Dear friends of the FSFE,
I have taken the task to tell you the latest news about how we hope to have a logo for the FSFE soon.
There has been quite some discussion within the core team. We like to take the opportunity to again thank everybody who contributed to the effort. Every idea and draft was useful for us and needed so that we could make up our mind about coming up with a logo which is best for the the FSFE.
Up to now a couple of logos have been ruled out so far by members of the core team who feel strongly about not choosing such a logo:
- Anja's "GNU and Europe" is vetoed http://agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/~anja/gnu/
- The "GNU" logo (which was also temporarily used on fsfeurope.org) is vetoed http://fsfeurope.org/images/gnulogo.jpg is vetoed
There are two main location where logo drafts still in discussion are collected:
http://agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/~anja/gnu/textlogos/ http://www.gnu.org/people/greve/fsfe/
What will happen next: As we have been without a logo for a time to long and had not many more ideas or drafts coming, we will now go for a stricter schedule.
In the next week, everybody will have the last chance to come up with more drafts with open discussion.
We will have another three days of discussion without new drafts to be accepted.
The core team will decide which logo to elaborate for final use. (Note that this might include hiring a designer for a small fee.)
Best, Bernhard
Hi,
On Wed, 9 May 2001, Bernhard Reiter kindly wrote:
--snip--
There are two main location where logo drafts still in discussion are collected:
http://agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/~anja/gnu/textlogos/ http://www.gnu.org/people/greve/fsfe/
^^^^^ Oh yeah. Hell, what a surprise...
--Georg Jakob
|| On Wed, 9 May 2001 09:29:56 +0200 (MEST) || Georg Jakob jack@unix.sbg.ac.at wrote:
There are two main location where logo drafts still in discussion are collected:
http://agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/~anja/gnu/textlogos/ http://www.gnu.org/people/greve/fsfe/
gj> Oh yeah. Hell, what a surprise...
Where is the problem?
Since I spent a *lot* of time talking to people and trying to get them motivated to do some drafts, they sent their ideas to me by email (they don't have webspace for this) and I put them online where it was most convenient for me.
I didn't think this mattered all that much, to be honest.
Regards, Georg
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Since I spent a *lot* of time talking to people and trying to get them motivated to do some drafts, they sent their ideas to me by email (they don't have webspace for this) and I put them online where it was most convenient for me.
I didn't think this mattered all that much, to be honest.
That's because it does *not*.
Let me state one thing here: I am sure that most people on this list share my appreciation for all the time, effort, and yes, also money, you put into setting up and organising the FSFE so far.
Anybody who feels "left out" by you making decisions are free to get more involved themselves, aren't they?
Regards, gpg - public key 0x1FE281EB karin "kyrah" kosina http://kyrah.net http://the.system.at +-----------------------------------><---------------------------------+ [ please sign the petition against software patents at ] [ http://petition.eurolinux.org ]
On Wed, 9 May 2001, karin kosina wrote:
Let me state one thing here: I am sure that most people on this list share my appreciation for all the time, effort, and yes, also money, you put into setting up and organising the FSFE so far.
Yes, this is also what I think. Please continue the good work. And please select *any* logo that a majority finds nice. I personnally do not have any preference, they all had their advantages and disadvantages.
We need an active FSFE, where the content and the activities are much better than any logo :)
Marc SCHAEFER schaefer@alphanet.ch writes:
We need an active FSFE, where the content and the activities are much better than any logo :)
I totally agree. A logo is not that much important. Many things need to be done.
BTW, a short question: what requirement will be needed to be part of FSFE, chapter france? (a small fee and/or having done some free software and/or evangelization?)
While not having time to write software, I'm doing some presentations to explain free software and I would like to answer questions about FSFE and more specifically chapter france.
Best regards, david
David Mentre a écrit :
BTW, a short question: what requirement will be needed to be part of FSFE, chapter france? (a small fee and/or having done some free software and/or evangelization?)
Well actually, there is no real requirement since the local chapters have no ambition to grow out of the legal minimum number of people necessary to found the organisation.
Volunteers may insted join associate organisations (like APRIL) if they feel like they need to belong to some organisation linked directly to the FSFE.
If you want to help but not necessarily need to enroll in some association, you still can get involved in the various projects (by creating an account on savannah), wrting material, contribution to the web site, etc.
These elements are explained (in french) on http://france.fsfeurope.org/about/organisation.fr.html
While not having time to write software, I'm doing some presentations to explain free software and I would like to answer questions about FSFE and more specifically chapter france.
