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Kevin Carmony Responds to Criticism
sharkscott writes to tell us that LXer's Don Parris took a few minutes to get Kevin Carmony's response to the large amount of criticism he has been taking over offering non-free software in Linspire. From the article: "Essentially, Carmony's position is that, in ten years of holding out, the FOSS community has made relatively few gains, in terms of convincing vendors to release libre codecs and drivers. In other words, the strategy doesn't seem to be working. Additionally, while some will be patient, most users would prefer to have something - anything - that works in the meanwhile."
Note that Mr. Paris pointed out to me that Robertson stepped down as CEO. Carmony is running the show now. (Just in case you pay as little attention to Linspire as I do.)
My point still holds, though. There's nothing "wrong" with what Linspire is doing with the Freespire project. They're giving away free binaries (which they don't have to give you) along with all the source code they owe you. In exchange, you may or may not become a Click and Run customer. I don't see an issue here. And no, I don't think that Linspire is really expecting a huge outpouring of volunteer programmers, either.
On another topic (since I can't make fun of poor Mr. Robertson's Linspire work anymore), has anyone noticed the latest from AJAX Launch? It seems that they have added an Excel "Demo" (a pretty bit of XUL that looks like a real spreadsheet), a media player that seems no more sophisticated than the one in sharkscott's link in the summary (if I wanted your website to make noise... grrr...), and a RealPlayer video of the "AJAX Desktop" of the Future.
Are you amazed yet? Ecstatic? Hopping up and down in excitement? Holding your breath in bated anticipation?
No, neither am I.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
If Linux proponents expect to see any sort of growth in desktop Linux usage, they are going to have to back down on this issue. Users want their MP3s to play. They want their videos to play. They don't want to deal with some complicated installation procedure just to get basic functionality that they can get easily, out-of-the-box in an install of another operating system.
Linspire realizes this, so they're doing all they can to make it easy as they can for new Linux users to use Linux and do what they want. People shouldn't be giving them flack for this.
Arrrrrrr
...that the _real world_ does not share their view that politics is the most important thing in software... Functionality is...
This is the first I've heard of this situation involving Linspire. All I can say is, "Sounds good!"
I can't believe how many times I have been stymied when configuring Linux because it didn't support my major-vendor video card. The "Open Source" version of certain drivers don't work. I tried an OSS implementation of some Nvidia drivers and it could barely spit out any video at all, much less allow me to use the advanced options on the card. I know the OSS developers tried hard, and I appreciate that. However, it just didn't work.
At times like these, I don't really care about politics or philosophy. I'm just trying to get the computer working, and if I get stuck because of OSS, I'll just abandon the project.
I suppose this is the reason why I haven't been a serious user of any Linux Desktop software for years. I use Linux as a server all the time, on dozens of different machines. It works great as a Server.
94% of Repubs and 21% of Dems voted to renew the Patriot Act
IMHO, there has been little to no success getting vendors to release documentation to write drivers for three major reasons:
1) To date, the market share represented by open-source operating systems is very small.
2) The users and distributors of opensource operating systems have not presented a united front when it comes to the inclusion of propriety drivers and code. In fact, it seems the vast majority of distributors and users are more than willing to settle for closed, propriety drivers (even when they are crap!)
3) American corporate culture reflexively resists voluntarily releasing information of any kind. It is always easier to say no. Some Taiwanese vendors, for example, have been found by some opensource projects to be rather cooperative when it comes to releasing information. Major American corporations by constrast are a guaranteed stonewall.
We believe that the only way the world can successfully advance in the field of computer software is by eventually replacing all closed source systems with open source ones.
Take an example of Apple's recent success with Mac OS X. This software, although it contains tons of closed source code, is based on open source code and contains literally hundreds and hundreds of free software packages. Apple would never have succeeded in creating such a feature-rich operating system in the time it took to make it without the availability and use of such open source code.
This is why this Linspire debacle is happening. People know that although the expedient thing to do is to continue using closed source proprietary stuff, the correct thing to do is to get ourselves off that addiction and on to some better software.
I'm guessing that this response was motivated (at least in part) by the effort of PJ at Groklaw. For those that have visited recently, PJ did a scathing article on Linspire/Freespire. Really harsh stuff which a lot of people found pretty unwarranted. Myself included.
... deleted. Then it descended into farce.
So I posted anonymously as I usually do. The odd thing that happened to me was that I found my post deleted. So I posted again
She seemed convinced that this was an orchestrated attack by Linspire "astroturfers". And when Kevin posted to the forum, she wouldn't talk to him and asked him for an apology from the (imaginary, IMHO) astroturfers. Having said that, Kevin did quote an email he sent PJ which I thought was poor form.
Anyway, I literally sat there for ages watching post after post being deleted which I thought was amazing. A large number of these posts were quite sensible. They just didn't tow the Groklaw line.
When it had calmed down a couple of days later, I posted that here is a place where they discuss free speech, but don't practice it. Quite frankly, the amount of groupthink and censorship I saw left me with a very different opinion of the place.
The best thing about Slashdot's comment system is that it keeps all the posts. Even the trolls.
Who else but the designers of the hardware to produce drivers (open or otherwise)? They have access to hardware schematics, development plans, and the engineers who designed everything from the fabrication plants to the chips you're writing the drivers for. Do you honestly think you're a good enough programmer to fix a driver for hardware you have no knowledge of? I'm not a programmer hardly at all. It doesn't matter to me if it's open or closed. Either way, I can't fix anything.
Assuming that something won't work because it's closed source is as stupid as the closed source camp claiming FOSS is more susceptible to security vulnerabilities. It's absolute BS. And won't get any help from the vendor? I'd say I'm as likely to not get help from a vendor as it is likely that the FOSS community will label my bug Won't-Fix. God forbid I happen to get some rare bit of critical hardware for which the FOSS "community" consists of one guy who's a complete idiot.
Yes, I understand the FOSS model. Yes, I beleive it is superior. Yes, I believe it is the future. But avoiding closed software because of some nebulous bugaboo makes you seem like Chicken Little in a snowstorm.
The road to tyranny has always been paved with claims of necessity.
I always play my MP3s with a legitimate, patent-licensed player. After I download them from eDonkey.