[OSM-talk] advertising

Frederik Ramm frederik at remote.org
Sun Jul 1 02:12:25 BST 2007


Steve,

> I hear you all about wanting the map to be Free and pure. Really, I do. 
> On the other hand I note that only two of you are foundation members.

Now that's a really cheap argument. If all of the critics were 
foundation members, would you listen to them more, or what's the point?

Have foundation members been consulted before these ads were put up?

> And that we didn't see all this time and effort when we were looking for 
> people to help organise the conference. 

Are you saying that you need to raise money for the conference, or are 
you just looking for an excuse to point your finger at people?

Have you made any effort to be open and communicative about your 
fundraising efforts? Are there numbers somewhere saying "we need so and 
so much money to do this and that, and we have the following options, so 
we decided to try this?" Or is such information only available to 
foundation members, or conference organisers, or only in an 
administrative building somewhere on a distant planet?

Isn't it you who keeps saying that the most important thing about OSM is 
the community? Then how come you don't give a damn about what the 
community thinks? Or are we, the mailing list members, something else 
than the community you value?

> It's really easy to send angry negative emails to 
> the list and it's much harder to volunteer and make things happen.

I wasn't even angry about the ads but you've really handled this badly, 
giving the impression that this project is not "open" at all. Any of us, 
if we were to volunteer for fundraising work, would talk to the list and 
attempt to build some sort of consensus before we act in a way that 
affects the way OSM is presented to the outside world. (Assuming for a 
moment we could.)

If you're looking for some excuse to exclude people, you'll always find 
something. Nobody except yourself can contribute heaps of maps *and* 
write lots of software *and* give talks about OSM *and* organise a 
conference at the same time. Most of us make choices. Are you saying 
this is your personal project and you can bloody well do whatever you 
please? If you continue acting like that then your community is going to 
go down the toilet.

Bye
Frederik

-- 
Frederik Ramm  ##  eMail frederik at remote.org  ##  N49°00.09' E008°23.33'




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