[OSM-talk] Post tastsic questions of my own

SteveC steve at asklater.com
Thu Mar 5 16:30:29 GMT 2009


On 5 Mar 2009, at 00:55, Frederik Ramm wrote:

> Steve,
>
> (Has someone told you that you're overly concerned about your Fake  
> self? He seems to make an appearance in every second post you write.)

I love him. I want to *be* him.

> SteveC wrote:
>> Over IM and email I've had some really positive replies. There are  
>> a  lot of you out there who personally responded that you liked my  
>> posts.
>
> "Lurkers support me in E-Mail!"
>
> I know how it feels only I seem to get the E-Mails of those who are  
> unhappy ;-) the tone of these E-Mails is usually: "I think the whole  
> process stinks but I am not with the project long enough to feel  
> entitled to say so publicly." - My answer is usually along the lines  
> "anyone is entitled to speak their mind so feel free to do so; yes  
> the process stinks but I think that it is worth trying to fix things  
> instead of rejecting the relicensing effort outright. Sometimes good  
> things are delivered in ugly wrapping".

/me nods

>> You don't like the crappy negative tone of a lot of people. You  
>> think  the license is a good step. You want to see my satanic  
>> portal. I have  to ask you why do you do this personally? I know  
>> the answer. You have  a secret and you want to keep it safe and  
>> warm and snuggly in your  duvet, away from these posts. It's called  
>> sanity. I know. It's hard.  But if you post here, and show the End  
>> Of The World crew that there  are opinions beyond.... we will all  
>> be better. Really.
>
> These mailing lists are for communication, for talking to each other  
> and finding solutions. I am not interested in "me too" postings from  
> people  who don't care enough to engage in discussion - from either  
> side of the argument. (Is there "either side"? Personally I feel  
> that I'm on all sides at the same time. Or on none of them,  
> depending on your point of view.) Someone who is unwilling to defend  
> and argue for his opinion is not a worthy addition to any kind of  
> debate. This is not a "whose fanboy are you" poll.
>
> And before you say that there is more mud-slinging than debate: We  
> had a lot of very sensible debate over on legal-talk; that would  
> have taken us even further had you or someone else from the  
> "licensing working group" participated in it rather than ignoring it.

agreed... but I wouldn't say we ignored it although I can appreciate  
thats how it might have looked.

>> My second question goes to those who live in the various countries   
>> that aren't bankrupt... oh I mean those that aren't in the UK. How  
>> is  the community there? Is it bad? Is it good? How can we help.  
>> What are  *you* doing to help? Are you stirring dissent? Are you  
>> trying to build  a consensus?
>
> My view of the community in Germany is that dissent stirs itself,  
> with the major themes being:
>
> (1) fear for loss of data because people will not agree to the  
> change - it seems to me that even more so than on the English- 
> language lists, Germans are so protective of the OSM they have  
> helped create that they'd rather keep a crappy and non-working  
> license than to have to delete data.

Hmmmm I hope we can convince everybody that it will be much better  
than that.

> (2) unhappiness about lack of protection for Produced Works, envious/ 
> greedy arguments about possible commercial exploitation of same, and  
> unwillingness to accept interim database share-alike as a replacement

One of the things I thought of was Produced Works could drop in to CC- 
BY-SA. What do you think?

> (3) general unease about the process (feeling left out/rushed;  
> having been told in the past that the OSMF does not want to  
> influence the fate of the project, just operate servers and collect  
> money; generally not having had any say in the new license and a  
> feeling that is unlikely they will ever have a say because the  
> license is being designed by lawyers from another country in another  
> language etc.

You didn't mention BAN POTLATCH? Seriously though... I understand.  
Lets make it better.

> I'm generally defending the benefits of the new license, subject to  
> the caveats being discussed here; however it is my opinion that the  
> process how we got to where we are now has been wrong and if someone  
> seeks reassurance from me ("please tell me that they will listen to  
> our concerns and not try to rush everyone into accepting a new  
> license while important issues are unsolved, please tell me that  
> they won't do funny things behind closed doors, please tell me that  
> we will get a profound legal opinion before they go ahead, please  
> tell me that I won't wake up one morning to find an E-Mail in my  
> inbox saying agree to this license or go away") - then, from past  
> experience in this process, the only thing I can honestly say is: I  
> *hope* so too.

Well the process is all up for discussion, the plan on the wiki etc.  
The first thing we will do in the license working group call is figure  
out how to make it more open. Suggestions welcome.

> If they ask me "what has changed between the last license draft and  
> the current one and why", then what can I say; I spent considerable  
> time to provide an (English and German) comparison of the two, but  
> since no information about the rationale has been forthcoming,  
> should I invent something just to hide the inadequacies of the  
> process? They ask why we need a new license at all; I try to  
> explain, I translate RichardF's old opengeodata.org posting; I  
> translate the license itself...
>
> I'm keeping the ugliest bits to myself; many things that have  
> surfaced on these lists and that are fuel for conspiracy theorists  
> (process behind closed doors, people on legal-talk being left out/ 
> ignored/not answered to, no minutes of discussions with lawyers,  
> OSMF board being sidelined in the process, information actively  
> withheld from public so as not to stir debate, no explanation when/ 
> why which lawyers were selected to work with us, WSGR/TWiki affair  
> etc etc) have not been discussed on the German lists and I have no  
> intention of raising them.
>
> The "use<->convey" blunder has been spotted and I have reassured  
> people that it is going to be fixed... but that is about as far as I  
> can go in glossing over the cracks without fearing for my place in  
> heaven.
>
> (Wait a minute... place already assigned to Fake SteveC? Well then...)
>
> I'm sort of betting my own credibility vis-a-vis the German  
> community on the assumption that from now on we'll get the license  
> process back on the right tracks, properly talk to each other and  
> work with each other in a civilised way to arrive at something that  
> works for most of us.
>
> If an attempt should be made to once again disregard the community  
> and just forge ahead with the current draft, deciding stuff behind  
> closed doors and ignoring legitimate concerns just to meet some  
> arbitrary timeline, then I would probably have to say sorry to the  
> German community - sorry for being optimistic where skepticism would  
> have been in order; sorry for making you believe this was a  
> community effort and we were all in this together.
>
> I hope it doesn't come to that.

Me too, and thanks for the help.

Best

Steve





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