The so-called "wisdom of crowds" is merely mob rule by another name and mob rule has a very poor history. Mob rule is behind lynchings, attacks on minorities, ethinic clensing, and other atrocites.
Dear friend, I'm definitely not pointing at the crowd involved in lynchings, attacks on minorities, ethinic clensing, and other atrocites. This is nothing but a group under a strong Authority doing blindly whatever the leader says. Such a crowd should not be confused with the crowd consisting of free thinking, and open minded people. What you are talking about is the crowd which consists of people who give their thinking ability to some Authority and just behave as the authority instructs them to do.
Linux community who has contributed so much to the technology is not that lynching crowd, but a free-thinking, technology sharing and open-minded people. This community doesn't want authoritarian elements spurting in it. This is the wisdom I'm talking about.
>Crowds are people. In the words of Agent K, "A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky animals and you know it."
Well, people may be panicky animals... but it is their wisdom that matters the most. A person by himself/herself may be smart but he his smartness couldn't be supported individually. If you think it can, they I say it is short lived. Well, considering all the examples you mentioned(USSR, Germany, Latin America...), still I say it is the wisdom of the crowd, though I may not support their stand.
All I wanted to say is if FSF comes with stingent rules or Novell plays a dual game, it results in groupism among the community. But, these groups may not be acceptable to much larger free and open-source community.
I can understand the problem and frustration you are facing in this FSF-Novell dilemma. But I guess you are not making the mistake of moving away from Linux just because of FSF/Novell. There are many community maintained distros which fare really well and don't get messed like the current situation ( I guess you know this). I feel the community's spirit continues to exist irrespective of FSF strict stand against Novell or Novell's agreement with MS.
Well, whether FSF sues Novell for their so called unethical tie-up with MS or Novell neglects the community interests by the suspected idea of achieving monopoly in Linux, or even if it is suspected that MS is playing double game!! the community cannot be taken for granted. There is a wisdom in the crowd, if not in a single geek. The community itself takes various forms; as developers, as testers and as end-users too. Any of the organization taking such a huge Linux community for granted would definitely be a foolish mistake. I hope FSF treads carefully in this regard, so does Novell, not loosing out its strong Linux user base just because of a DRP agreement with a monopolized company.
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Dear friend, I'm definitely not pointing at the crowd involved in lynchings, attacks on minorities, ethinic clensing, and other atrocites. This is nothing but a group under a strong Authority doing blindly whatever the leader says. Such a crowd should not be confused with the crowd consisting of free thinking, and open minded people. What you are talking about is the crowd which consists of people who give their thinking ability to some Authority and just behave as the authority instructs them to do.
Linux community who has contributed so much to the technology is not that lynching crowd, but a free-thinking, technology sharing and open-minded people. This community doesn't want authoritarian elements spurting in it. This is the wisdom I'm talking about.
>Crowds are people. In the words of Agent K, "A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky animals and you know it." Well, people may be panicky animals... but it is their wisdom that matters the most. A person by himself/herself may be smart but he his smartness couldn't be supported individually. If you think it can, they I say it is short lived. Well, considering all the examples you mentioned(USSR, Germany, Latin America...), still I say it is the wisdom of the crowd, though I may not support their stand. All I wanted to say is if FSF comes with stingent rules or Novell plays a dual game, it results in groupism among the community. But, these groups may not be acceptable to much larger free and open-source community.
I can understand the problem and frustration you are facing in this FSF-Novell dilemma. But I guess you are not making the mistake of moving away from Linux just because of FSF/Novell. There are many community maintained distros which fare really well and don't get messed like the current situation ( I guess you know this). I feel the community's spirit continues to exist irrespective of FSF strict stand against Novell or Novell's agreement with MS.
Well, whether FSF sues Novell for their so called unethical tie-up with MS or Novell neglects the community interests by the suspected idea of achieving monopoly in Linux, or even if it is suspected that MS is playing double game!! the community cannot be taken for granted. There is a wisdom in the crowd, if not in a single geek. The community itself takes various forms; as developers, as testers and as end-users too. Any of the organization taking such a huge Linux community for granted would definitely be a foolish mistake. I hope FSF treads carefully in this regard, so does Novell, not loosing out its strong Linux user base just because of a DRP agreement with a monopolized company.