[LGM] LGM and FOSS in 2014 - coming of age

[Andreas Vox]

Hi Greg,

Happy New Year to you, too!

I think most of us don't follow an "either with us or against us" approach.
Contacts to the non-Foss world have been amicable in the past, I remember
a talk from the Xara folks and good discussions with Leonhard from Adobe.

Some of us even use MacOSX or Windows computers...

That said, accepting sponsorship from the NSA would send absolutely the wrong signal.
They are not just another project, they are not a normal IT firm, instead they are a
arcano-bizarro-paranoio governmental cluster-fuck. If they approached LGM they'd have a 
hidden agenda which would be incompatible with openness or freedom. 
Remember their work for NIST and their sponsorship for RSA.

/Andreas


Am 01.01.2014 um 18:57 schrieb Gregory Pittman:

> Happy New Year!
> 
> I would like to offer this email as a consideration of a mindset or
> strategy for LGM in the future.
> 
> It's not a suggestion to abandon any of the cherished principles of
> FOSS, but mainly some ideas about how to interact with the proprietary
> or non-FOSS world out there.
> 
> In short, I think we should endeavor to embrace (figuratively) the
> non-FOSS world out there. It's not going to go away, and its relative
> success is largely out of our control. A starting point might be to make
> sure we don't have some attitude that suggests "you're either with us or
> against us." People don't have to either stick with their proprietary
> software or switch to FOSS, they can use both -- some are compelled to.
> Even within the FOSS world, things are Darwinian -- you succeed as long
> as you give people what they want/need, and you can be replaced by some
> other FOSS project that does a better job.
> 
> Thus, there is no taint on help, financial or otherwise, that comes from
> some non-FOSS entity. But we accept help from whatever quarter, as we
> accept any help, without any "deals" or contracts or preferences. We are
> going to scrutinize any display of some corporate entity's identity to
> ensure that it is not construed as an endorsement. Google, for example,
> has done a lot for open source, but mainly has done a lot for Google.
> 
> A worst case scenario in 2014 might be for the NSA to approach us as a
> sponsor (talk about looking the devil in the face!). Even then, let's be
> realistic, we don't have anything someone can steal, we've already given
> it away!
> 
> This isn't intended to apply to anything specific on the agenda right
> now, but I mainly meant this as something to consider as we look for
> resources, for help, for acknowledgment of what we do.
> 
> Greg
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