You mean answer questions of the people asking you at these presentations ?
I think you may still go ahead explaining our movement's philosophy and goals even if you're not involved.
Feel free to ask anyway, if things are not perfectly clear (and, btw, help fill holes about that in the web site with the answers you get, for instance... ;) ).
Regards,
I think there a misunderstanding from the beginning between people of this list. Some, like Jos, think that Free Software is, at the end, that Free Software should be a hobby. Some others think that we can make a living of writing free, should get organized to dialog with authorities like government to promote the use of Free Software. I just can not see how we can convince authorities like government to trust us if we present us as a joyous amateur movement.
If we adopt the first point of view, everything should be free, cooperative, fully distributed and we do not really need representatives to convince anyone: we are already convinced, have fun, and do not worry about what other people can think of our hobby. In the second point of view, at the extreme, we can find professional software developpers (I am one such strange thing :-) ), who eventually like GNU/Linux and would like to use it in their daily work, recommend it to their clients, all that if possible contributing to the Free Software movement. In this perspective, we need people to represent the free software movement, at least so that big organizations can have an interlocutor. Along with that, there are points common to both point of view, like the interest of having Free Software used by governments in order to avoid naughty things like back doors...
Both point of views are quite respectable, but we should make clear whether FSF Europe aims to represents the first or the second point of view. I thought FSF Europe defends the second one (I found strong indices of this by the existence of the GBN, for instance). Does everyone agree with that? Or at least, can the core team precise its position?
Best regards,
Ludovic
On Wed, May 09, 2001 at 04:02:04PM +0200, Ludovic PENET wrote:
Both point of views are quite respectable, but we should make clear whether FSF Europe aims to represents the first or the second point of view. I thought FSF Europe defends the second one (I found strong indices of this by the existence of the GBN, for instance). Does everyone agree with that?
I'm not absolutely sure our goal is **only** to promote the use of Free Software in big organizations, governments... We have several roles, among which being an interlocutor for both individuals AND organizations. Some of us feel more comfortable speaking to ones and others members prefer to speak to institutions or big companies, depending on their professional experience or personal feelings.
Free Software doesn't make difference between users and developers, by allowing the same rights to the ones and to the others. This distinction had been brought by firms developing proprietary software. Now, it's not time to make the difference between people who develop free software for the joy of hacking and those who develop it for their job. Both approaches are interesting and complementary ones. We shouldn't be more in favor of one against another.
**Please** stop flaming about it and speak more constructively !
Raph
|| On Wed, 9 May 2001 11:03:56 +0200 (CEST) || karin kosina kyrah@gnu.org wrote:
kk> Let me state one thing here: I am sure that most people on this kk> list share my appreciation for all the time, effort, and yes, kk> also money, you put into setting up and organising the FSFE so kk> far.
Thank you very much!
kk> Anybody who feels "left out" by you making decisions are free to kk> get more involved themselves, aren't they?
Absolutely. A lot of people are already bringing themselves in with lots of contributions (from doing the web pages to coordinating our tradeshow booth for the LinuxTag) and we value this very much!
Regards, Georg
On 09 May 2001 00:45:11 +0200, Bernhard Reiter wrote:
Up to now a couple of logos have been ruled out so far by members of the core team who feel strongly about not choosing such a logo:
I think you've just made a political error: you've ruled out this logos without any justification (at least in the view of anybody that didn't went to the meeting). Could you please correct that ?
|| On 09 May 2001 08:48:07 +0100 || João Miguel Neves jneves@ieee.org wrote:
Up to now a couple of logos have been ruled out so far by members of the core team who feel strongly about not choosing such a logo:
jmn> I think you've just made a political error: you've ruled out jmn> this logos without any justification (at least in the view of jmn> anybody that didn't went to the meeting). Could you please jmn> correct that ?
Okay, let me try.
One part was always personal taste. We feel we cannot use anything that one FSFE member feels totally unhappy about since they need to live with it more than anyone else.
This is essentially what ruled out the new GNU logo Loic had a designer do.
Other crucial points (essentially raised about Anja drafts) were:
- A logo is a symbol for a organization/company/initiative.
When selecting a logo, it is important to chose something fresh that will get associated with you.
Both the "bridge metaphor" and the "Europa on the bull" themes have been used a million times by so many people that people will associate all kinds of things with it but _not_ the FSF Europe (unless they were subscribed to this list).
