Because modern FOSS movement is not to be trusted.
The goal of Indiecomputing Initiative is to be the spiritual successor of the original Free Software movement and provide truly-libre alternative computing solutions that one can trust. By the phrase "solutions that one can trust" we mean that we hold an absolute-neutral stance on any non-tech issues. To be able to maintain this, Indiecomputing Initiative adopts the Trust Principle.
The Trust Principle of Indiecomputing Initiative goes as follows:
Rule 1 (Trust Principle). Everyone should be treated in the same way with absolute no regard of their stances on non-tech issues. If you believe someone should be prohibited from taking parts in indiecomputing activities purely for any non-tech reasons, you are not to be trusted.
We firmly believe that changes in any part of the project - let it be the documentation, the maintaining team, the code itself, or any other aspects - that happens purely for non-technological reasons are strictly untrustable.
No, because unlike certain modern FOSS projects, we don't believe in oppression of opinions; we operate purely on trusts instead of modulation like most part of the current FOSS movement do.
Rule 2. Indiecomputing Initiative does not have a ban list, and any organisation which claims to be align with the spirit of Indiecomputing should never have one. Rule 3. Any one who violates the Trust Principle is untrusted instead of banned; the actual performed offence should be documented and released and freely available to the public. Rule 4. The contribution from untrusted parties to any Indiecomputing Initiative codebase should go through extra-strict examination and scrutinization; maintainer of said project is allowed to simply reject these contribution if they are not directly related to the tech per se. Rule 5. Whoever's on the untrusted list stays on the untrusted list permanently.
Rule 6. We believe in a strict division of "opinion" and "action"; the former is protected by the Trust Principle and the latter is not protected and subject to being the reason for untrust. For example, assume there is someone not happy with the political stance of a certain project maintainer on a certain topic; if they only went on social media to vent, the project maintainer should not untrust them because of their venting; but if they went on social media to ask their peers to back them up and spam the issue tracker of the project, this should be considered brigading and the project maintainer should untrust all of them and is allowed to reject any contribution from them in the future.
Rule 7. Anyone - including people who have been listed in the untrusted list in any of the previously-existing group or subgroup before - is allowed to participate, start a subgroup or declare one or many of his project to be a part of Indiecomputing Initiative if and only if they strictly adhere to the Truth Principle and any of the rules mentioned above and below. Rule 8. Any individuals, organizations, projects, groups or subgroups is automatically denounced from being a part of the Indiecomputing Initiative once the Truth Principle or any of the rules mentioned above and below is broken.
Rule 9. Indiecomputing Initiative has no global governing body and has no global representative organisation. Whoever claims to be the definitive representative of Indiecomputing Initiative is to be untrusted.
Rule 10. Subgroups are allowed to share their untrusted list - people who have been untrusted in one group are often people who should've better become untrusted in another group.
All the rules mentioned in this document are designed, drafted and set by Zãaktîn Läm, the first Grand Observer of Indiecomputing Initiative. Rule 11. All new rules in the future must be added in the form of addendum, i.e. the text describing the new rules should be appended after the old text; under no circumstances shall the text describing the previously-established rules be changed. Rule 12. All rules mentioned in this document are absolute: they apply to any self-proclaimed subgroup of Indiecomputing Initiative, and under absolutely no circumstances shall these rules be changed, dismissed or nullified in any way, shape or form, and no new rules in conflict with these rules shall be added.
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