Logo timeline

[Marc Eberhard]

Hi Jos,

please don't get personal, that doesn't help anyone.

On Wed, May 09, 2001 at 08:40:35AM +0200, josX wrote:
> You are kidding, right ;-)!

No, they are not. Please note, I've used "they", because I'm _not_ a member
of the FSFE.

> You know what I think about you FSF-E?
> You are here for the money, and for the power too.

Hmmm, which money and which power? If the core team members would list the
amount of money, that they have spent so far for creating the FSFE, you
would be surprised. I bet with you, that they spent a lot of their own
private money to get this thing going. So in that sense, they already lost
money. So if you mean, they are here to loose money for promoting free
software, you're perfectly right.

Power? They don't have any power over the hackers. We still decide on our
own, if we want to do something or not. It's entirely up to us. And there is
no way, that they could change that. So which kind of power do you mean? You
would never accept the FSFE to tell you, what to do. Neither would I. So
which power? They don't have any and they will never get any. No need to
panic.

> Press release: ""this is the source for ```Authorative''' information
> regarding free software in Europe?????"

Well, that sounds really good to me. What's the problem? Obviously they
promote themself to be the "authoritative" source of information. And that's
good. It is exactly the idea behind it. The FSFE should promote free
software in Europe. Apart from that, your opinion is as authoritative as
theirs. Everybody can claim that. So why not the FSFE? That's not a law,
that's just a statement from an organization. If they will succeed to really
become the main source of information in Europe will depend on their work
and their decisions. And it will be _our_ choice, if we support them or not.

> The non-democratic core-team has spoken it's veto.... and GEE this is the
> FIRST dicesion you ever make !!! so we can get used to your dominance
> soon?

It's not the first decision, because a lot of decisions have already been
made to found the organization at all. And before this decision was
announced, Georg wrote several mails to this list expressing, why they don't
like the logos proposed so far. It was clear, that they would decide in such
a way. I wasn't surprised by it at all. And yes, I don't like this
minimalistic text logo either. Dominance? I guess the same arguments apply
as for "power" above. So I won't repeat them here.

> You are not hackers, you are not free software, you are a bunch of shrude
> managers seeking to exploit free software. A big villa huh? with a nice

Please... do you really think, you could impress politicians and companies
with a group of unshaved, unwashed long hair guys housing in tents in the
middle of nowhere? I doubt. I met some of them some time ago somewhere in a
pub and I can assure you, they are not "shrude managers". What do you think,
if you look at my home page (http://www.aston.ac.uk/~eberhama/)? Am I a
"shrude manager" too? Do you think, I run around like this every day? I
don't. I even don't wear a suit when I give a lecture in front of 150
students. But I still think, that my official web page needs an official
picture. Don't get fooled by things like this. If you want to see, how I
normally look like, see http://alpha.greenie.net/vgetty/. The links are
outdated, because Marc Schaefer is maintaining and enhancing vgetty. But the
picture there, is how I really run around. Surprised? Well, that's the idea.
Politicians should see the picture, they expect. This doesn't say anything
how people really are. But since they've managed to fool you, they will
probably also succeed to fool politicians and that's really good news!

> garden huh? expensive restaurant? .... I see you put your money where you

Did you check the other pages of the Villa Vogelsang too
(http://www.villa-vogelsang.de/engl/index-en.html)? It is a completely
independant Hotel, that is _donating_ services to the FSFE. The local Linux
Users Group has a regular meeting there every Tuesday. Yes, you can just
come and enjoy it. No entrance fee, no drinks you need to buy, nothing. But
you will always get a presentation on some Linux stuff. Once a month the
meeting is dedicated to beginners. Why not?

> mouth is... /literaly/, not figuratively. Why don't you sell the villa to
> generate funds so we can buy computers for the kernel-hackers? Why don't
> you use that money to start printing free stickers to be given away 

Because the Hotel doesn't belong to them. It just offers them to host
events. And I'm sure, they didn't have to pay very much for it, if at all.
But I don't know.

> Don't think you can kid everyone.

They just want to kid politicians. And I think, they do really good. They
even managed to fool you. Isn't that a good start really? They even
convinced you, which wasn't the goal. But be assured, they are just normal
people as you and me. They are _not_ managers. And they are _not_ rude.
Trust me, you are part of this team too, as we all are. But if you want to
change something, you have to present it in an appropriate form. That's all,
that has happened. Do you sleep better now?

Bye,
Marc
_______________________________________________________________________________

email: marc at greenie.net
email: m.a.eberhard at aston.ac.uk, web: http://www.aston.ac.uk/~eberhama/