[Sugar-devel] Private vs Public conversations.

[Walter Bender]

On Mon, Oct 28, 2013 at 8:14 PM, David Farning
<dfarning at activitycentral.com> wrote:
> On Mon, Oct 28, 2013 at 2:51 PM, Walter Bender <walter.bender at gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Mon, Oct 28, 2013 at 3:01 PM, David Farning
>> <dfarning at activitycentral.com> wrote:
>>> On Mon, Oct 28, 2013 at 9:17 AM, Martin Langhoff
>>> <martin.langhoff at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> On Wed, Oct 23, 2013 at 12:26 PM, Walter Bender <walter.bender at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>> On Wed, Oct 23, 2013 at 12:04 PM, David Farning
>>>>> <dfarning at activitycentral.com> wrote:
>>>>>> I just wanted to bump this line of questions as, it is the critical
>>>>>
>>>>> I don't speak on behalf of the Association, but I think your positions
>>>>> are overstated. As far as I know, the Association is still pursing
>>>>> sales of XO laptops and is still supporting XO laptops in the field.
>>>>> Granted the pace of development is slowed and there is -- to my
>>>>> knowledge -- no team in place to develop an follow up to the XO 4.0. I
>>>>> don't have a clue as to what you mean by a "technical philanthropy"
>>>>> but it remains a non-profit associated dedicated to enhancing learning
>>>>> opportunities through one-to-one computing. The fact that the
>>>>> Association has private-sector partners is nothing new. It has had
>>>>> such partners since its founding in 2006.
>>>>
>>>> +1 on Walter's words, David's position is overstated. OLPC has shrunk
>>>> its Sugar investment, that is true. But on the other points, nothing
>>>> has changed significantly, OLPC has always had to find sources of
>>>> funding.
>>>
>>> As I stated, I hope to be proven wrong.
>>
>> You also stated:
>>
>>> The degree of openness and transparency is our fundamental
>>> disagreement. Best case is that the status quo works, Sugar Labs
>>> thrives, and I am proven wrong. Worst case is that Sugar adopts to the
>>> changing environment.
>>
>> Several of us have asked for an explanation.
>
> Yes, and sorry about the delay. This is a nuanced discussion which
> requires focusing on goals which can strengthen the project while
> avoiding recriminations about the past mistakes and individual
> weakness.
>
> The general observation is that open source projects are most
> effective when they provide a venue for multiple individuals and
> organizations with overlapping yet non-identical goals to come
> together to collaborate on a common platform which they can use and
> adapt for their own purpose.
>
> The specific observation about Sugar Labs is that an emphasis on
> identical goals tends to limit active participants. Outliers tend to
> be nudged aside. The remaining group of active participants are small
> but loyal. And yes, I see the irony of posting this observation on the
> sugar-devel mailing list. Everyone who is troubled by this observation
> has already left.
>
> As two Data points:
> In a private conversation with an Association employee they told me
> that they conciser Activity Central a competitor because Activity
> Central increased deployments expectations. Their strategy with regard
> to Activity Central was to _not_ accept patches upstream with the goal
> of causing Activity Central and Dextrose to collapse under its their
> weight. As it was private conversation I am not sure how widely spread
> the opinion was held.

It seems unwise to damn Sugar Labs based on hearsay from OLPCA. Sugar
Labs is *not* OLPCA and we don't traffic in hearsay, regardless.

>
> Recently there was a call for help testing HTML5 and JS. Two
> developers Code and Roger have been writing proof of concept
> activities. They have been receiving extensive off-list help getting
> started. But, interestingly, their on-list request for clarification
> about how to test datastore was met with silence.

Wow. Their email was send 4 days ago, right before the weekend and
*after* your assertion that Sugar Labs is somehow remiss in its
integrity. This too seems a real stretch.

That said, there is clearly something bothering you. It would be good
to clear the air.

thanks.

-walter
>
> I have tried to communicate that there is competition between
> organizations and deployments within the ecosystem... and that is
> good. Competition drives innovation. The challenge, as I see it, is
> for Sugar Labs to become the to common "collaborative" ground around
> which these organizations compete.
>
> Hope that helps.
>
>> regards.
>>
>> -walter
>>
>>>
>>>>>> Given financial constraints, these are reasonable shifts.
>>>>
>>>> That's more like it ;-)
>>>>
>>>>>> there are ways to establish publicly disclosed and mutually beneficial
>>>>>> relationships. In the meantime we are happy to provide deployments
>>>>>> support while seeding and supporting projects we feel are beneficial
>>>>>> to deployments such as School Server Community Edition and Sugar on
>>>>>> Ubuntu.
>>>>
>>>> "Seeding and supporting projects" is how it's done.
>>>>
>>>> cheers,
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> m
>>>> --
>>>>  martin.langhoff at gmail.com
>>>>  -  ask interesting questions
>>>>  - don't get distracted with shiny stuff  - working code first
>>>>  ~ http://docs.moodle.org/en/User:Martin_Langhoff
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> David Farning
>>> Activity Central: http://www.activitycentral.com
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Walter Bender
>> Sugar Labs
>> http://www.sugarlabs.org
>
>
>
> --
> David Farning
> Activity Central: http://www.activitycentral.com
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-- 
Walter Bender
Sugar Labs
http://www.sugarlabs.org