OpenRespect
                       ===========
                        2010-11-20


You may have noticed the heated discussions  on  Ubuntu  and
Canonical lately.  The decision to move to Unity as the main
desktop shell for Ubuntu 11.04 and  Canonical  insisting  on
developers assigning their copyright  to  them  hasn't  made
them many new friends.  Whether you agree with Canonical  or
not some people seem to speak very harshly of  their  latest
actions and deviate from a well-mannered debate. There seems
to be an increase of rudeness in  the  open  source  /  free
software  debate.   To  counter  these  tendencies  Ubuntu's
community  manager  Jono  Bacon  launched   openrespect.org.

On 26th October I read a dent from @jonobacon [1]

> amuses me how some corners of the  Open  Source  community
> assume mal-intent before good intent...we are all  on  the
> same side people!

That sentiment seemed to be a precursor for Jono's  blogpost
"Making our world more respectful" [2] in which he describes
his tiredness of all the bickering in Open  Source  and  his
want for a more polite debate.  This  all  resulted  in  the
OpenRespect website and  the  OpenRespect  declaration  with
which  I  mostly  agree.   To  support  his  cause  you  can
stick a button on your website [3].

To be clear: I don't agree with everything Canonical and the
people  from  Ubuntu  do.   I  don't  believe  in  copyright
assignments  and  think  it's  best  to  not  diversify  the
GNU/Linux default desktops too much  so  we  can  share  the
effort and focus our attention.  On the flip side I  believe
they're doing much good for GNU/Linux and Free  Software  in
general. They might not place the emphasize on Free Software
I'd prefer, but I think they're doing a wonderful  job,  and
until their actions proof otherwise I  will  keep  believing
that!  I've used Ubuntu for years  and  I'm  using  Trisquel
GNU/Linux (which is based on Ubuntu) right now so I actually
own them a debt of gratitude.

I hope the thoughts behind OpenRespect may have  its  effect
and many people realize the importance of  being  respectful
towards others you strongly disagree with.


Hyperlinks:
[1]: http://identi.ca/conversation/56962055#notice-57465766
[2]: http://www.jonobacon.org/2010/11/05/making-our-world-more-respectful/
[3]: https://farm5.static.flickr.com/4066/5162704497_56efc5481d_m.jpg


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                      Tags: english

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