On Sat, Apr 06, 2002 at 05:25:10PM -0500, Joe Drew wrote: > On Sat, 2002-04-06 at 15:09, Jeroen Dekkers wrote: > > > I don't *like* the registration page being hosted on IIS. But I prefer a > > > registration page to no registration page at all. > > > > Is it that difficult to make a registration page with free software? > > To the best of my knowledge, no. But I didn't have time to learn how and > do it, and Lindows.com decided that they wanted to pay one of their > engineers to do it. It's quite simple: nobody else did it, so I took > Lindows.com up on their offer. > > Also, the form itself isn't free: > > (C) 2002 Lindows.com, Inc. All Rights Reserved. > > Why is this a problem? It's just the fact that is non-free. It doesn't have to be a problem, it should just be free IMHO. There is no reason not to make it free, and I see at least one reason to have it free: We could use the registration form for debconf 3. > > So if microsoft starts spending real money on debconf 3, we all have > > to start supporting them? > > This is almost a new case for Goodwin's law. But by "Support" I meant > more along the lines of "thank"; I chose words wrongly. That's right, you can thank people if they give something to you. > > Sorry, I think this is ridiculous. Does > > debconf really need money from a proprietary software company? > > Why should we refuse? Lindows.com came to us, not the other way around. Because it's a proprietary software company? > I think people are all getting way too upset about this. My main > priority in everything I've said is twofold: > 1) Give credit where credit is due, i.e. Lindows.com; > 2) Keep Lindows.com from getting flamed by a bunch of people who didn't > bother to do anything for Debconf, but think they can dictate how others > will help anyways. > > This doesn't mean I don't want discussion on it, but it DOES mean that I > want to make it perfectly clear that it is very counterproductive for > anybody to mail lindows.com with non-constructive criticism. Saying > "Hey, I see you hosted the Debconf registration form - Thanks! But, it > seems sort of strange that it's hosted on IIS. Why is this?" is one > thing. Saying "Debian has no use for you and your proprietary page, > lamers. Go to hell, proprietary software vendor!" is another entirely. I > want to keep the Lindows.com <-> Debian relationship friendly and happy, > just as they have strived to do. We can also say in a friendly way that we don't want to have anything to do with non-free software IMHO. > Remember, Lindows.com wants to contribute to us. We should accept their > support with open arms provided they don't try to subvert our > principles. A web page on a proprietary OS doesn't subvert our > principles, IMO. It subverts my principles (and probably also others). The fact that the company itself is probably also going to distribute non-free software also subverts my principles. The thing I want say is: Debian is about free software, IMHO we should not have such a prominent sponser promoting non-free software. Especially as we probably don't need it. Jeroen Dekkers -- Jabber supporter - http://www.jabber.org Jabber ID: jdekkers@jabber.org Debian GNU supporter - http://www.debian.org http://www.gnu.org IRC: jeroen@openprojects
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