[OSGeo-Board] Service Provider Directory

[Jason Birch]

We would police reactively.  If the community notices a provider that
does not actually offer the services stated, we'd take care of them
(euphemism?).

The intention was to make this a service (not product) directory for
providers that give support directly for open source packages.  I don't
think that ESRI offers direct support for GDAL, but if they do I think
that they would be welcomed in the list.

Excluding languages and products from the directory would limit its
usefulness to the users.

Jason 

-----Original Message-----
From: Dave McIlhagga [mailto:dmcilhagga at dmsolutions.ca] 
Sent: Tuesday, September 26, 2006 14:34
To: Jason Birch
Cc: Tyler Mitchell; dev at webcommittee.osgeo.org; OSGeo-Board
Subject: Re: [OSGeo-Board] Service Provider Directory

I understand both needs for sure -- just trying to see if there is a
means to achieve both goals.

Perhaps one way to make this simpler would be to restrict the service
provider directory to simply an organization name and link to website so
that it doesn't cannibalize the promotional opportunity on the
sponsorship side. Otherwise we have this weird situation where you can
get more info available to people for free than you can get by being an
Associate Sponsor.


Also - how is this policed? Who has authority to determine that Company
X is a valid service provider, and Company Y is not? That seems like
some very murky water to me. ESRI has GDAL built into their software --
so can they include their services on OSGeo? If we say no to ESRI, would
we not have to say no to Autodesk since MapGuide Enterprise is a
proprietary bundling of MGOS? That doesn't seem fair. OTOH if we say
anybody can be a service provider if they make use of any OSGeo
technology (which is most of the Geospatial universe) -- than is there
any value to it?

Ok - devil's advocate I know ... I'm not suggesting one thing is right
or wrong -- simply that it gets extremely gray. We might be creating a
monster we don't know how to manage down the road.

Dave

--
Dave McIlhagga
President, DM Solutions Group

http://www.dmsolutions.ca/premiere
EMail : dmcilhagga at dmsolutions.ca
Phone : 613-565-5056 x15
Fax : 613-565-0925

Jason Birch wrote:
> Sponsors will be listed on the "Sponsors" page, and will be entitled 
> to place an OSGeo Sponsor graphic on their website; these benefits 
> will not be diluted.
> 
> We talked about having an appropriate "sponsor" flag show up next to 
> the listing?
> 
> I think that it's important that we maintain a directory that doesn't 
> require sponsorship, while making sponsorship of value to those 
> entering their details into the directory.
> 
> Consultants will initially enter their details into the list, and then

> consider sponsorship as a way of increasing their visibility within 
> the list?
> 
> Jason
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Dave McIlhagga [mailto:dmcilhagga at dmsolutions.ca]
> Sent: Tuesday, September 26, 2006 14:05
> To: Tyler Mitchell
> Cc: dev at webcommittee.osgeo.org; OSGeo-Board
> Subject: Re: [OSGeo-Board] Service Provider Directory
> 
> Could this diminish value of some of the OSGeo Sponsorships? Visible 
> association for companies with OSGeo was one of the benefits we had 
> outlined for some of the packages -- so this would make that case a 
> lot more difficult.
> 
> Dave
> 
> Tyler Mitchell wrote:
>> On 26-Sep-06, at 11:21 AM, Frank Warmerdam wrote:
>>> Tyler, could you add a link to the entry form on the community site?
> 
>>> I can't
>>> seem to find it.
>> Done, added it to the bottom of your wiki page.
>>
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