Re: [Koha] Support for Koha
Here's a small (hypothetical and allegoric) story to illustrate how i feel about the e-mail transcript from the ALA meeting... Once upon a time there was a great land. Many martyrs and heroes had poured their blood, sweat, and tears to make it a beautiful place to live in. The land welcomed all to itself, and everyone that visited marvelled at its wonder. It was always fertile and provided everything that people wanted or needed, only they had to sow the seeds first, and tend them with a little sincere effort. Also, it always felt like home for anyone that cared to spend a little time there. What was in your hearts mattered a lot more than what was in your purse. And everyone that made it their home, in their own small ways, contributed even more to its wonder. Then, one day, a few people decided to cordon off a part of this land for themselves, and make like, a 'reservation'. At the time, for the people that lived in this part, it sounded like a good idea. They all felt they belonged together more than other people did, and they'd all pool their resources and make their own little part of the land more prosperous. They started building a barbed wire fence around those parts. After a while, no one outside could see what was happening within, but for towering smoke stacks, that spoke of some secret industrial activity. But the carefree winds that once fanned the free flow of ideas, the plentiful showers that nourished the soil, the rivers that brought it prosperity, and the abundant sunshine that provided energy soon decided to shun those parts that lay within the fence. The goodwill of the many failed to reach the people inside the fence, not that it was ever withheld... Slowly, the land within became barren, ..., and failed... regards, krishnan See the Web's breaking stories, chosen by people like you. Check out Yahoo! Buzz. http://in.buzz.yahoo.com/
That is so beautiful. Krishnan M wrote:
Here's a small (hypothetical and allegoric) story to illustrate how i feel about the e-mail transcript from the ALA meeting...
Once upon a time there was a great land. Many martyrs and heroes had poured their blood, sweat, and tears to make it a beautiful place to live in. The land welcomed all to itself, and everyone that visited marvelled at its wonder. It was always fertile and provided everything that people wanted or needed, only they had to sow the seeds first, and tend them with a little sincere effort.
Also, it always felt like home for anyone that cared to spend a little time there. What was in your hearts mattered a lot more than what was in your purse. And everyone that made it their home, in their own small ways, contributed even more to its wonder.
Then, one day, a few people decided to cordon off a part of this land for themselves, and make like, a 'reservation'. At the time, for the people that lived in this part, it sounded like a good idea. They all felt they belonged together more than other people did, and they'd all pool their resources and make their own little part of the land more prosperous.
They started building a barbed wire fence around those parts. After a while, no one outside could see what was happening within, but for towering smoke stacks, that spoke of some secret industrial activity..
But the carefree winds that once fanned the free flow of ideas, the plentiful showers that nourished the soil, the rivers that brought it prosperity, and the abundant sunshine that provided energy soon decided to shun those parts that lay within the fence. The goodwill of the many failed to reach the people inside the fence, not that it was ever withheld...
Slowly, the land within became barren, ..., and failed...
regards, krishnan
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Krishnan M <kmlist@...> writes:
But the carefree winds that once fanned the free flow of ideas, the plentiful showers that nourished the soil, the rivers that brought it prosperity, and the abundant sunshine that provided energy soon decided to shun those parts that lay within the fence. The goodwill of the many failed to reach the people inside the fence, not that it was ever withheld... Slowly, the land within became barren, ..., and failed...
This sounds like RedHat Linux? Right!? Ask yourselves, would Linux be where it is without RedHat? And, of course, if you do not care for RedHat, do what I do, use CentOS. It is *very* stable - and free! The stability would not be there without RedHat, and it would not be honest to say CentOS is possible without RedHat. IBM has been a big player with Linux. The large corporate sponsorships are important if a project is going to mature. While 20 years ago I would have agreed that corporations should stay out of anything DIY (open source), now I can say that corporate sponsorships and grants are why many open source projects are actually good. We aren't talking about some romantic poetic notion here - like the meaning of life. We are talking about software which when you look at it, is basically a type of machine, an invention. And without proper backing, all ideas eventually end up as footnotes in the lists of all possible inventions. Darrell Ulm
2009/8/9 Darrell UIlm <darrellulm@smfpl.org>:
Krishnan M <kmlist@...> writes:
But the carefree winds that once fanned the free flow of ideas, the plentiful showers that nourished the soil, the rivers that brought it prosperity, and the abundant sunshine that provided energy soon decided to shun those parts that lay within the fence. The goodwill of the many failed to reach the people inside the fence, not that it was ever withheld...
Slowly, the land within became barren, ..., and failed...
This sounds like RedHat Linux? Right!?
