/reading certain ALT.NET people making their claims without properly backing them up or simply brushing off any questioning of those claims.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with being opinionated and voicing those opinions. But we really should try to do so in a more positive manner. Simply stating that all developers should use certain practices or principles just doesn’t work. We have to formulate our messages better and we probably need to provide more material that properly explains why practice X or principle Y or library Z allows us to achieve better results. And most importantly, we need to make sure we’re able to discuss these things with anyone who’s not yet ‘into it’ or even against it, without putting people off. If a lot of people think that we’re elitist, closed-minded, frustrated, annoying, or whatever (and they do, just google it) then we are clearly not doing a good job. If we really want to spread these practices and principles that we value so much, we can’t afford to rub so many people the wrong way.
As i mentioned in the beginning of my post, i’ve definitely made these mistakes on quite a few occasions. And i’m gonna try to change that from now on. So if you see me repeat those mistakes, please direct me to this post 
August 25th, 2008 at 10:46 pm
You have a point about the people on the Alt.Net list being opinionated and I do understand the frustration you feel from the one line answers.
I think the community members are getting tired of answering the same 20 questions over and over again, and this is why you get the one line answers like; “go check RhinoCommons” or “read Evans”.
If the group is going to change for the better they need a new way to communicate their collective ideas to existing and new members. Forums are a great way to communicate with fellow developers but not a good way to disseminate knowledge to the uninitiated.
Now all you need is a forum with its communication and notification features and a wiki like system like knol (http://knol.google.com). If the Alt.Net forum had a built in wiki, then we could get the group past the startup questions and on to other practices that might be able to tolerate some other points of view.
Just my opinionated opinion
Adam j Wolf
Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
Albert Einstein
August 26th, 2008 at 11:16 am
I have been researching and utilizing product agnostic solution architecture, where APPROPRIATE, for a few moths now, coming from a “MSDN way” background. I thought the ALT.NET comunity was all about using the best solution to the problem regardless of produced it originally. Problem being that the ALT.NET community virtually only use open source or ported open source technologies, and if it’s named Rhino something you know it’s got to be good. Isn’t that narrow minded???
August 26th, 2008 at 11:40 am
“I thought the ALT.NET comunity was all about using the best solution to the problem regardless of produced it originally.”
yup, that’s what it _should_ be about
but i wouldn’t necessarily agree that the ALT.NET community only uses open source technologies… if closed source solutions are the best, then those are the ones that are recommended (resharper, dottrace, etc…)
but yeah, open source usage is pretty prevalent in the ALT.NET community, which isn’t a problem as long as the chosen solutions really are the best ones
August 26th, 2008 at 2:36 pm
[...] Why the ALT.NET Community Needs to Change Their Ways (Davy Brion) [...]
August 26th, 2008 at 10:14 pm
[...] *** Why The ALT.NET Community Needs To Change Their Ways – Davy Brion Nice opinion piece by Dave (on a pet peeve of mine lately, so I might be biased). Agreed that we see too many elitist opinions floating around in the Alt.NET world. We need to rethink what the central goal is here: voice our opinions as much as possible to – in our view – the unknowing masses, or reaching out and helping other developers who are struggling to find a better way to do things ‘ If we really want to spread these practices and principles that we value so much, we can’t afford to rub so many people the wrong way ‘ [...]
August 26th, 2008 at 11:40 pm
Thank you for this post, but I hold little hope for change. Theirs is the more public forum and they tend to dominate public discourse. Their reactions to challenges of any kind are beyond off-putting and put a very real burden on any who would raise questions–enough so that I have to wonder if that effect isn’t deliberate. As someone who has had the temerity to question Alt.Net principles in public I can tell you that the response tends to start with patronizing and build to furious over time if you refuse to recant. I get called names, my professionalism is challenged, my positions are distorted, and that’s when leading community figures don’t simply dismiss me as ignorant out of hand. It seems that to some “ignorant” means “doesn’t agree with me.”
And here’s my response to those who claim that they keep answering the same 20 questions: if you were actually answering them, they wouldn’t keep returning. I get the sense that some in the community want to move on and consider certain processes and concepts as settled before they’ve actually settled them–at least in a way that can be transfered to someone who doesn’t already believe. You may be personally convinced, but since the logic eventually comes down to “I tried it and liked it” you need to understand when that isn’t convincing to skeptics.
And here’s what I’ve been waiting for: an honest and thorough examination of where the beloved techniques and patterns break. Saying that something delivers value can be interesting. Saying that something gives value in situations a, b, and c but tends to break down in situation d gives contextual information that is invaluable when it comes to deciding if something is applicable in your own situation. Because here’s an unvarnished and universal truth: everything breaks somewhere. I have much more confidence in a pattern or process when those edges have been explored, mapped out, and made public than when all I hear about are the amazing benefits of .
