On Thursday 24 January 2008 11:26, Andrew Savory wrote: > On 1/22/08, Kevin Donnelly <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Ah, I understand now. You're a bit like an 18th-century liberal > > espousing universal suffrage, but not for the lower classes, women or > > blacks. I still don't see how the zealotry of insisting that closed > > software should still have a privileged position in the landscape wins > > out over the pragmatism of advocating the benefits of free software (eg > > access to your own data), but that's a circle for you to square. I find > > it hard to believe that the time or useability advantages are all on one > > side, however. > > Wow ... that's quite a leap. From "not hardline enough to be Free > Software" to racist, chauvinist supremacist? You, sir, are a master of > reductio ad absurdum.
Hmm - not really. You want things to change, but only a little bit. Justifying this by suggesting it's what every "pragmatic" person should want does smack of the zealot to me .... > > I never mentioned Al Gore - I had in mind the common or garden business > > person, in fact. Their message would certainly be weakened ... if it > > were sincere to begin with, of course. > > Well, replace Al Gore with anyone doing particularly good works for > the environment. That's my point - for the average business person to emote about global warming and then do little about it in practice could be seen as hypocritical. > I am not claiming that Free Software is 100% suitable for "prime time" > on the desktop, so I don't think that using a proprietary OS is > hypocritical. I don't think anyone is claiming that - the question is whether we should be making it easier or less easy for closed software to retain a privileged position in the marketplace. I do wonder whether the advice you are giving to customers about the Linux desktop (for instance) is not a couple of years out of date - only this week Nortel was reported (http://www.mbtmag.com/articleXml/LN731846314.html) to be looking at switching to a Linux desktop (though I doubt it will go ahead with the switch), and there are many other examples. Are such companies completely misguided? -- Pob hwyl / Best wishes Kevin Donnelly www.klebran.org.uk - Gwirydd gramadeg rhydd i'r Gymraeg www.eurfa.org.uk - Geiriadur rhydd i'r Gymraeg www.rhedadur.org.uk - Rhedeg berfau Cymraeg _______________________________________________ Fsfe-uk mailing list [email protected] http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/fsfe-uk
