One sided reporting continues

One sided reporting continues

Our community lacks a nexus of strategic influence and that's why one-sided reporting continues to frustrate us. In the specific examples being given, balance can be achieved if another organization issued press releases and media advisories challenging those issued by SCO. If the org had membership including publically traded corporations, it would increase the likelihood of coverage.

Then, the challenge would show up at any financial site when someone types in the SCOX symbol. Likewise, the challenge would naturally generate more media coverage of the OSS position.

If the resources could be found to build a nexus of strategic influence, our community could REACT quickly (just as Perens and Raymond have done). It's a job for a quarterback with great contacts and communication skills. Someone extremely fleet on their feet.

But, REACT is the wrong approach. Our community needs to be proactive. We need to mount a sophisticated and unimpeachable outreach campaign to the media, and to actually put our story on the road. There is no substitute for person-person contact. Our long term strategy must be proactive, not reactive. And it should be done face to face with carefully selected media.

Writing to pubs like Computerworld AFTER they've interviewed Darl is fine, but it makes far more sense to talk with them in advance, and to help them ask the right questions before an interview. Performed professionally, CW would most likely also include the other side of the story in their presentation.

A proactive program would arm the media and analyst community with research materials, URL's and most importantly, unimpeachable sources willing to talk on and off the record. I've participated in programs like this for many years -- on both the media and the corporate side -- and can testify to their success.

Assuming we actually approach a trial date for SCO / IBM, you can bet the farm that both sides will field proactive teams to preposition media coverage. We can hope that SCO runs out of $$$ long beforehand. Privately, I've been told this will never get to trial.

Apart from our valid desire to expose SCO's deeply flawed reasoning and maddening actions, what I am advocating makes sense anyway. Even if SCO never happened, the OSS community needs to engage in proactive strategic outreach. You only have to look at the headlines that Redmond is generating (Linux on the Desktop more expensive than Windows; Linux TCO much higher than Windows; Cost to develop Linux applications much higher than Windows).

Which organization is correct for this program? LI sounds right. So does FSF. And OSDL. What do you guys think?