On Thursday 06 August 2009, Vickram Crishna wrote: > Particularly in the FOSS support community, I believe there are many people > who wholeheartedly support FOSS (and each of jtd's 4 listed points of > agreement) yet whose stance as an organisation may be different, as Kenneth > points out. > > On Thu, Aug 6, 2009 at 11:11 AM, Kenneth Gonsalves <[email protected]>wrote: > > On Thursday 06 Aug 2009 11:10:06 am jtd wrote: > > > > -1. So we are back to the mixture as before, with 90% of the > > > > community and practically all outside players outside fosscomm. > > > > > > We are not. There are no stats available whatsoever. We are just making > > > assumptions based on our personal views. > > > > > > We agree that we require to be broad based. > > > 1) Most insiders agree that Software Patents are to be opposed. > > > 2) We agree that the government must be made to use FLOSS for > > > > e-governance. > > > > > 3) We agree that Open unencumbered standards are a must. > > > 4) We agree that FLOSS must be used in ICT > > > > > > Given the last three (especially 3) , i dont see how we can reconcile > > > to > > > > a > > > > > different stance on 1. > > > > you may not be able to. I may not be able to. But I can assure you a lot > > of people are able to. Check the archives for a list.
> > > So the CMP (in no particular order) for now Could be > > > > > > 1) Engage various ICT agencies for using FLOSS. > > > 2) Engage the government for enforcing the use of FLOSS in > > > e-Governance. 3) Engage the government in enforcing Open unencumbered > > > standards and > > > > avoid > > > > > multiple standards in IT software and hardware. > > > 4) As a corollary of the above two campaign against Software patents. > > > > forget no 4 - set up a separate body for no 4 > > > > > 5) Enlist members who support one or more of the above. > > > > yes > > Please let us follow suggestion 5 wholeheartedly without quibbling on # 4. So the campaign for open standards / ICT / Egovernance / whatever would clearly state that if for any reason an encumbered technology is part of a standard, this technology will automatically be placed into the public domain. And No member will object to this statement thru FOSSCOM and or externally in reference to FOSSCOM. > Finally, if it came to a public statement (CMP), I would hope that the > putative fosscomm would have no objections to publishing individual (ie > organisational member) dissents, just as individual members of court > benches do regularly, and the position on that is well understood. I > mention that only as a reference to precedents. On every other issue yes. On the issue of patents No. The reason being that in the case of patents (not just software patents but we will let that pass) the entire process is highly contentious and without an iota of public review. In the case of software I am sure that the patent office will never ever be able to keep up with the exponential rise in permutations-combinations of old+new algorithms, (computer) languages, methods and concepts etc in solving exactly the same problem in an infinite number of ways. Consequently everbody must agree to a sortof diplomatic silence as far as using FOSSCOM is concerned, pending a better mechanism that can reconcile with wide membership. -- Rgds JTD _______________________________________________ network mailing list [email protected] http://lists.fosscom.in/listinfo.cgi/network-fosscom.in
