[Koha] Some more thoughts to add.
Brendan Gallagher
info at bywatersolutions.com
Tue May 12 09:40:01 NZST 2009
Hi All --
Greetings from ByWater Solutions! I hope everyone had a great weekend
and mother’s day. I love the passion I have seen on this post over
the past few days. Although we are relatively new in the community we
are completely dedicated to Koha and wanted to weigh in on the
conversation.
In regards to the pay-for-support listing page; I vote that the
companies be listed by location, which can either be implemented by a
linkable map or just listed by region. However, I also truly believe
that this should not be solely decided by the vendors and developers
of Koha, but by the users as well. They are the ones whom are going
through the arduous task of deciding which company, if any, to choose
to lead them through the task of migrating to a new ILS. Another
reason for this belief is that as per human nature, whomever controls
that page will have self (company)- interest in mind, whether intended
or not.
I also have a question about the Koha-manage list. What are the
qualifications to be on this list? I've sent several requests to join,
to no avail, and I have never received an answer as to why? My company
is listed as a pay-for-support option and we are heavily invested in
supporting the community. To me, having exclusivity to a list where
many of the decisions being made for the community are done seems
against the whole community/ open-source ideal. For example, the
discussion of how to list the pay-for-support companies was completed
and decided on that chain and then changed on the community koha.org
website. The escalation surrounding this issue may have been prevented
if all of the members in the community, some of whom this directly
affected, were allowed to be part of the discussion.
I think many of us in the Koha community will be interested to see if
any of these discussions, suggestions and ideas actually yield any
results. As of right now it seems to be self-serving, as we have yet
to see any changes. Every community feels growing pains when it comes
to evolution and change, but only the successful ones foster open
discussion, hold each member in esteem, and have leaders who can chose
the path of humility when change is needed. I sincerely hope we can
take that path and look back at the issues we have now, and will have
in the future, as inevitable speed bumps on the road to success.
ByWater Solutions has not yet had the opportunity to contribute major
developments or groundbreaking answers to problems in the community,
but I hope my comments will still be taken seriously regardless.
Thanks, merci, gracias, tēnā rawa atu koutou.
-Brendan
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Brendan A. Gallagher
ByWater Solutions
CEO, Director of Innovation
Support and Consulting for Open Source Software
Installation, Data Migration, Training, Customization, Hosting,
Complete Support Packages
Headquarters: Santa Barbara, CA - Office: West Haven, CT
Phone # (203)823-5847
http://bywatersolutions.com
info at bywatersolutions.com
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