Re: Icon designer wanted (Aquamacs Emacs)

[David Kastrup <dak@gnu.org>]

Tim McNamara <timmcn@bitstream.net> writes:

> "Luis O. Silva" <l.o.silva@mail.ru> writes:
>
>> On Thu, 05 Jan 2006 00:59:49 -0600, Tim McNamara writes:
>>
>>    TM> I've yet to find a GNU/Linux or BSD system that
>>    TM> is as good to use as OS X.
>>
>> It's not a matter of how well something works. The only way to
>> go is that of freedom.
>
> How well software works is a central issue in getting people to use
> it.

It is a secondary consideration for free software.  The primary
motivator is freedom.  If it weren't, free software would not exist,
since the beginnings of free software were almost necessarily
technically inferior to proprietary offerings.  Free software owes its
existence to its freedoms, not its usefulness.  If you sacrifice the
freedom for the sake of usefulness, you'll lose both in the end.

> If the Free Software movement is content to have a limited market
> and minimal adoption, well that can't be helped.

Restricting generally useful features to MacOSX only is limiting
market and adoption.

You are actually making my case without realizing it, because you
don't look beyond your favorite platform, the proprietary MacOSX.  But
the free software movement never was about promoting and improving
MacOSX.  It is about promoting and improving free software.

> My computer is a tool.  I need it to just work, I need it to be
> reliable, and I need it to be easily useable.  In short, I don't
> have time to edit .conf files.

Completely irrelevant.

> I do see those things.  I just disagree with David K's hostility and
> castigation of others.

You disagree with hearing things you consider inconvenient for your
private goals.  Tough.  It is a perfectly valid viewpoint for you to
be interested only in MacOSX and ignoring any other aspects of free
software.  But that viewpoint does not help promote free software at
all.  You have, of course, no obligation to promote the cause that has
made the software possible that you are using.  But there is little
point in pretending something different.

> What the free software movement doesn't seem to grasp is that one of
> the things that counts is useability- both in terms of the
> relationship between software and user, but also the relationships
> between contributors and maintainers.  If you alienate people, they
> just go away and stop using/contributing to your software.

But we are talking about a case where somebody has chosen a way that
makes it impossible to contribute back to the software.  Whether he is
alienated and goes away and stops using the software does not actually
make a difference upstream: in either case, no improvement to the
software benefitting its users in general is achieved.

In contrast to you, however, I am not of the opinion that David is
incapable of listening to and understanding a different, though
inconvenient, opinion.

> The implied "oh well, good riddance" is an attitude that is the kiss
> of death.

If my attitude were "oh well, good riddance", I'd hardly be wasting my
time with explaining the problem, would I?

-- 
David Kastrup, Kriemhildstr. 15, 44793 Bochum