No, not really at all.
Ask yourselves, would Linux be where it is without RedHat?
And, of course, if you do not care for RedHat, do what I do, use CentOS. It is *very* stable - and free! The stability would not be there without RedHat, and it would not be honest to say CentOS is possible without RedHat.
IBM has been a big player with Linux. The large corporate sponsorships are important if a project is going to mature.
While 20 years ago I would have agreed that corporations should stay out of anything DIY (open source), now I can say that corporate sponsorships and grants are why many open source projects are actually good.
We aren't talking about some romantic poetic notion here - like the meaning of life. We are talking about software which when you look at it, is basically a type of machine, an invention.
And without proper backing, all ideas eventually end up as footnotes in the lists of all possible inventions.
I think you have totally misread Krishnan's email, nowhere does it say that commercial interests are bad, or that everyone who works should be a volunteer. It says that walling yourself off from the community and the other people doing the same thing as you is a bad idea. If you had sent this email as a stand alone, I would have agreed with nearly every part of it, and I still do agree with most of the content, but to contend that Krishnan was trying to say that there should be no commercial interests involved with Koha is just totally missing the point. He was saying that being part of the community is better than locking yourself off. Chris
Chris Cormack <chris@...> writes:
content, but to contend that Krishnan was trying to say that there should be no commercial interests involved with Koha is just totally missing the point. He was saying that being part of the community is better than locking yourself off.
Chris
Chris, Right, I do see his point, and that is why I was making the RedHat point. RedHat has done several things with Linux to wall itself off from the rest of the community. They are not at all as open as Debian. However, they are involved in the One Laptop Per Child Project and have done a great deal for Linux. Their huge IPO fueled open source development not only in Linux but across the board. Yes, RedHat walled itself off in several instances because they did not want to go out of business, but they gave back also. There has to be a quid pro quo because developers cannot eat code. RedHat is not perfect for walling themselves off, and they have. But would Linux be as advanced today if it were not for their business model? This is just an open question. - Darrell Ulm
2009/8/9 Darrell Ulm <darrellulm@smfpl.org>:
Chris Cormack <chris@...> writes:
content, but to contend that Krishnan was trying to say that there should be no commercial interests involved with Koha is just totally missing the point. He was saying that being part of the community is better than locking yourself off.
Chris
Chris,
Right, I do see his point, and that is why I was making the RedHat point.
RedHat has done several things with Linux to wall itself off from the rest of the community. They are not at all as open as Debian. However, they are involved in the One Laptop Per Child Project and have done a great deal for Linux. Their huge IPO fueled open source development not only in Linux but across the board.
Yes, RedHat walled itself off in several instances because they did not want to go out of business, but they gave back also. There has to be a quid pro quo because developers cannot eat code.
RedHat is not perfect for walling themselves off, and they have. But would Linux be as advanced today if it were not for their business model? This is just an open question.
Ahh I guess we don't agree on the fundamental point that they have walled themselves off in the same way. All code they develop for the linux kernel goes back to the linux kernel. Having value added services, like the syndetics deal that you can get with Liblime, or the support that Liblime support, or Redhat support that you get or any of the other Redhat products seem perfectly fine to me. The simple fact is that Redhat couldn't wall themselves off with respect to the Linux kernel, the kernel is under the GPL, and so every time you get a copy of Redhat, that has been distributed to you under the GPL. They have a perfectly valid business model which doesn't involve forking the kernel. I agree totally that businesses have a right to pay their employees and programmers have a right to be paid. I mean I would be a hypocrite to argue otherwise as I working as a paid employee when I was writing code for the initial version of Koha. I also agree with both MJ Ray, and Joshua that sometimes code is unintentionally not committed back. But I do think that intentionally withholding code to gain some kind of business advantage, will 1/ not actually result in advantage and 2/ will engender so much bad will it is a much greater threat to the business itself, than any external threat. Everyone has the right to be paid for the services they render, if they wish to be. But Koha is not the product of one person, or one company, it is thousands and thousands of hours with input from hundreds of people. Every version benefiting from the version that existed before (not only the code but the 'brand'), and every new developer benefiting from the work of the previous developers. Of course without the guidance and financial support of libraries and librarians, none of this would have been done. So I join with Bob when he asked (in another thread) if WALDO could explain to us why they are wanting to withhold code. And I think if Liblime made a simple statement saying that "We will not withhold any Koha code, as soon as its ready it will be committed upstream" This whole thing would be consigned to a footnote. Chris
participants (5)
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Chris Cormack -
Darrell UIlm -
Darrell Ulm
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Joann Ransom -
Krishnan M