Re: [libreplanet-discuss] libreplanet-discuss Digest, Vol 79, Issue 9

[Serge Hooge]

> On the one hand, I've never experienced the Free software community as
> caring very much about corporate correctness (I say corporate because
> this is a far cry from political correctness), which for some people
> can be very refreshing. Some of us got really fed up with Windows and
> looked for other options, and then found GNU and the philolophy
> around Free software.

Definitely. 

My main point is that limiting sarcasm in a place of discussion is
nothing short of censorship. And censorship on a mailing list with the
word "libre" in it sound ludicrous to me. North Korea reportedly banned
sarcasm not long ago, last I heard.

A public mailing list, to me, is a place for discussion and discussion
requires expressing opinions. Anyone should be free to express opinions
regardless of somebody's personal agreement or understanding of such an
opinion.

If it's the clarity of discussion people are so afraid about, then what
happened to politely asking and getting a polite response back? There
is no shame in doing so.
If it's language or culture, well, you'll end up learning something.
English is far from my first language and I certainly didn't end up
learning it by telling everyone to speak easy English because I *might*
end up not understanding it.

> On the other hand, I understand that it would perhaps be necessary to
> see companies stop using proprietary software.

A lot of them already see the benefits from their business standpoint
and contribute. The Linux kernel and Firefox are very good examples of
that.

In the end, most of the contributors to one company's free software
project will be their employees and bugtrackers, on the other hand, are
places of business and not so much places of discussion. I can
understand pushing for clarity there.

I haven't seen corporations that liberated their software projects get
heavily involved with the actual community. Any company is driven
mainly by profits and free software must be appealing to them from a
business standpoint first and foremost.

Perhaps if they see their company names "tarnished" they will wonder
why and try and get their name back. Because as of right now, I
don't think they deserve them. And if they are not willing to actually
stand for free software, then I don't see how they would fit into the
community in the first place.

> What kind of support? Given that many of us do all this stuff for
> free, I think hackers and helpers should get some "support" ($) in
> return from companies (not individuals). Perhaps this could be part
> of the move toward providing an easy way to donate to developers. (As
> for tech support, anyone can build a regular business around that.)
> 
> Thoughts anyone?

I absolutely agree. After all, this *was* the original topic of
discussion.

Cheers,
-- 
Serge Hooge

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