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List:       kde-promo
Subject:    Re: [kde-promo] About the Free Software Association
From:       Mihnea Capraru <mihnea_capraru () yahoo ! de>
Date:       2005-11-16 23:23:53
Message-ID: 20051116232353.17104.qmail () web26309 ! mail ! ukl ! yahoo ! com
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This short discussion has discussion has been started
by one of my previous posts. I wanted to reply to each
message separately, but it seems to make more sense to
do it like this. If this breaks the mailing list's
etiquette, please tell me, I'm new :)

I wrote:

"We don't say 'Free Software' in the first paragraph
because we assume the target reader to not know what
this is about. However, a link to the FSF should be
placed at a prominent location to underline KDE's
commitment to software freedom."

Tom Chance replied:

"I admit a personal bias here, in that I support KDE
because it promotes free 
software. But this is a really bad decision. Mention
the phrase with a link 
to the FSF definition page, don't be ashamed of it.
That fact that KDE is 
free software is one of the key advantages."

I agree with this entire paragraph, except mentioning
the phrase 'free software' (or 'open source', for that
matter) within the first paragraph. This is not
because somebody should be  ashamed of it, it's just
because it doesn't deliver an understandable message
to the prospective new user (regardless who the target
user actually is - except the case when the main
target is the Linux/Unix user)

KDE's free nature is indeed one of its key advantages,
but is this the sort of advantage one would expect a
user to buy into? KIO slaves are a key advantage too,
but saying KIO slaves in an introductory material
would certainly scare some guys off. And since people
tend to know what software is, while not knowing what
free software is, wouldn't it be more efficient to
first attract them to KDE, and after that educate them
in the spirit of freedom? That would be like throwing
seeds on a fertile soil, as opposed to throwing them
on sand.

As for political affiliation, I hope that sporting a
link (maybe a banner) at a visible location would
solve this matter.

Aaron Seigo replied:

"aside from the fact the FSF is not exactly
KDE-friendly (unofficially they are 
tacitly supportive of us because we are Free Software,
officially they 
recommend other software), not everyone out there
holds with the philosophies 
and means of the FSF. they are more political than KDE
is and i don't think 
we need nor want the association such a link on the
home page would bring."

I'm afraid there is already a link there, the first
sentence goes something like "KDE is a powerful Free
Software graphical desktop environment", whereby 'Free
Software' is a link to the FSF.

I think that used to be Open Source, and than it
changed.

I'm quite aware that the FSF has a dark and quite
dirty history with regard toi its relationships to
KDE. But the Open Source Initiative seems to be even
worse in this respect, so why link to them?

Maybe the best solution would be designing KDE's own
software freedom manifest.

and

"in face, i wouldn't use the term Free Software as it
has all sorts of odd 
connotations in english. Open Source is more widely
known and clearer."

This is indeed a strong ambiguity, but maybe it can be
partially solved by calling the link 'Software
Freedom". Freedom does not make anybody think of
freeware, I suspect.

Tom Chance replied:

"Personally I always find this (common) view very odd.

Open Source is only known to some geeks and IT
managers, and the name makes no 
sense without explaining all about source code. I've
always found explaining 
freedom much easier to non-geeks... this is in all
kinds of crazy things I do 
locally with absolutely normal people in the arts and
activist worlds. Time 
yourself explaining "you're free to do X, Y, Z" versus
"the source code, 
which is ... is open, which means ..., which allows
you to do X, Y, Z" :D"

It is indeed easy to explain 'Free Software' to
artists or activists, but these people are already a
special group, and what holds of them does not hold of
a majority. On the other hand, I wouldn't mind
targeting the artists at all :)

Leaving these things aside, I suppose this topic has
much more to do with politics than promoting. To sum
up it's relevancy for the promotional efforts: it
makes sense to use KDE in order to attract people to
software freedom, not viceversa.

Mihnea



	

	
		
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