On Thursday, December 26, 2002, at 01:15 AM, James Sparenberg wrote: [...]
Yes, but you're still missing the point, James. I don't know if there *are* a million boxed sets in stores right now. Sure $5M would be helpful, it would be excellent! But if those boxes aren't there *today*, I fail to see how this helps us get to the point where we will be putting that number of boxes on store shelves.So while James made some very good points, they're pretty much irrelevant to the topic at hand which is, looking at the subject line, Increase of Capital for Mandrakesoft, which is happening *now*... not next year.Hope everyone had a great Christmas!I was commenting on the letter in the thread immediately before me, and if the short term doesn't include the long term (or vice versa ) It can be counter productive. If MDK had a million box sets in the stores right now. Making 5 bucks a crack... would 5 mill help the short term bottom line? Yes I know that it can often be 30 to 60 days before this
comes in but this kind of recievable would have possibly prevented theI don't know about a pull-out of funds. It's been postponed/delayed according to the website announcement, not retracted or cancelled.
pull out of certain funds MDK was expecting (taken from the website
announcement.) I don't wish or desire to denigrate the original letter..
but rather say yes I agree .... but more is needed for both short andAnd I thank you for that, James. The issue at this instant in time, if we could freeze on today, is not new users; it's existing users that aren't doing their part (freeloaders if you will). Mandrake Linux is perhaps one of the most popular Linux distributions out there, but you'd never know it in terms of money. One of out greatest strengths and, inevitably, our greatest weaknesses, is allowing the entire distro to be downloaded for nothing. Don't tell me that people out there don't take advantage of this and continue to download ISOs and use Mandrake all over the place without contributing a dime. These are the same people who will whine and complain if Mandrake ceases to exist, or who currently scream and yell if something doesn't work to their liking.
long term success. I want to buy MDK 11.4 (yes I know they never get
that high with sub numbers *grin*) I just hope there won't be another
crisis like this right after 9.1 comes out, but the pattern is in
place. I'm a club member, I buy my disks (not just download them,
although I do that while waiting for my disks) I encourage others to buy
not download. And right now... I'm tapped. My company is reaching an
equally tight cash situation... but then again.... we are still
privately funded with no Angel or Vulture investment. (soon to change)
I don't know. Maybe we need to go with SuSE's model and allow a one ISO demo a few months after release to prevent people from doing this. Then again, who wants to see Mandrake become another SuSE? I think the fact that Mandrake does this is, again, it's greatest strength and I'd hate to see that change as I think it would change the entire philosophy of the company. So is that really an option? I hope not.
At any rate, I don't think there is much value in debating/discussing this further. The real value is for people to step up and do something to keep their distribution alive. That's right... *their* distribution; it isn't our distro. It's *your* distro. We have opened the process so much that almost anyone can put their mark on the distro it is, essentially, a community distribution that we just maintain and put the nuts and bolts on. If having that kind of distribution is important to people, I trust they put their money into it to ensure it's survival.
I don't want to sit here and become an evangelist for Mandrake... that's not my job. But I do feel that certain things need to be understood about how all of this works.
I also don't want anyone to feel we are neglecting the long term for the sake of the short term as that is not the case at all.
I've said enough on this particular thread. I think it's time to have actions speak instead of words.
Thanks.
--
MandrakeSoft Security; http://www.mandrakesecure.net/
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