> > Frequently I hear people say "Mozilla is not an end user application".
> > Most often this is in reply to people asking about spell checkers for
> > mail/news.
> >
> > Well, why not?
>
> Because being an end-user application involves packaging, advertising
> and (most importantly) support, none of which mozilla.org is able to give.
The most obvious comparison is between the people who write Linux and
a certain organisation called "Debian", which prodvides end-user Linux
and GNU based stuff (amoung other things)
However, folllowing the example of the Penguin isn't necessarily the
Thing to Do. FreeBSD gets by without a Debian-clone.
> > Binaries are being released, and "end users" are using them. And from
> > what I can see, there aren't large notices that say "Warning: these
> > binaries are only meant to test the Mozilla code, and are not meant to
> > be used by non-developers (end users)".
>
> There are. Right at the top of http://www.mozilla.org/releases/, it says:
>
> "We make binary versions of of Mozilla available for *testing purposes
> only!*. We provide no end user support."
It does. I thought it was pretty clear that Mozilla is a work in
progress, at least. But it's not clear enough, there, that the Mozilla
organisation will never release end-user targetted stuffs.
> > So to imply that features
> > like spell checking aren't on the radar isn't quite right,
>
>
> Well, from the large amount of heat and tiny amount of light on the
> issue, I'd say it's not on the radar.
Unless someone cares to write it themselves.
> > and probably
> > hinders Mozilla's ability to eventually gain world domination by
> > addressing common needs of end users. ;)
>
> This is a common misconception. Mozilla is not about world domination,
> or even web domination, despite what the anti-Microsoft crowd would have
> you believe. It's about providing excellent technology to companies who
> want to fight that battle. But mozilla.org is not in the front line.
>
Mozilla the organisation is all about getting things right. The
adamant refusal to implement a fudge for right-mouse-down, select,
right-mouse-up behaviour in Windows is part of this, as far as I can
see. They do the Right Thing, which occaisionally ends up being the
wrong thing from an end user's point of veiw.
Once Mozilla 1.0 is released (assuming the bugs in textareas are fixed
so that the browser is actually usable) I think it quite likely that
someone will release a browser almost identical to the Mozilla browser
but targetted at end users. I might help such people, if I could.
> --
> People killed in WTC tragedy (approx.): 5,000
> People who die every day of starvation: 24,000
> Each of those deaths is more preventable than one caused by a terrorist.
> So when does the Western World declare war on hunger, disease and poverty?
>
I appreciate the statement you're making there, but a) it's way more
than 5,000 and b) should you decide to keep that as your signature, it
might incite more unproductive argument.
Declaring war on poverty won't work, because poverty is built into the
system. The system needs to be changed, somehow. No-one has a sensible
suggestion on how this could be done, of course. The person who
suggested that "given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow" was wrong
- many, many, many people have thought about how to make a system
without poverty, and still no-one has a working "patch" for this "bug"
in our social system. Perhaps if people actually cared? But that's
never going to happen.
Perhaps if you change to Mozilla Public License to require users to
take notice of or even to care about stuff? (No need to specify what
"stuff" is, anything is better than nothing)
