"Roy Schestowitz" <newsgroups@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:11801940.ksfKPD2qs2@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Who understands the OSS community?
,----[ Quote ]
| There are a lot of OSS programmers that feel the very same way. We might
| not always agree on certain (technical) issues, but we are proud of our
| work. That is a big difference with the code slaves that work for closed
| source companies. They have very little influence on the work that they
| do, give up their intellectual rights the moment they lift their fingers
| from the keys and get badly paid. And when closed source program is
| horribly made, the true artisan in us is disgusted.
|
| When you're doing a OSS project, you do it because you like it. Because
| you have an itch to scratch. And if your humble project is of any use to
| the outside world, you're are emotionally involved to say the least.
|
| There is no central OSS or Linux company. What we usually call "Linux"
| is actually a bunch of loosely connected OSS projects. There is no
board,
| no CEO, no stock holders, no PR department and you don't have to apply
for
| a job.
`----
http://thebeez.vnunetblogs.com/the_beez_speaks/2006/08/who_understands.html
I'm not sure it's wise to point out that CSS programmers are "badly
paid" when comparing against OSS programmers, who for the most part, are not
getting paid at all. Yes, I know of, for example, IBM paying its employees
to work on the Eclipse project (which is OSS), but I suspect that the vast
majority of OSS projects out there are done in the programmer's "spare time"
as a hobby.
<quote>
"We" don't have to understand anything. "We" will just continue doing what
we're good at, which is making programs, either for ourselves or the whole
world. "We" don't need ignorant, pedantic editors telling what "we" got to
do, think or write. "We" won't change our ways. "We" use Linux and know what
it is all about and why "we" use it and continue to use it. And if you step
on our pet project or insult us, "we" will continue to react. Because "we"
are only passionately doing what "we" do best.
</quote>
There's a sort of duality of purpose in the OSS community, precisely
because there is no "we", as the author writes. I believe it's this duality
that leads to the biggest communication problems. Some people in the OSS
community, let's call them the advocates, are trying to get people to
convert over to OSS from CSS.
The rational users would try out OSS, and if the benefits outweight the
drawbacks, they'll switch over to OSS. And if the benefits don't outweight
the drawbacks, they won't switch. When asked about it, they'll reply "Well,
I don't want to use this program unless factors A, B and C change."
Then the other half of the OSS community replies, saying "We don't care
what you think. We're making OSS software because we want to. We don't have
to listen to you, we're gonna do things our way." The author seems to be
part of this latter camp. And his position is perfectly reasonable. I write
OSS too. And I put in whatever features *I* want. I'm the boss of the
project, and what I say goes. I'm open to suggestions from my users, but I'm
at liberty to ignore those suggestions if I want.
But from the point of view of the user, this is very confusing. Earlier,
they were asked to try out OSS, and now they're told that OSS will not bend
overbackwards to meet their needs, and that the users will just have to
accept whatever they get.
I'm caricaturizing of course, but I see signs of this duality even
within this newsgroup. On the one hand, a lot of posters here are telling
Windows users to switch to Linux, and that Linux is easy and intuitive. Then
the Windows user (e.g. me) say "Okay, well I'd use Linux if A, B and C were
changed to be more like Windows", to which a different set of posters reply
"Linux isn't Windows. We're not gonna dumb down Linux to work like Windows.
We don't care about 95% marketshare, we're happy with the marketshare we
have."
- Oliver
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