[Zope] Zope needs this (and Dynamo has it)

[Alexander Staubo]

> From: John Goerzen [mailto:jgoerzen@complete.org]
> Sent: Tuesday, March 07, 2000 9:47 PM
> To: Alexander Staubo
> Cc: Zope Mailing List (E-mail)
> Subject: Re: [Zope] Zope needs this (and Dynamo has it)
> 
> 
> Alexander Staubo <alex@mop.no> writes:
> 
> [snipped]
> 
> > Zope doesn't have the flashy packaging and sexiness of a 
> product line
> > Dynamo -- which, actually, I strongly urge you (and 
> everybody else in
> > this forum) to experience yourself, before you snap back at 
> my again --
> > and this affects management decisions. Dynamo is 
> exceedingly sexy, and
> > it boasts the kind of bullshit magic that have management and tech
> > people alike drooling.
> 
> OK, but see you're trying to make Linux something it is not.  Linux is
> not about marketing.  It is not about world domination.  We
> specifically do not care about this :-)  Now, digicool is a company,
> and they probably DO care about this.  Making Zope Free Software is a
> great way for them -- and us -- to benefit.  

World domination has nothing to do with it. If Zope were the only tool
out there (or if it were enjoying the same kind of monopoly iron grip on
the market), that'd not be a Good Thing.

At the moment, Zope is still very much a "guerilla" product. It follows
that you might have to use guerilla tactics to lure it into your
company. Like Linux was just 1-2 years ago.

>So your comments should
> be addressed at them if you want them to make the sale.  Not me, a
> Linux hacker.

Well, you entered this thread on your own -- I wasn't addressing my post
to you. If the elements of the discussion do not concern you, why are
you arguing against them?

> > As one of my colleagues pointed out, the problem starts 
> with the name.
> > (Somebody out there is hyping what they call Linux' 
> next-generating GUI.
> > And it's called... GNOME. What's wrong with this picture?) 
> I don't care
> > myself, but I recognize the problem.
> 
> But see again, Free Software is not about marketing.  The name is
> irrelevant to us.  Free Software is about what's *right* and what
> *works*.  We leave the marketing to those that want to do it (such as
> digital creations, or whomever else).  So again, write to digital
> creations' marketing dept. :-)

Arguably, free software (or Free Software) is about freedom, not
necessarily about what's right or what works.

RMS, arguably the grand old man, top banana, and icon of the Free
Software movement -- which is not the same as Open Source -- openly
admits he'd rather have bad, free software than good, non-free software.
The Open Source movement takes the pragmatic view that bad, free
software isn't an improvement at all, and that the software industry has
little use for RMS' moralisms. The Open Source guys just wants "software
that doesn't suck".

Perhaps Free Software people don't care about marketing. But then making
good impressions or having good hygiene has never been top priorities
for geeks. ;-)  For some people, outward perceptions do count. I flinch
every time somebody sets up Microsoft Exchange Server, or buys some
pricey piece of non-compliant Internet software, or seriously argue the
significance of ASP.

The people who make such decisions are often, sadly, uneducated about
what's good and about "software that doesn't suck". *Other* people
suffer because of such misfires.

Here's a different perspective you might not have taken into account in
your salutations to the spirit of Free Software. If Linux *hadn't* been
picked up by huge corporations and stock markets, if Linux *hadn't* been
rampantly commercialized, would we have seen the surge of wonderful
developments and innovations for the OS that we're seeing now? Methinks
not.

As much as I abhor commercialism and the new Linux hype, Linux' implicit
"world domination" plan is doing good things for the OS. Linux is not
the ultimate OS and hopefully won't be the last stop on the way to
utopia, but I rather look forward to the point where it's usable as a
desktop OS and I can forever throw out the software I know for a fact
sucks.

Marketing, in the case of Open Source/Free Software, is mostly a tool to
educate ignorant brass. *We*, as you point out, don't need the stuff.

> -- John
> 

-- 
Alexander Staubo         http://alex.mop.no/
"Do not go gentle into that good night/old age should rave and
burn against the close of day/Rage, rage against the dying of
the light." --Dylan Thomas