[Board] A possible view of the world

[Frank Warmerdam]

On 11-11-13 01:45 PM, Daniel Morissette wrote:
> On 11-11-11 05:12 PM, Michael P. Gerlek wrote:
>>> 1) Mark has convinced me that in the intelligence and military
>>> world in the US we are currently in a moment of opportunity
>>> where strategically applied resources would be very valuable.
>>
>> This one has me conflicted:
>>
>> As an board member, I'm hesitant to put OSGeo International resources
>> directly into the US defense sector because I recognize some of our non-US
>> members may be morally/politically opposed to such a move. (Does anyone else
>> share this concern, or is it just me?)
>>
>
> I share this concern, and believe that defense stuff would fit better in a
> local chapter.
>

Folks,

To be clear I'm not suggesting we pour resources into such an effort just
in order to make the US military and intelligence community more efficient.
The goal is to engage them in open source geospatial so they will support
projects and the organization as a whole pushing our mission forward.

Our holding a conference in Beijing will be primarily in partnership
with government organizations there.  But we did not did not avoid holding
our conference there just because some people have concerns about the
behavior of the government there.  Instead, we proceeded in part based on
the assumption that promoting open source geospatial within the government
would lead to increased contributions to, and use of our projects over time.

On account of our being based in the USA there will be some countries it
is hard for us to deal directly with (ie. Cuba, Syria, Iran) but where that
is the not the case, I would *hope* that we would not let concerns not
directly related to our primary mission interfere with our activities
anywhere in the world.

All that said, if it is going to be terribly divisive I suppose it would
be better to approach the American opportunity in different ways.  I would,
however, be disappointed.

Best regards,
-- 
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I set the clouds in motion - turn up   | Frank Warmerdam, warmerdam at pobox.com
light and sound - activate the windows | http://pobox.com/warmerda
and watch the world go round - Rush    | Geospatial Software Developer