On professionalism

There's been a huge storm in a tea-cup lately over Matt Aimonetti's "CouchDB: Perform like a pr0n star" presentation. It's been unexpectedly polemical. The responses have been exceptionally strong and polarized:

• people who view the presentation as inappropriate or unprofessional and are extremely upset, offended or threatened
• people who approve of Matt's presentation and vehemently defend his right to be as "edgy" as he pleases

But let's not forget the third category:

• people in the "middle of the road" — who perhaps approve, disapprove, or don't care — but who regardless of their perspective don't get all vocal about it

I'm firmly in the third camp. I think the people who have invested their energies in writing 2,000 word essays on the subject really could have spent their time a lot more wisely.

My two line take on the issue:

The presentation was evidently inappropriate, offensive, in bad taste, and he should have known better. But big deal; Matt's lack of good taste is hardly worth the amount of energy that has been poured into discussing it, even if he is a Rails "Activist".

"Professionalism" isn't a dirty word. It isn't "façade, fake sincerity, political correctness, not offending anyone, and everything else that makes life lifeless". On the contrary it's just focussing on doing your job well; and if the task at hand happens to be making a technical presentation to a heterogenous audience then that means doing so with a modicum of respect, good taste, and an awareness of what kind of message is appropriate.

Matt made an error of judgement and I don't hold it against him; but if he doesn't learn his lesson and goes and does this kind of thing again then, well, I'll have to revise my evaluation.