On 2/8/07, Sandip Bhattacharya <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Kenneth Gonsalves wrote: > > the only question being asked here is 'should the community > > participate in conferences where microsoft is a sponsor' - and if it > > does, how does the community benefit? > > I believe there is a disconnect between what Kenneth is talking about > and what others are talking about. > > We all (Kenneth included) believe that every company (even Microsoft) > should have as much an opportunity as others to be at a FOSS event if it > has something relevant to say. This is probably a point on which every > body including LA, Anupam, Kenneth agree upon.
Agreed. > Kenneth(and Me and others) goes beyond this argument with the following > line - Microsoft has had enough opportunities to participate in FOSS in > the time so far. Microsoft has announced its intentions and beliefs > rather clearly everytime - it doesn't like GPL/Free software/Opensource, > and it will go to any length to subvert this > community/movement/industry. It has shown its subversive intentions this > time too - by undermining Linux in a Linux event by ostentatiously > participating to show their open source offerings, and then promoting > their closed source software as an alternative. > > Given this rather long track record of Microsoft, we feel that it has no > place in an Free/Open Source event of any nature. Its presence(leave > alone sponsorship) itself undermines the event's credibility. I don't agree to this. As I've already pointed out. Microsoft's presence can only negatively affect a Linux event as much as we let it. That Microsoft's presence would undermine any Linux event's credibility is a myth that I'd like to see broken as soon as possible. Whenever I see a big computing conference being publicized I always wishing that somehow Linux and FOSS manage to grab some sound bytes right along with the big closed source boys. When I see MS employees on a Vista publicity campaign, and users being captivated by the 3d opengl based interface, I wish someone shows these people XGL and Compiz running on Linux and makes it a known fact that you can have everything Vista *promises* and more, on their desktops, right now, without costs or licenses. In short I wish for an equal stage, free of FUD, and it's clear that Microsoft is too scared to provide one. So when it comes to Microsoft advertising in Linux magazines and sponsoring Linux events, where you see red, I see an opportunity, of an equal footing, at Microsoft's expense. Linux and FOSS is clearly better than Windows, we just need to cut through MS's FUD. Mailing Lists will not do that for the average Joe, such collaborative events will. > > It is because of this argument, that we are considering whether we > should associate ourselves with any organization which doesn't feel the > same way about our movement. > > And please, for those focusing on the "practical side of Linux", it > would be best that you stay away from this discussion. You obviously > don't look at the larger picture. There would be no Linux/FOSS if people > only focused on the "practical side". Not true. Linus is another one of those "practical side" people, who had created Linux without any philosophy in mind. I totally agree that without RMS and FSF and GNU and all the "big picture people" we would not be where we are today but without "the practical people" we would all still be hacking on a huge bunch of loosely coupled GNU utilities wrapped around a commercial closed source kernel, waiting for GNU Mach to make an appearance. There would be no KDE, only a Gnome which would have been but a shell of it's formidable capabilities now (because I believe much of the impetus for Gnome's development came from KDE's success, I may be wrong but let's not debate that, it's seriously OT). For programming we would probably have a choice between C and Lisp and for editors between Emacs and Vi. Oh and the Linux user community would probably be in tens (or at max hundreds) of thousands instead of millions as is the case today, and Microsoft would be too busy promoting Windows 2007 to be wasting time sponsoring Linux events. Yes Sir, in the world inhabited solely by the "big picture people" things would be all too rosy and everyone would be happy. You and me, as happy as we can be, the happy hapless people stuck with Windows who wouldn't even realise what *could have been* and yes, the happiest of all would have been Microsoft. Regards, Anupam Jain _______________________________________________ ilugd mailinglist -- ilugd@lists.linux-delhi.org http://frodo.hserus.net/mailman/listinfo/ilugd Archives at: http://news.gmane.org/gmane.user-groups.linux.delhi http://www.mail-archive.com/ilugd@lists.linux-delhi.org/
