On Wed, March 7, 2007 15:37, Josef Assad wrote: > Hello OSGeo community, > > I am a little new in here, so a quick two line introduction; Ive been > involved with free software for something like 8 years now in almost > all capacities except programming it (much to the fortune of code > quality everywhere). Advocacy, program management, licensing, community > building, etc. Grass roots to enterprise (UN agencies, government, > etc.). > > On Wed, 07 Mar 2007 23:08:06 +1100 > Tim Bowden <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > >> This thread has really mutated but fwiw, here goes: > > Yes, this thread has gotten thrown a bit :) Back to the original > discussion around whether it makes sense to let Oracle in given the > proposal Paul showed us. My two cents are: > > 1. I am missing the point around dissecting the expressions open source > and free software. From my perspective, OSGeo is about the kind of > software which will generally adhere to the four basic freedoms[1]. > I prefer the French expression for free software: logiciels libres > (excuse my horrible French). Liberty. What we are seeing from Oracle in > this presentation does not address that core ethos in any manner. > 2. Oracle does provide some free-of-charge systems, but that clearly is > neither free software nor open source. In fact, it is debatable whether > their products which are free of license costs are free of costs in > general (cue long-winded discussion on costs of getting locked in to > their platform, costs of requiring more fancy hardware than if one had > gone with more resource-efficient open source systems, etc.) > 3. In my mind, OSGeo is what the name sounds like; we are a boolean AND > operation of interest in geospatial systems AND open source. If > Oracle were to be let in simply because they are addressing one of our > thematic interests then I might ping the firefox team and see if they > want in also! :) > 4. I am not seeing any explicit nods towards open standards (OGCs > domain, I think) either in the proposal. > > I think its great to be inclusive, and I think it is worth taking a > little trouble to help Oracle make a better match to what this > community represents and is trying to advocate. There must certainly be > plenty of clever people there, and if we could give them guidelines for > what kind of proposal they could come up with which gives better > congruency with the twin themes of geospatial systems and open source, > then everyone would be richer for the effort. > > What I would not agree with however would be showing flexibility in > commitment to what open source fundamentally is in the name of being > inclusive. This does not mean we chase people off with a stick if they > mutter the word windows, but it does not mean either that we have > proprietary shops roll in and set up stands. In this case and with a > major proprietary vendor such as Oracle, there would be the need to be > extra careful about the way they are brought in since we might be > talking about different kinds of free. That can only confuse people > rather than enlighten them, and we do hope that one of the objectives > is more enlightened people not less :) > > There are fields out there where proprietary systems are entrenched and > where the field could not get ahead if the proprietary vendor were not > there; geospatial systems as a field is fortunate not to be one of those > and we seem to have an extremely solid stack. This merits protection > from dilution of the concept (Free) from which this stack arose, in my > opinion. > > So, in a situation like this (apologies for rehashing; I want to make > sure my personal position is clear in this matter), I would > emphatically vote in for Oracle but not with that proposal. > > Apologies for a long rant! > > > Josef
Thanks a lot. Arnulf. (I just removed the quotes around the Free in the subject ot make sure...) _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss