evan leibovitch and the LPI certification tests

[Craig Brozefsky <craig@red-bean.com>]

http://www.zdnet.com/enterprise/linux/opinion/0,5954,2260109,00.html


"On the other hand, those in our world who believe in manipulating
 language for political means insist on the term GNU/Linux in order to
 pay forced homage to the FSF and GNU."

Mr. Leibovitch is the executive directory of The Linux Professional
Institute, which is non-profit corporation attempting to provide
standardized certification across all Linux platforms.  Normally, such
rhetoric as he spouts in this article (and a previous one which
mistakenly assumed that the Debian refusal to distribute KDE was an
ideological position when it is in actuality a legal decision) does
not cause me any concern, but the fact that he is the exec. director
of a organization that could become a important force for
certification (with several vendors lining up behind them already)
gives me pause.

After reading his articles it is apparent that he has slotted Debian
as some niche academic distribution with little promise in commercial
endeavors:

"Debian, so far, has been very popular in academia, hobbyist and
 research circles, but doesn't appear to be a big player in the retail
 and commercial fields."

LPI as a whole does not appear to have such a uneducated opinion as
Mr. Leibovitch on Debian's decisions to call itself GNU/Linux or to
not distribute programs in violation of their licenses (especially
what that license is the cornerstone of the Free Software movement).
Their mission statement is to be distribution neutral as much as
possible.  Their strategy is to provide both general, and
distributions testing.  Their method for developing the exams is
community based, with lots of outside input, and the exams will be
publicly available so that third-parties can base training and testing
on them.

Might I suggest that someone involved with Debian PR contact
Mr. Leibovitch and attempt to open a dialog with him in order to
better educate him on why Debian has made various decisions, and why
Debian is not anti-commercial by any means.  If noone is available to
do this, then I could attempt it (I imagine Adam DiCarlo just gasped
in disbelief).

Also, if anyone representing Debian interests is working with LPI
presently could they post a quick summary of how things are going
there?

And lastly, if someone who knows the Debian group dynamics better than
me can make better suggestions on how to better educate
Mr. Leibovitch, I'm certainly listening.

-- 
Craig Brozefsky        <craig@red-bean.com>
Less matter, more form!      - Bruno Schulz
ignazz, I am truly korrupted by yore sinful tzourceware. -jb
The Osmonds! You are all Osmonds!! Throwing up on a freeway at dawn!!!