Re: Yet another [cross] installer
On Fri, Mar 5, 2010 at 8:00 AM, Hector Oron <hector.oron@gmail.com> wrote:
>> For any device where the manufacturers try to close it off to hackers,
>> we're always going to have to jump through hoops specific to that device
>> to get Debian installed. They can easily disable bootloader
>> features but on netbooks, maybe they won't: PC makers are used to having
>> a BIOS with screens saying "Press F1 to enter Setup".
>
> It is nice if we can hack manufacturers toys, but if those are
> non-free to hackers, why should we "officially" support them?
allow me to tell you a story.
around 1998 or 1999 i did my first samba "nt domains" talk, it was i
believe at queen mary's, london. audience of maybe 400 people.
questions-time came, and someone asked, "we are free software
developers. we have openoffice. we have nfs. we have
industry-published and open standards. we have all the tools we ever
need. why should we bother to even _talk_ to the proprietary windows
world?"
and everybody clapped.
and it was one of the most stark and defining moments that has
haunted me ever since.
why?
the answer is simple: because this person - and the rest of the
audience - clearly indicated that they were self-serving
technologists. by applausing the questioner, they clearly indicated
that they were perfectly happy in their "free/libre" world, and that
the rest of the world, who were (and still are) being duped and
cartelled into proprietary software could, as far as they were
concerned, go to hell in a handbasket.
now having spent a significant fraction of my personal money over the
past fourteen years breaking various proprietary strangle-holds (the
largest of which was nt domains in samba), such that other free
software people could take over and maintain at least _some_ way for
the average computer user to cross the proprietary / free-libre
polarised barrier, you'll excuse me if i perhaps sound a little
unhappy at the question you ask.
maintaining and developing free software on free/libre/open/opened
hardware is easy, and i fully recognise that somebody has to do that
(otherwise there's nothing for people on proprietary systems to "cross
over" to, is there? :)
so the question comes down to this: whom do you serve? do you serve
yourself, or do you serve others, who have less skill with computers
than yourself?
also i think it's worth pointing out something else, which may not
have occurred to many people yet. regarding free software vs
proprietary: we've won. i'll say that again: the "battle" is over.
free software has won. the critical threshold point where awareness
has entered peoples' heads, such that free software's prominence and
long-term usefulness is guaranteed as _long_ as the core experts
continue to get paid full-time (*) to work on the insanely difficult
bits, was passed some time in the past eighteen months.
(key to that success i think is, much as i don't really like either of
them, is android and ubuntu).
the reason why awareness of the fact that the "battle" is over is very
simple: free software doesn't have a PR or a marketing department, and
thank god it never will.
that's all i want to say, hector.
l.
(*) anyone who thinks that free software's critical core components
can be done purely by unpaid workers or on a part-time basis is truly
deluding themselves.
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