[LAU] An appeal to famous artists?

[Alexandre Prokoudine]

On Thu, Aug 4, 2011 at 2:23 PM, James Morris wrote:

>>> I'm all for getting all sorts of professionals involved, but here and
>>> now if we want to get anything done and we can't find people who are
>>> better at design, usability and marketing than us, then we can either
>>> keep moaning or bloody well study the stuff the best we can.
>>
>> Fine, just don't take digs at developers who would rather develop
>> software. Believe it or not, many developers
>
> Believe it or not, many developers do actually want to make usable software.

Well, I already said that here and now you can be either a
monotechnician with little to no user community or a, er,
dolby-surround-technician :) with a bigger community.

When you start a business, you don't hire hundreds of people all at
once. You do a hell of work yourself, *then* you hire people to
gradually substitute you so that you could focus on management or
whatever it is you do. Why should a free software project be any
different?

If you are on your tod with your project and you refuse to larn new
stuff to get a potential to grow dev/user community, then you already
lost. Yes, you still have your pet project, but chances are that very
few people will care.

>>> Do you think usability architects focus on just usability? No, they
>>> study every-fucking-thing that is even remotely related to human
>>> beings and the world around us: art, architecture. physics etc.
>>
>> Well let's all hail the new saviours! My, how big their brains must be!
>
> So let's get this straight: Developers should stop moaning and just
> get on and study the entire spectrum of human endeavour while
> simultaneously developing usable software?

Do you think overreaction and exxageration will help the discussion?
I think not.

> Perhaps you should come up with some usable ideas.

Love your attitude :)

>>>> Such activities are much better suited to people with big strong forceful
>>>> opinionated personalities such as yourself.
>>>
>>> Me? No, I'm as humble as a lamb :)
>>
>> So you don't want to help developers by chasing government contracts for them?

When we first discussed using Linux in government institutions,
schools etc. here in Russia back in 2008 or so, the plan was to hand a
bagful of money to FOSS developers including those who are in
multimedia produuction niche. Then the cr*s*s got to us, and the
initial plan was buried due to all sorts of financial cuts. Needless
to say, if and when another opportunity arises, I will do my best.

Alexandre Prokoudine
http://libregraphicsworld.org