Comments on: Healing old wounds

By: Patrick

Patrick — Tue, 10 Aug 2010 01:41:12 +0000

I didn’t see Mark specifically, explicitly apologize for calling Red Hat a “proprietary software company”, but I’m not sure that would have been necessary in the first place. I can see the difference between Red Hat’s approach to the actual distribution of the software and Canonical’s, the difference that Mark was first talking about. Red Hat’s non-code contributions (branding) are only available through a purchase from Red Hat. Ubuntu Server, without any exchange of money or licensing going on, is just as much “Ubuntu” as the paid-for package. But with Red Hat, the un-bought version of the software is technically not Red Hat (Enterprise) Linux. So there is a difference in approach there. But even so, Ubuntu’s trademarks are still owned by someone, and you can’t just attach them to your own product arbitrarily. The difference is just that there’s “only one Ubuntu”, while Red Hat distinguishes between the free and purchased versions of the distribution through branding and packaging.

It’s not an issue of proprietorship. It’s an issue of marketing. It seems to me that what Mark was saying came down to: “Reserving your branding and binaries for paid customers gives off a less-free vibe to me, and I don’t like it.” But the accusation came out essentially grouping Red Hat into the same category of software company as Microsoft, which really couldn’t be further from the truth.

Anyway, what I’m working towards saying here is that nobody needs to completely back down from their position. It’s fine for Mark to say, more or less, that he doesn’t like the way Red Hat manages their brand, or he wouldn’t/doesn’t manage his company’s brand the same way. And it’s also fine for Greg to continue to politely insist, as he does, that Canonical ought to contribute more code to GNOME’s core modules. Apologies aren’t about completely rejecting one’s former opinion. They’re about acknowledging the mistake of turning an opinion into an insult, and I think both parties have done that here.

As for my own two cents, I like the fact that Ubuntu’s official binaries are available freely as such. And I would definitely love to see more pleasing commit statistics regarding Canonical and GNOME. But really, GNOME’s not that relevant to my preferences or use cases. I’m a KDE guy. I’ve only followed this because I want to see my people, free software people, get along. The health of the relationships in the community is more important than the opinions, for the purpose of apology and the interests of us F/OSS users on the sidelines.

By: Celso

Celso — Sat, 07 Aug 2010 18:25:24 +0000

Mark, sorry my english but i live in portugal, so isnt the best english you will ever read

you have the “power” to guive to the people what others don’t want to do.
I will always use ubuntu because you use your “power” to help making an good OS
for the comunity (poor and rich people). and because its really a good OS and have
an a great future ahead.

best regards from a biggest fan,

celso

By: Marie

Marie — Sat, 07 Aug 2010 16:57:23 +0000

sharp: We do have an excellent community edition without Canonical’s proprietary stores/services and less mono…it is called Xubuntu.

By: salemboot

salemboot — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 03:19:37 +0000

If you turn to the doctrine of Creedence

“Yeh, some folks inherit star spangled eyes,
ooh, they send you down to war, Lord,”

“And when you ask them, how much should we give,
oh, they only answer, more, more, more, yoh,”

By: hendi

hendi — Thu, 05 Aug 2010 21:51:22 +0000

Just making sure I understand you correctly:

Red Hat is proprietary because it divides the world into those that have RHEL, and those that don’t. RHEL seems free as in freedom (see CentOS), but not as in beer.

Canonical is not proprietary, although it divides the world into those that have source code for Ubuntu One, and those that don’t. Ubuntu One is free as in beer, but not as in freedom.

By: Mackenzie

Mackenzie — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 18:56:11 +0000

0e8h:
Please have a read of https://wiki.ubuntu.com/StableReleaseUpdates for why software versions in the repositories are behind upstream. It’s intentional for stability. For why updates stop on the weekends, are you looking at stable versions (where only a small handful of people can approve the updates (again, see that wiki page)) or the development version? There should be uploads even on weekends for the development version, but since the uploads for stable release updates are being approved mostly by Canonical staff, it makes sense that those only happen on weekdays.

By: Ian

Ian — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 12:53:14 +0000

You said you’d “add new ingredients”
Isn’t that the crux of the debate. Canonical has been reluctant to commit upstream and ‘share their toys’.
While you can knock Red Hat for commercial success, and it’s clear that you’re trying to do so without saying it directly, the bottom line is that if Red Hat didn’t sell their product and make money, they couldn’t pay the engineers that write the code that you ship and take credit for.

By: » Novità su AppIndicator per Maverick Meerkat

» Novità su AppIndicator per Maverick Meerkat — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 10:20:09 +0000

[...] polemica con De Koenigsberg è stata archiviata e Mark Shuttleworth è tornato a parlare di cose più interessanti. Mi riferisco ad AppIndicator e [...]

By: Novità su AppIndicator per Maverick Meerkat | Giovanni Raco

Novità su AppIndicator per Maverick Meerkat | Giovanni Raco — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 08:14:07 +0000

[...] polemica con De Koenigsberg è stata archiviata e Mark Shuttleworth è tornato a parlare di cose più interessanti. Mi riferisco ad AppIndicator e [...]

By: Cedna

Cedna — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 04:25:53 +0000

greetings.

I think “help free software” is mean not only contribute upstream. it has also include fix the bugs, make a useful application with GNU license, and even some feedbacks.

so, compare Radhat and Canonical in upstream, I think it is wrong. And in fact, does companies are already good other evil companies.

I hope to Canonical commit source codes on upstream, but it is not mean now.

I trust Canonical will commit codes.

sorry for my bad english. thanks.