Hi! I'd like to represent Gentoo developers and the overall community in the 2021-2022 Gentoo Council. Let me have a go at persuading you. I've noticed some common themes during discussions. I've noticed a tendency to defer debate - which, on individual topics, may seem reasonable at the time, but with a wider perspective, becomes problematic. I feel the council should have its eyes on moving Gentoo forward. One _forges_ consensus, it doesn't develop naturally, especially in a large project like ours. I want the council to be front-and-centre in discussions about the future, not just the "boring last formality". I consider myself in touch with various parts of the project; I don't just maintain my packages. My main philosophy is 'user-centric'. I keep an eye on bugs which are affecting users, I'm prominent in #gentoo (one of our main support venues). I know what's bothering our userbase and I work to fix it. Technical correctness? That's important to me (you can look at some of my commits for that), but so is being useful, and keeping Gentoo practical (and fun for many of our users) to use! Sometimes we have to find a middle ground between those and that's okay. If I had to give myself a 2-word bio, it'd be "ruthless pragmatist". I *hope* I've managed to get across within my time in Gentoo so far that I care about fixing things. I care about things working. I care about reaching compromise. I've mediated plenty of times between plenty of developers and helped to reach a conclusion which everyone can be happy with. Finally, if I haven't yet persuaded you enough to kindly include me on your ballot, you're very welcome to message me publicly or privately with any questions you have. best, sam