On 21 May 2001 01:48:04 +0200, loic@gnu.org wrote:
I wanted to share with you the new document of FreeDevelopers.netthat looks interesting to me:
[Warning: I'm a Computer engineer who has taken a few business classes and helps somes companies top level management understand their systems.]
It's interesting as an idea, but solely as that. This won't work. The reason why free software has worked so well so far is the connection between users and developers: the user is the develloper. Even Microsoft, who is usually accused of not listening to its customers has the biggest usability labs in the world (yes, one of the reasons word has so many features is that they put "everything" in it the usability labs tell them to).
Now, if you believe Microsoft is not a sucessful company, from not only a financial view, but also from a political/advocacy point of view, then ignore this.
The structure they propose is not different from proprietary software companies, it's just like them, but like the ones who were beaten up by MS. I believe this proposal was done with the best of intentions, but it has no way to survive, at least not in the big picture.
BTW I believe it's impossible to have a single entity doing the role proposed for freedevelopers.net. Can someone explain me why, on a networked world, someone proposes a single entity point of access ?