Alan Pope (popey)
| Profile | Link |
|---|---|
| Launchpad | ~popey |
| popey AT ubuntu DOT com | |
| Discourse | @popey |
| Blog | popey.com |
| Mastodon | @popey@mastodon.social |
| Employer | Chainguard (Staff Software Engineer) |
About Me
I live in Hampshire, UK, with my wife and two cats - Trigger & Blaze. Our two human children are grown up and out of the house. I’ve been an active user and contributor to Ubuntu since 4.10 (Warty Warthog), running it daily across my laptops, desktops, and servers.
My journey with Ubuntu spans both community leadership and internal advocacy:
- 2006 – 2012: Active community member, UK LoCo team lead, podcast host, and elected Community Council member.
- 2012 – 2021: Canonical employee working as a Community Manager and Developer Advocate (including several years on the Snap team).
- 2021 – Present: Back as an active community contributor, working in developer relations and currently serving as a Staff Software Engineer at Chainguard.
Why I’m Standing
Having served on the Community Council from 2009 to 2012 before joining Canonical, I want to lend my experience and time to the council once again.
Ubuntu has been a central part of my adult life. Having experienced the ecosystem as a community volunteer, an employee, and a volunteer again, I offer a clear, 360-degree view of how the project functions. I understand how governance looks from the outside and how decisions get made inside Canonical. That perspective is invaluable when resolving disputes, finding middle ground, and guiding community health.
Much of the council’s day-to-day role involves Code of Conduct cases, mediation, and structural health. This work demands patience, fairness, and a calm disposition. After nearly two decades moderating IRC, Ask Ubuntu, and Discourse, I am known for maintaining composure and treating community members with empathy—even during heated discussions.
With my kids now adults, I also have the personal bandwidth to handle the spiky workload that comes with council duties.
What I’ll Focus On
- Rapid CoC Resolution: Timely handling of Code of Conduct reports. A delayed response causes unnecessary stress and hurts community trust.
- Radical Transparency: Decisions and rationale should be documented publicly wherever privacy constraints allow, helping the community understand how and why the council operates.
- Proactive Governance: Monitoring team activity to ensure sub-projects and councils don’t quietly stall out—helping either revitalize them or gracefully wind them down.
- Mentorship & Succession: Reducing reliance on long-standing figures (myself included) by identifying promising contributors early, pairing them with experienced mentors, and onboarding them into leadership roles.
Conflicts of Interest & Transparency
- Employer Context: Chainguard builds minimal container images and a Linux distribution, which competes with Canonical in specific enterprise areas. However, the Community Council governs community culture and dispute resolution rather than technical or commercial direction. If a matter ever touches Chainguard’s commercial or strategic interests, I will declare it and recuse myself.
- Constructive Critique: I have written publicly regarding security concerns in the Snap Store. My feedback stems entirely from a desire to keep the platform safe and reliable for users. I bring that same direct honesty, grounded in care and respect, to my work on the council.
What I’ve Done for Ubuntu
Community & Governance
- Community Council Member (2009–2012)
- UK LoCo Team Point of Contact (2007–2008)
- Instance Administrator: Set up and maintain ubuntu.social Mastodon for the community.
- Moderation & Support: Long-time moderator and support contributor across IRC, Ask Ubuntu, and Discourse.
Media & Projects
- Co-founder: Ubuntu MATE (alongside Martin Wimpress).
- Podcasting: Co-founded and co-presented the Ubuntu Podcast (2008–2021, reaching ~10k listeners per episode). Currently co-host Linux Matters.
- Snap Packaging: Active maintainer of ~50 snaps in the ecosystem.
- Tooling: Created community web utilities like
snap-updates.
Events & Outreach
- Attended multiple Ubuntu Developer Summits (UDS), starting with self-funding my attendance at Seville in 2007.
- Co-organized OggCamp (one of the UK’s largest open-source events).
- Represented Ubuntu and the UK LoCo at LinuxWorld Expo London, Software Freedom Day, and international events.