[OSGeo-Discuss] FW: Can you help spread work to any FOSS developers you know

Thu Apr 9 19:46:08 PDT 2009

One thing I've noticed that has even got me into rather heated  
discussions about F/OSS geo software is .. how to put this delicately?

Basically, most technical people are lousy at communicating  
requirements and demonstrating capabilities to end-users & decision  
makers.

The F/OSS geo community is no different overall in this. Many (I'd say  
most) developers focus overwhelmingly on technical details - and do  
not appreciate the need to "sell" the application, and tweak their  
presentation to the organizational/cultural issues that differ between  
the two worlds, as it were. The notion that a company or agency might  
spend $2k on a simple web calendar app seems incredibly stupid and  
bizarre to them (and well.. it probably is) - but if said company  
doesn't KNOW of a good alternative - and they need a calendar NOW -  
then it's logical from there perspective to pay someone to do it.

This isn't the developer's fault - it's just that quite often there's  
nobody else to pitch the product for them. And further since it's free  
they may not understand WHY it should need a pitch. Their attitude  
is.. It's free, It's open source.. It can do what you want.. why  
aren't you using it?

Don't get me wrong, by no means am I picking on everyone. I'll pick on  
Dane Springmeyer of Mapnik and point out what a great job he does  
bridging the gap between development and actually talking to people  
and understanding what they want to do in an enthusiastic way - but  
not all projects have someone like this, which is why you see some  
incredibly good code simply rot because the developer built it, tossed  
it up somewhere, but didn't get a lot of people using it and didn't  
communicate their idea well to the relevant decisionmakers/users in a  
manner they understand. In other words - many F/OSS people suck at  
marketing. No different from a lot of devs in the commercial world;  
but the difference is that most companies hire sales and marketing  
teams.

  I can tell you right now that I'll probably end up deploying some  
collaborative map tools using BlazeDS (or one of its similar cousins)  
- Why? Because one of adobe's evangelists showed how it could be done  
via a blog. Could I do it via.. virtually anything else? Sure but this  
works now.. and well basically there's no reason to investigate other  
options further. In this case BlazeDS is open source now so no big  
deal - but a lot of decisions are made just like this - based off  
limited hours/day to do research and so if you find something that  
does what you want you go with it.

  - bri

On Apr 9, 2009, at 2:55 PM, Arnie Shore wrote:

> Boy, have you hit a hot button of mine!
>
> But I think the research could profitably veer off a bit.  Like  
> there's only one federal Department of X, but shift the focus to  
> local government agencies and things chang radically.  Like there's  
> like 4500 counties - not to mention towns - and they're ALL DOING  
> THE SAME KIND OF APPLICATIONS.  And they're ALL HURTING FOR $$$.
>
> That shd be a prime target, but I've seen virtually zero interest in  
> FOSS stuff so far in that world, and, in truth, there really is a  
> support problem.
>
> Case in point is our work in developing a F/OSS Computer-Assisted  
> Dispatch application: ( See http://groups.google.com/group/open-source-cad 
>  as well as http://sourceforge.net/projects/openises/  )
>
> The bulk of interest in our CAD package has come largely from the  
> HAM  world, those folks oriented to supporting emergency comm's  
> during crisis conditions.  Surprisingly (to me, anyway) little from  
> the career response shops like EMS.
>
> But wait, there's more ... !
>
> AS
>
>
> On Thu, Apr 9, 2009 at 5:51 PM, Tyler Mitchell  
> <tylermitchell at shaw.ca> wrote:
> FYI - a FOSS-related survey for a research project.
>
> Begin forwarded message:
> -----original message------
> From: Felicia Sullivan <felicia at oc-tech.org>
> Date: Thu, Apr 9, 2009 at 3:00 PM
> Subject: Can you help spread work to any FOSS developers you know
>
>
> Perhaps some of you can help spread the word:
>
> For wide distribution
>
> I'm a PhD student in public policy at UMass Boston doing research on
> what motivates members of free and open source software communities.
>
> I'm looking at ways that public policy could increase the quantity and
> quality of contributions to free software and open source software
> (defined as projects with an approved open source license -
> http://opensource.org/).
>
> I have a professor that says if I can provide some convincing data on
> how to best support free and open source software, he thinks he can
> get the ideas on President Obama's desk. I am conducting a survey -
> http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=SA1BorCQ_2b9E6NSE_2bNCKavw_3d_3d
> and I need over 500 responses by May 1st in order to answer my key
> research questions.
>
> One lucky respondent will have $100 donated to the FOSS project of  
> their choice.
>
> Questions about this survey can be directed to me at
> felicia.sullivan at umb.edu. Thanks for your input.
>
> Acknowledgement
>
> I want to thank my FOSS developer go-to-guys -- Dan MacNeil, Peter
> Bull, Stéphane Alnet, and Bill de la Vega -- for providing critical
> feedback on this survey.
>
> --
> _______________
>
> |  Technology and training to advance and sustain social change  |
>
> Felicia M. Sullivan
> Organizers’ Collaborative
> felicia at oc-tech.org
> http://organizerscollaborative.org
> 617.848.9513 [ voice / fax ]
>
> Gtalk/Jabber:  felicia.oc at gmail.com
> AIM:  forge66
> Skype;  forge66
> Linkedin:  http://www.linkedin.com/in/feliciasullivan
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-- 
Brian Russo
brian at entropy.net
(808) 271-4166

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