Re: SourceForge drifting (?)

[<kara@luci.org>]

> Again, I've covered the bases.  I have a right to whine.  Moreso than any
> shareholder.
>
Well, I'm a shareholder *AND* someone who got slapped around and royally
screwed over by the linux.com ordeal, and that was over a year ago! And my
work is STILL being used on that site! And so is my name, if you consider
the number of times ignorant staff used tools developed for me which
contacted people signing my name and email to their spam.

In any case, there are a number of community members who are being screwed
over due to the VA ordeal. I will verify that. The people who were
overpaid to solicit free work and take credit for the works of others have
been screwed over because without warning, they lost their jobs. Jobs
their families depended on. The people who invested their time and
resources to contribute to a project after believing their contribution
was going toward a long term cause for Open Source have been ripped off as
they, overnight, will have no return on their investment.

So, as someone who probably could claim more right to whine than anyone, I
can say the situation sucks, but sucks is as sucks does. I wish VA found
their original business plan successful, but for a variety of reasons, it
isn't. So, they are trying to capitalize on their most popular assets. As
unfortunate as that may be for some people, I don't think it's the end of
the world. The linux community lives independently of what VA does, so I
don't think what they do will have any significant impact on us. While
they can help us significantly, helping themselves just helps us less, not
hurts us.

I just want to see VA survive. Granted I don't see a scalable market for
their new CVS product in a box (meaning, I see a limited market that will
be quickly saturated, leaving no new business), they have researched it
more than I have, and hope they succeed.

I don't see a /. subscription service going anywhere, as while I don't
mind paying for good news sites, the people who rely on /. and thrive on
/. discussions aren't likely people who will pay for anything. So, the
issue isn't whether the service is worth it, it's an issue of who they're
marketing to.

As for Linux.com, they announced over a year ago plans to commercialize
the project and move away from real community oriented services. That's
why they killed the LUGs resources project, and tried to resurrect it via
another individual under OSDN and failed (now, what makes you think I'm
bitterly amused by that?) That's when I moved to my own resources, which
if it becomes a problem with other community members, I'll expect them to
do the same.

As for SourceForge, they are trying to do exactly what Asynchrony.com has
been doing (except with a little flakier plan) and some members will
benefit financially from that, and others too will simply move. They can't
legally change the license of any software development, unless people who
are hosting their projects there signed something that said VA could
manage licensing rights, etc. Therefore, even if they made the site a
subscription service, they wouldn't own the code anymore than LinuxOne
owned theirs.

That's what's great about GPL, you can sell something someone else did,
as long as you credit them and provide the source. It doesn't prevent you
from doing something different with your code, including close sourcing
it. You're simply selling the packaging and documentation, and maybe even
some support!

In any case, silug-discuss isn't as seasoned for handling arguments such
as these as other lists. We'd appreciate a cease and desist :-)


-- 
Kara Pritchard                          Phone: 618-398-7360
Director of Exam Development            http://www.lpi.org/
--





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