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Re: [LUG] Advocating Linux was: Computer Shops and Linux (and various other s as well).
On 10 May 2004, at 12:51, Brough, Tom wrote:
1. Its NOT the job of any particular shop to promote one "brand" of
technology over another. True, better shops will retain more informed
staff
who will be able to give Joe Punter (JP) an idea of what to expect and
which
way to go, but ultimately JP makes the decision as to what he buys and
the
reasons for buying (and rightly so). Sadly informed staff are few and
far
between and probably chosen more by luck than judgement. Of course you
could
always become a staff member of one of these establishments, but then I
gather the pay isn't great, and hence (unfortunately) the cycle
continues.
Take the Apple Store for example, Apple have retail stores for their
products across the USA and one in Japan. They're opening a large store
in London soon, in these stores they have Mac Genius people, who know
the stuff they're selling inside out and are able to recommend the
right product to the right people. In addition, Apple train staff in
shops like PC World, John Lewis, etc that also sell their products so
the staff know what they're talking about.
I don't think misinformed staff is just a pay issue, but the pay
certainly doesn't help much. Perhaps the community (and I'll get onto
this in a moment) can take a leaf out of Apple's book - Apple is
currently, I believe the biggest seller of Un*x-based desktop computers
and operating systems in the world. There's an awful lot of the stuff
that the community use in there, albeit mixed with proprietary stuff
too, but even a lot of that is based on standards.
2. Always bear in mind that open source / linux / GNU "is not just
about the
software" (c) RMS. Open Source is as much about community membership
(IMHO
as always). Please remember that while the major contribution is
programming
skills, there are documenters, artists, testers, "supporters", users,
(even
advocates) and many other "non programming but skilled" people who have
never contributed a line of code, but have never the less made a
difference
in the Open Source Community. Cherish and celebrate them all, in their
part
they are good people one and all.
Part of the problem here, is that there are really two communities.
There's the timely Free Software movement, and the trendy new Open
Source movement. I don't believe that the Open Source movement helps
the issue. Now, a lot of us know that a lot of stuff labelled as Open
Source, would be better named as Free Software, but I think people fail
to make the distinction. I may be in a minority, but I feel that
perpetuating the myth of "the Linux operating system" helps us none
either; GNU is the operating system, it's the GNU system - it's just
that we're using the Linux kernel. The fact is, the Linux kernel could
be replaced with another kernel, and it'd still be GNU.
The other people you mention, the non-programmers/non-hackers - these
people all do what they do, because of their freedom, not because of
open source. The very word 'source' is something that only applies to
programmers, and is ambiguous too. Open Source, could mean I show you
some source code, but you can't do anymore than see it, you can't
modify it or adapt it - because I choose not to offer you that
*freedom*
Open Source means far less than Free Software, or Libre Software, if
you will.
3. IMPORTANT: Not all the community members think and act in the same
way,
but most of the time they are pulling in the same direction. Example:
Philosophically there is a gap (not a rivalry) between RMS (Mr
Philosophy)
and LT (Mr "Just For Fun"), but both have progressed the Open source
movement considerably. Its easy to loose sight of this and become
isolated
and embittered, if JP looks at you as if you are personally
responsible for
his machine falling over, my only suggestion is try to develop a
thicker
skin, and a broader smile (and yes I am also guilty of sensitivity, as
many
of my posts in the past are a testament to such), but we must all try
harder.
RMS is not fighting for the Open Source movement, most people are not
fighting for the Open Source movement. I would say that Open Source is
more of a programmer thing that Free Software.
4. JP is interested in a solution. If open source does it for him/her
so
much the better, but he/she may not wish to sing from the roof tops the
virtues of using open source, neither may he/she be that enthusiastic
about
solving his own frustrating problems. In my computing career I have
had my
fare share of frustration, disillusionment and yet more frustration.
Being
able to turn to a "Bigger Brother" (in the friendly sense) has made the
difference between calm existence and chaotic madness (or maybe I have
just
come to accept my own personal chaotic madness). Yes it may be trivial
question to you "been there, done that, etc. .... etc....." but lets
face it
if we knew the answers we would never ask any questions, and it
doesn't do
any harm to anybody to have an alternative solution suggested that is
more
efficient (apart from a slight bruise to the ego, yes I'm talking to
you
Tom). There will always be those that will seek to shortcut reading a
manual
or trying something out, see it as an opportunity to demonstrate your
knowledge and pass on a word or two of wisdom. Genuine ignorance is
however
usually a by-product of confidence (lack there of), and nothing can be
more
damaging to someone's confidence than the words "RTFM you stupid
...........".
The public doesn't care about open source. The public doesn't know, or
give the slightest care about source, or source code, or the fact that
it's been developed 'over the Internet' - what users care about is what
it can do for them, be that a cost issue, an issue of freedom (a lot of
users in other countries really seem to get the freedom thing much than
the UK) or an issue of functionality.
I work with a Mac a lot of the time. I do this, because although at the
time I bought it, it cost slightly more than a comparative PC did - the
reason for this, was that it works well. At this time, I'd been using
Windows for way too long, and was getting nowhere fast. I had also
tried to use GNU, but I didn't have a very good PC and my hardware was
largely unsupported, or getting it to work was a real nightmare.
I think people want to be free, but they also want to feel like they're
able to work independently of a manual.
5. So therefore, please be patient with JP, it really isn't a daft
question
to him/her.
Computers need to be more intuitive to users. I find GNU particularly
tricky, because things are in different places, or not in a place I
would expect to find it, or that it's different in Redhat, etc.
matt
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