[linux-audio-user] linux audio wiki

[Pete Bessman]

On Fri, 26 Aug 2005 23:58:24 +1000, "Shayne O'Connor"
<forums at machinehasnoagenda.com> said:
> your long ass email assumed that i was saying everyone should refer to 
> linux as "GNU/Linux" 100% of the time,

I assumed nothing about your position.  My email was about why
GNU-approved terminology is a stumbling
block to adoption, and why I think we should not use it ever.  This
isn't even affected
but how often you think we should say "GNU/Linux."  I don't care about
that, anyway.  If it's greater
than 0%, I think it's too much.


> and that whenever you refer to it 
> - however briefly - one should then launch into a spiel on the concept 
> of Open Source, its history and so on ... while this was convenient for 
> you to get your opinion across, it sort of melodramatizes what i'm 
> saying, i think, if not downright misrepresents me.

I don't understand this passage.


> i should let Stallman explain things himself, cos in the biggest 
> coincidence today, my mate sent me this article from today's Sydney 
> Morning Herald ... what timing:

This is a rehearsal of the standard GNU position.  As my previous email
addressed, the issue
of software freedom is a complete non-starter outside of our circle. 
Ergo,
the pragmatically oriented open-source-and-Linux movement is better at
growing the userbase.  This is, I think, easy to verify empirically.


> this is pretty much what i'm talking about - it's not complicated, and 
> it's hardly asking too much ... but as you know (voting for bush and 
> all, heh heh) it's your right to do anything you want.

I have attempted to demonstrate that the "GNU way" retards adoption, to
a degree that makes
naming an important domain in a "GNU approved" manner "asking too much."


> "What is open source software?"
> 
> "It is software whose code is freely available for anyone to modify, 
> copy or distribute. As opposed to proprietary software, the use of which 
> is highly regulated by patents and copyright law."
> 
> i'm sure there's better, briefer answers out there.

I don't understand what this is supposed to prove vis-a-vis "free
software."


> > You think that, to some fuzzily defined extent, we should say
> > "GNU/Linux" because that's The Right Thing.  This is ideological.
> > 
> 
> No - because that's what it *is*.

Then, you think that, to some fuzzily defined extent, we should
say "GNU/Linux" because that's what it *is*. 


> > I think that, to an absolute extent, we should say "Linux" because
> > that's what the rest of the world says.  This is realistic.
> > 
> 
> apart from the "absolute extent", you are right. you just don't seem to 
> have read what i wrote properly.

I should hope that I'm right about determing what I'm thinking.

As it pertains to growing the userbase, I still think that my position
is realistic,
and yours ideological.


> > These days, I say "I use an open source program called Specimen that I
> > wrote for Linux," and everybody understands me fine.
> 
> meh - same diff ...

Not.

-Pete