Re: Political climate of Debian
Hi All,
* [ 14-04-05 - 00:33 ] Helen Faulkner <helen_ml_faulkner@yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
> Erinn Clark escribió:
> > * The general idea of pragmatism vs. purity
[...]
> It is my impression that division over this issue is a fundamental
> aspect of what Debian is today. The basis of the conflict seems to be
> expressed in part 4 of the social contract [1], which states that "Our
> Priorities are Our Users and Free Software".
> As I understand it, this statement doesn't place either the users or the
> freedom of the software as being more important than the other thing. I
> assume that this was intentional - a deliberate piece of flexibility
> within the system.
We are a lot of people, everybody has got his/her opinion about which
one of the two aspects deserves an higher priority. This was (and is)
often the cause of a lot of flames and misunderstandings.
We should remember that we're trying to reach the same target; it is
simple to understand but it's not always easy to do. :)
> However it perplexes me that Debian can claim to
> adhere to such a commitment, because of the potential for conflict
> inherent in it.
The flexibility in the Social Contract that you mentioned above give us
a chance. We can try to give our users as much pragmatism as possible
together with as much purity as possible.
> I think that, for the forseeable future, there will be borderline cases
> where the needs of the users to have a usable system conflict with the
> freedom of the software. I would like to think that software in general
> is increasing in freedom fast enough to make Debian increasingly usable,
> as compared to other OSs and distros. However, I am not sure that this
> is the case, because new non-free software is also appearing all the
> time.
The worst thing is that often the non-free software which is appearing
around us is free as in beer, confusing a lot of people.
These are the situation where our position makes the difference:
offering free alternatives (or being insistent about licensing changes)
is not only a matter of purity, it is also serving our users.
It's important to mention that not every distro has got a Social
Contract to respect; some are devoted to their users (customers,
sometimes) for what concerns pragmatism, but they give not much for what
we call freedom.
Our users know this difference very well (luckily), and this is one of
the things that makes Debian what it is.
My 2 cents.
ciao,
ema
> What do others on this list (keeping in mind Erinn's remarks below,
> which were directed at those who have discussed these issues in great
> detail on earlier occasions), think about this issue?
> > Another important note I would like to make: we have many "old school"
> > Debian people on this list who've thought long and hard on these issues and
> > have more or less decided which direction they think Debian is headed (and
> > which direction it *should* be headed). While your input could be helpful,
> > I'd like to encourage you to keep from turning this into a rehashing of old
> > discussions. If you absolutely must contribute, please do so only to clear
> > up facts or provide details -- these discussions can get heated
> > occasionally, but I'm really just trying to see what people less embroiled
> > in the current battles think about where we're headed. Thanks :)
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