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Re: [ox-en] Germ of a new form of society or germ of a new form of business?



On Wed, Jan 28, 2004 at 02:04:11PM -0000, Niall Douglas wrote:
Most (young) people who hate computers do so because of two things:
(i) the historical unreliability of Windows and (ii) lack of usage
skills because MS made them appear sufficiently simple that they
could claim no training is required (this was and is lies, but still
not one we've gotten over).

In other words: the only intuitive interface is a nipple. :)

The great trouble with the Linux desktop is that of the Windows 
desktop - to really get anything done you need some technical 
knowledge. That technical knowledge for Windows is not that for Linux 
nor can it be translated - therefore this is a major switching cost 
for the average home user.

Interestingly I have found the non-programmer users with the most 
technical knowledge are Mac fans. They don't know how or why deleting 
some line in some file works, but they do know it. I find this kind 
of mentality extremely interesting because these people are much more 
common than programmer-types and thus a larger market.

This is getting into some pretty serious (and pretty thorny) UI
theory. Have you read "The Anti-Mac Interface"? I haven't read it for
years but IIRC it offered a pretty interesting take on a bunch of the
issues you are bringing up.

I reinstalled my laptop with one version of Debian and upgraded the
entire system it twice (including libc upgrades) and have not invoked
yet a compiler. Every major Linux distribution (No, Gentoo is not a
major Linux distribution yet) is binary only.

Are you seriously claiming that you can run programs compiled for 
modern Debian on an untouched Debian from 1996? Even from 2000?

No. I'm saying there are smooth binary only upgrade paths.

The problems you described is a problem and I explained it was one
that people are (successfully) working on. Will you be able to run a
LSB 1.3 application in 10 years on a Linux of your choice? Yes. All
you need to do is install lsb1.3 support (AIUI).

I am unduly influenced by RedHat true. I have never used Debian which 
from what I understand is a far more stable system. However how many 
Debian installations are there versus RedHat?

If Debian is more stable and handles ABI changes more gracefully, it
stands to reason that people will migrate toward it. If you look at
the latest Netcraft report, you will see that Debian is the fastest
growing Linux Distribution.[1]

There's a proposal right now to put LSB and ABI compatibility into the
Debian social contract!

I would wholeheartedly endorse such an action. However because of how 
the software is designed they will have to do like OpenSSL and rely 
on mature packages not changing much.

That's not true. They will have to standardize a given set of API/ABIs
with particular LSB version numbers.

What I *am* saying is that it's stupid to try applying a malfitting 
tool to all situations. Linux is excellent on the server, excellent 
for thin-client office suite terminals and is pretty good for 
embedded OS's. Its strengths lie naturally there. It however is not 
good as a home user OS, in fact it's positively bad and due to how it 
is developed right now it will remain so.

I disagree for reasons I've stated before on this list.

My definition of free software is what freeing software is all about, 
why it must be done. If you look closely you will find that my 
definition encompasses all others, it is the one true definition. 
Unlike GNU which states an intention and then goes on to only 
implement it with caveats, I am remaining true to their original 
vision.

I think you misunderstand the FSF's position. The FSF's definition of
Free Software is *not* and has never been the GPL. The BSD, the
Artistic, X11, and many other licenses are all Free Software licenses
according to the FSF. The license they endorse in the GPL but they
don't try to tell people who like other licenses that their licenses
aren't Free Software -- quite the opposite in fact.

Software must be freed for the good of mankind.

Amen.

If the FSF and GNU really had the best interests of software in mind, 
they would not act like they do.

That is not fair. The fact that the FSF doesn't agree with you about
the ideal license in all cases doesn't mean that they don't have the
best interests of software in mind.

1. A certain RISC microprocessor manufacturer wanted to develop a C++ 
compiler for their processors. G++ was already available complete 
with back-end for their instruction set. However they still had to 
employ fifteen engineers over two years to write another from scratch 
because of the GPL forcing early disclosure of trade secrets from 
which this company derives most of its profits.

2. AtheOS was a highly innovative, even radical operating system. It 
was licensed under the GPL. Its original developer lost interest and 
so the community took over and made it Syllable. Unfortunately 
because of the conservative effect of volunteer led design, it's 
actually become less radical with time because no one would 
volunteer/waste their time on untested unagreed ideas - therefore 
they simply cloned ideas from other systems. This is an area where 
paying engineers to do what they're told is the only one which works.

3. Could Apple have survived if it had chosen Linux instead of BSD as 
the base of MacOS X? (This is a harder question to answer than it 
looks).

All of these are based on the idea of selling software licenses and
restricting access to software as the only way to make money from
software and to make development profitable enough to support. I think
this is just uncreative.

And this creation of diversity is something that Linux has not yet 
matched. FreeBSD is still a superior Unix to Linux despite a much 
smaller developer base.

I think that's subjective and unsupportable. Are there things that
FreeBSD does better than Linux? Yes. Are there things Linux does
better than FreeBSD? Obviously. If there weren't, Linux's huge
popularity would be either a major scam or a total fluke. I don't
believe it's either.

Can I link GPL code in with my open source product and sell that 
product? No. Why? Because the GPL guarantees the freedom to 
distribute your product to others without paying you.

Therefore you can't commercialise GPLed code which is the whole point 
of it after all.

Not true! You can't *proprietize* code. You're more than welcome to
commercialize it. You are using a very uncreative (and incorrect!)
definition of commercialize. This is a prevalent misconception but
it's still a misconception.

Is this new Mozilla better than Opera? No.

IMHO, unquestionably yes.

It's pointless doing work unless the work is worth it. Since KHTML
was designed, yet another free HTML renderer seems foolish. Still,
people are free to waste their time if they choose.

I don't think Mozilla was a waste of time. I think it's the best
web browser I've used and *lots* of people agree with me. I'm sorry
you don't.

The economics of volunteer free software development and contracted
development are totally opposite. Volunteers will undertake
pointless complex work for no remuneration because it's
fun. Contracted development will do as I say and do the least
possible to meet the terms of the contract.

I think you have overly cynical attitudes toward both forms of
development.

Regards,
Mako


[1] http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2004/01/28/debian_fastest_growing_linux_distribution.html


-- 
Benjamin Mako Hill
mako debian.org
http://mako.yukidoke.org/

_______________________
http://www.oekonux.org/



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