[Board] Board Meeting July first

[Seven (aka Arnulf)]

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Howard,
thanks for you input. A few comments inline.

Howard Butler wrote:
> "In many respects, open source software and proprietary software are
> similar in the ways they are developed and used.  "  -- How they're
> used?  sure.  How they're developed? Hell no.  The whole point of
> open source software is that its development model provides
> advantages to developers.
...and to users.

Seems like we need to rephrase this. My thought was that this passage
might be rather reassuring to the non-FOSS enlightened in that the Open
Source way of doing things is not different (read: inferior) to the
proprietary one. Which is still a major perception thanks to all the FUD
tha tis out there. By saying: It is just the same developers with the
same tools doing good software we do not drop anything. Then add: Big
difference: developers can dive into things a lot deeper, reuse und
ommit reinventing wheels, etc. Licenses should be better separated out
from development processes (in my opinion). Would this make it more
acceptable?

> The entire section that feebly attempts to characterize open source
> and proprietary software development should be ditched.  Deep linking
> and quoting of other, more nuanced and complete descriptions of the
> landscape is going to provide much more accurate detail and give the
> reader places to go to find out more.

This is probably right. But as I understand it a White Paper needs to
summarize all facts at least at a management level. Which unfortunately
excludes deep linking. Just think "printed on paper" to get what I mean.
No matter what - we will end up with a somewhat feeble version. If that
is untolerable we have to ditch the whole idea.

> The part about OSM is dead wrong.  The ODbL exists *because* the
> licensing concepts of open source software cannot apply.

As I said in the other mail to Jeff, yes we should probably simply
remove the data bit altogether. It goes down another ally and gets into
a different mess. Good for another paper of OGC and OSM (hehe, I can
already see Steve and Carl thrash it out).

> projects2 -- typo
> 
> "For example, OpenLayers moved from Metacarta to Nokia, and Metacarta
> and Nokia have quite different ideas about the meaning of the
> OpenLayers Copyright."
> 
> 1) what does this mean? 2) how does it have any bearing on this
> paper? 3) The *license* of OpenLayers makes Nokia's ideas about open
> source moot

This section definitely needs to be ditched. I am sorry that it showed
up at all, must have been a side note that ended up in the full text.

> What is the point of this paper?  To inform the members of OGC?  I
> find it quite mushy and weak (and factually inaccurate in a number of
> places), but I am most definitely not the intended audience.

It is intended for folks who confuse Open Source, Open Standards, Open
Software, Freeware, Free Software, OSGeo, OSM, OpenGeo, OpenData, Shared
Software and so on. Unfortunately this is still more than 99% of
humanity. Even in our protected OSGeo environment it applies to at least
50%. Inside OGC my estimate are a good 80% are not well informed. In the
OSM community another 90-something% have no idea about OSGeo and OGC and
that there actually is a difference. This is why I went through the
whole trouble and think it is really worthwhile. But I can be convinced
otherwise, so thanks again for your input. My hopes are to get something
done that manages to just scrape your tolerenace level and is still
readable to a broader audience.

Makes sens? Or should we not bother to try?

Best regards,
Arnulf

> On Jun 28, 2010, at 6:08 AM, Seven (aka Arnulf) wrote:
> 
> Yeah, sure, the attachement...
> 
> Here goes.
> 
> Arnulf.
> 
> Arnulf Christl (OSGeo) wrote:
>>>> Board, the next regular board meeting is on Thursday (1st of
>>>> July) this week. I have added an agenda [1], please feel free
>>>> to add items. Also observe the timing, we start at 17:00 UTC.
>>>> 
>>>> One potential motion needs up front work to be done. The OGC
>>>> plans to publish a White Paper on Open Standards and Open
>>>> Source. They asked me whether I could help with the Open Source
>>>> perspective which I did. Over the last weeks we jointly
>>>> prepared the paper and I feel confident that it is good to go
>>>> now. The result of this work can be found in the attached
>>>> document. In preparation for this meeting I ask you to read and
>>>>  comment or edit the attached document. It is not intended for
>>>> broader dissemination just yet which is why I did not send this
>>>> mail to Discuss or Standards.
>>>> 
>>>> Please go through this paper and consider in what role you
>>>> would like to have OSGeo appear / associate with it. OGC would
>>>> be happy to publish this document as a joint White Paper which
>>>> would give it most authority with the intended audiences. OSGeo
>>>> could also just be mentioned as a reviewer or collaborator or
>>>> any other form you consider useful.
>>>> 
>>>> It would be great to have discussions *before* the actual board
>>>> meeting on this list so that we can proceed to have a motion on
>>>> the floor to vote on.
>>>> 
>>>> Please let this list know if you *cannot* make it to the next
>>>> meeting as we will need quorum to go ahead. Summer time and
>>>> associated leaves are already looming ahead...
>>>> 
>>>> Thanks, Arnulf.
>>>> 
>>>> [1] http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Board_Meeting_2010-07-01
>>>> 
> _______________________________________________ Board mailing list 
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> 
<2010-06-28 Open Stds & Open Srce v5 LM SR CR
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- --
Arnulf Christl

Exploring Space, Time and Mind
http://arnulf.us
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