Re: Non-free software and GNOME

[Mike Newman <mike gtnorthern demon co uk>]

On Sat, 2001-10-20 at 01:01, Andy Tai wrote:
> Why mentioning Star Office (the non-Open Office
> version) in GNOME Summary at all? After all, GNOME
> Summary reports about what is going on in the
> development of GNOME.  

Sadly, we don't live in an easily isolated and compartmentalized world.
As mentioned elsewhere recently, StarOffice is part of the migration
path from Microsoft products to free products. In this sense, mentioning
it in relation to GNOME is acceptible and laudible.
 
> To promote GNOME, mentioning Star Office may not help
> that much.  Mentioning how nicely Open Office or
> AbiWord or Gnumeric works nicely within the GNOME
> environment would produce better results.

Mention them all, let people make a choice. I have views about free
software you might not share, and vice versa. Expecting people to
migrate is one thing, expecting them to swallow an entire belief system
whole is an entirely other thing.
 
> And RMS's people skills are known to be a weakness...
> it would be good if people are considerate of this and
> work around it...

I can't 100% agree with this - I admire RMS a great deal, but I make no
allowances for intolerance and petulance.

Mike