[OSM-talk] [Moved to Talk] [OSM-newbies] assistance not wanted

[Francis Augusto Medeiros]

On 13/03/2007, at 07:47, Nick Black wrote:

> Barry, Chistoph, talk,
>
> OpenStreetMap does not exist to promote the use or adoption of one
> form of software over another, it exists to:
>
> "encourag[e] the growth, development and distribution of free
> geospatial data and to provid[e] geospatial data for anybody to use
> and share."
>
> This was decided during an IRC meeting in April 2006.
>
> I was slightly concerned with Barry's email, it definitely pushed what
> I would personally consider the boundaries of mailing list etiquette
> to be.  However, it isn't for one member of this community to stop
> another from using the list in a way the community as a whole sees
> fit.  I think Barry should not withdraw his offer and certainly
> shouldn't withdraw from OSM, but Barry should consider the way he
> markets it.  For example, adding information about the  software to
> the wiki, a page like:
>
> http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/index.php/GPS_Reviews

I fully understand your worries (mainly because their mine too) about  
using the best judgement one can in order to preserve nettiquette.

However, in this particular case, I believe that it's more important  
to endorse and stimulate development of applications that use OSM.  
After all, the data is not useful without applications/services that  
use them! So I definetly believe that it is of the best interest of  
the comunity (it is mine, certainly) to be aware of products that use  
such data. It's great that applications are flourishing using the  
data, giving us even more motivation (again, at least it motivates  
ME) to keep the work going.

And, of course, the mailing list is an ideal forum to become aware of  
such new developments! Maybe Barry didn't use the best method (in my  
opinion that was nothing wrong with it - I tend not to take things  
too much according to my own judgement and to give other the benefit  
of doubt), but maybe we missed the whole point of it.

Just my two centavos ;)

Francis