August 27th, 2008 at 7:26 am
@Jacob
Actually, it was all those responses to your Typemock post that got me thinking about how much the ALT.NET community really needs to change in the first place. I personally prefer to design for testability as well as the other important -ilities, but your post made some good points. And the reactions you got where completely uncalled for and unfortunately, very typical for some of the ‘community leaders’. But even though they are considered ‘leaders’, i don’t think they speak for the entire community in situations like that. At least, i’d hope not.
August 27th, 2008 at 6:35 pm
Thanks Davy. That’s incredibly brave of you and I sincerely appreciate it. I hope they don’t speak for the entire community as well, but given their vituperation, I can see why those who disagree might hesitate to make their concerns public.
Here’s the thing I should probably make explicit some time: I tend to design for testability as well, I just do it for reasons that have nothing to do with testability. Well-encapsulated code and loose coupling have benefits in their own rights. Benefits that get obscured and/or ignored because we’re so hung up on “testability”.
September 1st, 2008 at 12:14 pm
This is the single most disappointing post I’ve read from you since I started reading your blog. I’m so tired of reading posts talking about why ALT.NET needs to “change their ways” or become more Mort-friendly or whatever. I thought this movement was founded to bring together people with the same mindset — not to convert the rest of the world to our viewpoint.
It’s funny to hear people talk about closed-mindedness when the raison d’être for ALT.NET was the fact that .NET developers were too closed-minded about non-Microsoft solutions. Yes, perhaps some of us dismiss things because of principles and values, but heck, aren’t those pretty good reasons to dismiss things? Perhaps people don’t back up all their claims, but I don’t recall signing up for a tutoring session. I’m willing to point people in the right direction but if they cannot do the necessary research themselves, I can’t get myself to care.
The worst thing about these blog posts is that they (imho) radiate a sense of superiority. The poster has been hanging out with ALT.NET folks for a while, and suddently “he gets it”. He “knows” what the big ALT.NET problem is. Sorry, but I wasn’t even aware we had a problem. (Agreed, this last part is not specifically geared towards you. But for the one time that I decide to answer to these posts, better include it.)
TL;DR: I disagree respectfully
September 1st, 2008 at 12:43 pm
converting the rest of the world to our viewpoints is not necessarily the goal, but a community has no right to bitch or complain when their viewpoints or preferences aren’t accepted by ‘the others’ if they are unwilling to properly educate people as to why those viewpoints matter
and again, one-liners don’t count… and as mentioned before in these comments, if the same questions are being asked over and over again, they are definitely not being answered. At the same time, you hear a lot of ALT.NET’ers bitch and complain because the other side still fails to see the point and they still don’t understand the issues
so really, who’s fault is that? Theirs for not doing the necessary research? Or ours?
Why does it have to be so ‘us vs them’ in the first place?
Starting a movement for people with the same mindset is great… but don’t bitch when people outside of that movement or community fail to see the point if you do a half-assed job of making clear exactly what the point is. All it takes is for Microsoft to release another library that isn’t up to ‘our’ standards, and then the bitchfest starts all over again. So yea, i’d say there is most definitely a problem with the ALT.NET community
How anyone can miss that at this point is beyond me
September 1st, 2008 at 6:00 pm
I have never “bitched” because other people fail to see the point. However, when “other people” come to places mostly frequented by ALT.NET people, I assume they are at least willing to do their homework. So yes, perhaps it’s a bit harsh, but IMHO, it’s their fault.
As for the “us vs them”, that’s what you get when you have opposing viewpoints. It doesn’t mean you have to go to war though.
That being said, when you say “Microsoft releases another library”, I assume you mean EF. There was alot of reason for bitching since, unless I’m grossly mistaken, the points had already extensively been discussed with the team behind EF. That other library, ASP.NET MVC, isn’t receiving this amount of bitching. I wonder why.
September 1st, 2008 at 7:42 pm
if you look at some of the reactions whenever someone posts something that doesn’t really fit within the ALT.NET mindset it often gets quite disrespectful and elitist. The responses Jacob got on his typemock post are a pretty good example of this.
i wasn’t talking specifically about EF, although it is a good example. With ASP.NET it is different, but then again, that team has been open to feedback from the ALT.NET crowd very early in the development cycle. Let’s hope it won’t be the last time
January 24th, 2010 at 4:07 pm
[...] done a good job (IMO) of being accessible to new-comers. I’ve complained about this in August 2008. Nothing changed after that post, and nothing will change after this post either. A lot [...]