On Thursday 20 February 2014 22:29:30 Tassos Koutlas wrote:
> Hello all,
> 
> I know this comes out of the blue but I have decided to weigh in this
> debate, sorry but it turned out rather long. I am a KDE user since the
> RH6.5 days back in 1999. I've experienced first hand the evolution of KDE
> and all the controversy surrounding the 4.x release, the bad press on
> nepomuk and so on. I have been however in numerous occasions presenting KDE
> software to students and professional groups and I have been outlining its
> merits, vision of the future and cutting edge technology included in each
> release.
> 
> But let's step back a bit and think about KDE as software. What has always
> been its number one advantage over other desktop environments (DE)? I
> believe it's been primarily consistency and platform integration and
> secondarily a unified UX (a distant third IMHO was stability but remember
> back in the day you had to recompile Xfree86 from source to be able to play
> DIVXes so stability for non technically inclined people is out of the
> question). People are using or switching to KDE to experience consistency,
> integration and unified experience in a FOSS desktop environment. In my
> opinion regardless of trolling and early criticism the 4.x releases
> strengthened KDE in those respects. Recently there was an article showing
> KDE having a concrete 30% of use in a very fragmented market.
> 
> Having said that, my initial reaction at the Baloo announcement over at
> planetkde was a sense of relief; I guess bad feelings on nepomuk overwhelm
> me too. However my next reaction was a sense of disappointment feeling that
> we yet again rush new technology when in fact should spend our time
> strengthening KDE's core values (consistency and integration). Please note
> however that these were my personal immediate reactions and they don't
> necessarily reflect reality. I understand that Baloo will be better than
> nepomuk in those respects and that it would be able to provide all
> integration nepomuk was destined to do. I also don't want in any way to
> diminish Vishesh's contributions on building a better and more suitable
> tool, he is doing a great job advancing KDE on that front.
> 
> But we, as a community, have to understand that technology developed in the
> context of KDE ultimately aims to serve people. Let's face it as far as
> software goes, a DE is as people-centric as software can get. People care
> about solutions and products that deliver them. Please note that product in
> this context is used as an entity in a competitive market claiming market
> share, not necessarily reflecting monetary attributes, after all a product
> is much more than a price tag. As a product, KDE, is destined to be
> something more than the underlying technology, it must have a unified front
> presenting itself to others in terms of narration, a set of core values and
> principles, a certain community ensuring continuity.
> 
> The above serve as a compass when arguments arise. Developers may change and
> users may increase or decrease, the project as a whole, however, can
> continue to fill market needs as it always did and it can expand
> incorporating new narrations based on values and principles. How these are
> presented to people matter. They matter because they define how people
> perceive the project and how the press perceives the project. For instance
> if our core values are consistency/integration/stability then marketing
> Baloo as anything different than the continuation of nepomuk is invalid.
> If, on the other hand, we want to be perceived as a project where cutting
> edge technology is presented to the user as soon as it is available then
> keeping nepomuk brand alive is invalid. But we cannot do both at the same
> time.
> 
> If we ultimately care about people and how KDE is offering solutions to
> people, then we have to treat it as any other technology product. There are
> three distinct characteristics in a technology project targeted at
> different audiences:
> (a) technology related matters targeted at developers,
> (b) marketing related matters (including product/user relationships,
> distribution/promotion matters, copywriting material and so on) targeted at
> people,
> (c) and community related matters target at people to ensure project
> continuity.
> 
> So there is a question, given that KDE is an advanced project in terms of
> technology and technical vision how can this can be communicated back at
> people both in terms of users and press?
> 
> First and foremost kde-promo mailing list is a very good step at
> coordinating efforts made, as are the development of the Visual Design
> Group (VDG) and the Human Interface Guidelines (HIG) group. But these alone
> are not enough. The cornerstone of these efforts is to distil and decide
> the core values of the project in terms of its audience. Then to change our
> idiosyncrasy towards the project given those values and principles. What
> that ultimately means is that instead of feeling that each component of KDE
> is vertically aligned we should change to a more horizontal approach.
> Developers may have authoritative control over the technical merits of a
> component, identity characteristics however should be vested in people with
> expertise in the marketing/promo space and the usability space.
> 
> To conclude with my thesis, I would like to thank you all for your efforts
> building KDE, an indispensable part of my everyday computing experience. My
> thoughts above have been piling up for quite some time now. I don't know if
> my expertise is adequate enough to contribute at the marketing/promo space
> of such an important project as KDE, but I indent to get more acquainted
> with efforts so far and participate more.
> 
> Best regards,
> 
> Tassos
I just want to say that I have really enjoyed reading your email, thanks for 
supporting us all these years.

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