[diskussion] Microsofts nya hot.

[Jeremiah Foster]

Mon, May 14, 2007 at 01:08:41PM +0200:  Bengt Gördén mangled some bits into this alignment:
> måndag 14 maj 2007 12:50 skrev Torbjörn Svensson:
> > Quoting Jens Odsvall <jens at linuxstore.se>:
> > > Borde inte Svenska Linuxföreningen, reagera på detta?
> > > Ta del av de diskussioner och länkar som finns.
> > > http://bbs.linux.se/viewtopic.php?t=35303
> > > http://www.linuxportalen.se/node/6260
> > > Personligen vill jag se, ett öppet brev. Riktat till Microsoft.
> > > Företrädesvis i *vanlig* media som Aftonbladet och SVT.
> > > Där Microsoft ombedes att förklara sig.
> > > Nu finns det ett sådant, öppet brev här.
> > > http://showusthecode.com/
> > > Vad säger ni?
> > >
> > > mvh/Jens
> >
> > Mig veterligt så finns det inget som hindrar dig från att ta tag i
> > detta. Personligen börjar jag bli rätt trött på folk i denna
> > föreningen som bara säger att *andra* skall göra en massa och sen
> > lyfter de själva inte ett finger.
> 
> Välkommen till föreningslivet. Du lär inte hitta många sammanslutningar som 
> funkar annorlunda.

I wish it were different but unfortunately what Bengan says is true. Furthermore,
many foreningar duplicate each other, (I am thinking of Svenska Linux Foreningen,
FFII, FSFE, med mera) and therefor dilute the message. No wonder the Swedish Linux
Foreningen is having a hard time filling positions on the styrelsen. 

It is a shame becuase there are great people involved in all the foreningar and 
their contributions are needed. 

- Linux use in Sweden needs more active participation from the business community
  to show its value proposition. 

- It needs more participants on the national level, currently the lack of 
  quality documentation regarding linux and free software in Swedish leads users 
  to English language sites. 

- It needs more developers to come forward since there are many excellent Swedes 
  doing excellent work (I'm thinking of Simon Josefsson and Daniel Stenberg, just 
  two examples of many good Swedish developers.) They need to be promoted publicly.

- It needs participation from the Swedish goevernment, currently the government 
  is way behind other nations in the use of FLOSS - why does the Swedish 
  government keep sensitive national information in a form that is wholly dependent 
  on an American monopoly? 

- It needs reliable sources of information and news. Gnuheter and frimedia both
  died. Why is there no one able to make a commitment to FLOSS / Linux news in
  Scandinavia from a community point of view?

- It needs more openness. Currently FLOSS is dominated by groups like FSFE and 
  the Swedish Linux Foreningen. These groups are closed - especially the FSFE. 
  While the FSFE has two board members from Sweden representing a significant 
  portion of the board no one knows how they got there. Are they elected? What 
  is the process? What about the Swedish Linux Foreningen? Is a forenigen the 
  right model for a truly open system? Why not a model more like debian where
  you do not have to pay to join and contribution counts? What is the point of 
  a national user group for linux? To promote linux? To have fun? To meet other
  linux enthusiasts? I think these questions need to be re-examined given the 
  lack of uptake of linux in Sweden.

Who am I to criticize? Well, I am someone who thinks Sweden is a great place
to live and has a role to play within the development of Free Software. I have
participated in FSFE meetings, (an on and off-again sort of affair, their 
meetings are more off-again recently). I participate in a recent reincarnation 
of LUGG. I travelled to FOSDEM with the Swedish contigent of the FSFE, I 
have taken a course on Open Source at GU, I write my own GPL'd software,
I maintain a list of companies using FLOSS in the Nordic region;
http://devmodu.com/scanfree/  I helped submit stories to frimedia when it
was more active, I used Free Software nearly exclusively at my last job
helping us to keep costs low and I participate in the community via mailing
lists and forums. 

I see great potential but right now linux, and Free Software in general,
is suffereing in Sweden.

	Jeremiah