Re: ESR wishes to retire
On Monday 29 March 1999, at 1 h 33, the keyboard of Adam Di Carlo
<aph@debian.org> wrote:
> I think the flame against ESR from Phillip R. Jaenke was a bit harsh.
I think that the main problem with Phillip's reply (even with his last
message) was that he seemed to imply that you don't need Public Relations (PR)
if your file is good enough. This is hardly true. First, you need a good file.
But, then, to develop, you need PR and we have less evangelists than
hackers... We need a Carl Sagan for Debian... and the free software in general.
> If you don't believe a PR person is important, consider that ESR got
> free software (and even Stallman) more press over the last 14 odd
> months than RMS has managed to do in 20 years.
This is really unfair. The free software developed in the medias a few years
ago for unrelated reasons and it was not Gun Raymond or RMS' fault. It just
happened. I began to evangelize Internet in France a few months before the
Internet hype started in our national media. Is it because of me?
> Sure, ESR has his flaws -- let's catalog them:
>
> * doesn't push hard enough for the GPL (Perens is much better in
> working out licensing details with ISVs, IMHO)
No. This seem to imply that he pushes other free licences instead of the Only
Good One (tm). But the main problem is elsewhere: he tries to avoid talking
about free software. He even coined a new term because he was unable to say
"free".
> But, still, we all need to recognize the value of the work ESR has
> been doing, and give him some credit
He works well, he writes well, he speaks well, he has the technical abilities of a PR professionnal. But
#define GOODWIN_LAW 1
#define MICROSOFT_CARTOON 1
Hitler had them, too.
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