[IAEP] how should we relate with our competitors? (was Re: First competitor?)

[Tomeu Vizoso]

On Sun, Mar 1, 2009 at 10:00, Edward Cherlin <echerlin at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Thu, Feb 26, 2009 at 8:27 PM, Bernie Innocenti <bernie at codewiz.org> wrote:
>> Or just a friend?
>>
>>  http://www.qimo4kids.com/
>
> I met them on the first day at SCaLE 7x last week, and the Earth
> Treasury booth was opposite theirs in the exhibit hall for the next
> two days. Their starting point was in discovering effective computer
> uses for their autistic son. They like the idea that they can provide
> Sugar to their clients.

I think that we should be establishing close contact with these groups
of people that have some goals in common with us. Our market and the
problems we try to solve are so vast, that there's more to win by
working together than by ignoring the others or trying to "leave them
behind".

In many cases, the people deploying those competing environments will
see a place where Sugar makes more sense for their users and may be
interested to deploy it along, if we approach them in the correct way.

To gain their interest, apart from the stronger points of Sugar
itself, we have something very valuable: our localization community.
Today, Sugar is translated to many languages that traditional software
has never been translated to. We have language teams that are highly
motivated by our educational goals and the prospect of improving
education in their countries through technology.

By offering this advantage to our "competitors", we not only improve
their chances of meeting the same goals we have, but also grow our
community and improve the visibility of the Sugar brand.

Also, take into account that only a very small part of the Sugar
platform is specific to Sugar itself. Most of it is shared with GNOME,
Maemo, XFCE, etc. So if a competitor deploys XFCE on a slow MIPS-based
netbook with little RAM and improves python, mozilla, gstreamer, gtk+
to run better and use less resources, Sugar also benefits from those
improvements.

Regards,

Tomeu

>> They even mention Sugar in the FAQ:
>>  http://www.qimo4kids.com/page/FAQ.aspx
>>
>> I'm downloading the ISO image to give it a try.
>>
>> --
>>   // Bernie Innocenti - http://www.codewiz.org/
>>  \X/  Sugar Labs       - http://www.sugarlabs.org/
>> _______________________________________________
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>> IAEP at lists.sugarlabs.org
>> http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Silent Thunder (默雷/धर्ममेघशब्दगर्ज/دھرممیگھشبدگر ج) is my name
> And Children are my nation.
> The Cosmos is my dwelling place, The Truth my destination.
> http://earthtreasury.net/ (Ed Cherlin)
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