They are "used up" and only people building bridges or organizations dealing with ancient European myths could truly use them.
- In order to be able to get free software in the press and make sure the legal systems will be in favor of free software instead of making free software illegal because they weren't aware of it, we need to work with politicians and the press.
This requires a logo that will look professional to politicians & the press.
The FSF Europe has the vision to not just hack a few lines of code today, we want to fundamentally change things and make sure free software will prosper on the long-term scale. This requires thinking in 30-year perspectives.
Regards, Georg
* Georg C. F. Greve (greve@gnu.org) [010509 18:35]:
jmn> I think you've just made a political error: you've ruled out jmn> this logos without any justification (at least in the view of jmn> anybody that didn't went to the meeting). Could you please jmn> correct that ?
Okay, let me try.
One part was always personal taste. We feel we cannot use anything that one FSFE member feels totally unhappy about since they need to live with it more than anyone else.
Ok, de gustibus non est disputandum
Other crucial points (essentially raised about Anja drafts) were:
- A logo is a symbol for a organization/company/initiative.
ACK
When selecting a logo, it is important to chose something fresh that will get associated with you.
First NACK, second ACK. Why something fresh, look at some successful organisations, they are using the same logo for a long time. The city of Rome uses SPQR in nice ancient letters for 2500 years. ;-) No serious, I think we can use something not complete new, if it stands for something we support.
Both the "bridge metaphor" and the "Europa on the bull" themes have been used a million times by so many people that people will associate all kinds of things with it but _not_ the FSF Europe (unless they were subscribed to this list).
Hm, the letters "f", "s" and "e" are used a little bit more. We could use a strange draft that was never used before and nobody will associate with anything known, but it will not be associated with Europe or free or software. I don't think that this would work.
They are "used up" and only people building bridges or organizations dealing with ancient European myths could truly use them.
What is against ancient myths, were are other symbols for Europe? The twelve stars or the EURO? Not really and not for Europe as a whole.
- In order to be able to get free software in the press and make sure the legal systems will be in favor of free software instead of making free software illegal because they weren't aware of it, we need to work with politicians and the press.
ACK
This requires a logo that will look professional to politicians & the press.
Ok, most politicans and most journalists[1] are seen as stupid and maybe this is correct. But most politicans and most journalists know more about strange old things like Europa than Joe Average Hacker.
The FSF Europe has the vision to not just hack a few lines of code today, we want to fundamentally change things and make sure free software will prosper on the long-term scale. This requires thinking in 30-year perspectives.
Yes, and in 30 years and longer no logo will be fresh, or do you wan't the discussion every year? So I think you contradict to yourself.
I think the whole discussion shows one thing. There is a danger that the FSFE will be a non-democratic organisation[2], that will try to rule all associated organisations. I think everybody on this list believes in freedom and free software and I thank everybody who is doing something for it, but as sombody wrote every kind of power can corrupt. Ok, there is no power, but somebody else wrote there is a lot of ego and this can corrupt too. I think, that every non-democratic (and democratic too, but there are some mechanisms to correct this) leadership causes in exaggerated opinion of oneself and this causes to undervalue other people and their opinions and thoughts. If there is real power to people who believe that they know the absolute truth than it is time to leave the country, because than there is the danger of real repressions. But there is no chance for real power for any free software organisation.
(I hope that this doesn't attack somebody personally, but my ability to read english is much better than my ability to write.)
Kind regards
Matthias Kabel
[1] Here I strongly agree with Karl Kraus.
[2] As I remember from a mail from one member of the core team, that is not seen as a problem for him. Optimists believe that a democratic organisaton is the best form for a organisation, pessimists fearing the same. I'm one of the pessimists.
Hello,
Bernhard Reiter wrote:
Up to now a couple of logos have been ruled out so far by members of the core team who feel strongly about not choosing such a logo:
Anja's "GNU and Europe" is vetoed http://agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/~anja/gnu/
The "GNU" logo (which was also temporarily used on
fsfeurope.org) is vetoed http://fsfeurope.org/images/gnulogo.jpg is vetoed
It was me who vetoed against `http://fsfeurope.org/images/gnulogo.jpg'.
My personal opinion about this logo: This gnu looks unfriendly, creating distance to the viewer. Although this logo displays a gnu, its style is IMHO more appropriate for a random dot.com company than for a hacker organization. I cannot identify with it.
As the Head of Office I will have to deal with the FSFE logo all the time, so I vetoed against this one.
Peter