Open Source Parking [LWN.net]

Open Source Parking

Posted Apr 20, 2006 4:05 UTC (Thu) by hppnq (guest, #14462)
In reply to: Open Source Parking by Democrates
Parent article: Open Source Parking

Mmmmhh.. This has already taken on the appearance of a personal vendetta, but what the hell, I've got some time on my hands and I don't mind explaining a bit more.

Let me try it another way then.

1. I never said Open Source parking of idle domains was a bad idea. I pointed out an alternative, which you seem to interpret as some kind of leeching, and which in fact is nothing more or less than getting the community involved in correctly upping the stats for Apache by adopting idle domains. No ads needed, just a bit of distributed bandwidth. I myself might participate in such an effort, and others have actually offered this kind of help to Bruce. To which he didn't even respond. Count the number of reasons for choosing either way, and compare the relative benefits and drawbacks. Please take into account that those in favour of the chosen path are acknowlegding that it has hairy details, but that it's something we've got to do. Also note that "it" seems to change every other comment.

2. The point about the stats is exactly that we are not going to achieve the desired results with the given plan, but rather the opposites. Note: plural.

3. I'm getting fed up with the trust thing. Please point me to the relevant success stories. I have read Bruce's bio, I have googled. Please take the same care I have taken to separate the obvious successes from the miserable failures, and see where and how they apply.

4. You seem to suffer from the same funny disease regarding ethics: anything goes, as long as it's done by the good guys.

5. You seem to share the same strange feeling that the task of solving the software patents problem is not and cannot be dealt with by anyone but you, while you keep assuring me that even the tiniest bit of help will also be of considerable importance (yes: you always win!). Let me assure you that people are not actually sitting back. Let me also stress the fact that the software patents problem goes way beyond Congress, and that based on that observation alone you are NOT going to solve it on your own. Stop pretending you hold the key. It serves no other purpose than to prove that the proposed parking site is a good idea, while obviously, it should be the other way around. The tricky bit for me, is that I am almost forced to convince you of the benefits of software patents in order to be able to criticize the plan without coming across as a blasphemic idiot.

It is funny that you should choose this comment to reply to. Let's ask Bruce exactly what he meant, and what he has done to change the server identification. Then, let's ask him why he bothers.

After all, I have asked him about this a number of times directly, and I'm sure you'll agree with me that there is no reason not to be clear about it; that, in fact, it makes absolutely no sense to be fuzzy about it. It's not that this is an extremely important thing to me, it pales in comparison to software patents. But I find it strange that the straight forward answer one might expect is so carefully avoided.

Oh well, maybe it's just that I am getting to the point that I have stomached so many of Bruce's observations that I can read his mind through the UserLinux release notes.

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Open Source Parking

Posted Apr 20, 2006 5:30 UTC (Thu) by BrucePerens (guest, #2510) [Link] (1 responses)

OK, now I see what you want. It was a little difficult to see which complaint was the important one.

You will notice that there is an Apache 1.x server on old.technocrat.net, because the Slashcode (which that runs) depends on mod_perl. That server exists only to serve archives of older technocrat postings, since I have switched to Rails blog software of my own creation for the more recent postings. I haven't heard if the Slashcode was ever successfully ported to Apache 2.

I am in Tahoe with my little boy, and only a slow and flaky GPRS connection. I have Linux on Wall Street in NY on Monday. As soon as I have desk-time on a good net connection, I will figure out how to get the Apache server I am already running to direct all hosts except old.technocrat.net to the fastcgi connection for the parking Rails software.

Thanks

Bruce

Open Source Parking

Posted Apr 20, 2006 7:36 UTC (Thu) by hppnq (guest, #14462) [Link]

Thanks Bruce. Yes, I do want to keep it slightly more on topic, so information like this is what I'm after. I don't think my reasoning was that obscure, and I do expect people to ask what I mean if they can't follow me, even if they are Bruce Perens, admired Open Source leader. ;-)

For example, I don't care about your actual business plans or what you would do in a number of hypothetical situations as much as I have probably made you think. But I can't see how you will pull this off without any concrete plans at all. Surely, there must be something substantial. My questions on this subject were not much more than a "Well, if you don't have a financial picture, HOW are you going to do it then?!" There must be something, or there must be a reason for not having a plan. "We'll see" is not an entirely satisfying answer to those questions from my perspective, I do hope you understand this.

As luck would have it I'll be hanging out in NYC next week, maybe I'll drop by on Monday. If you like and if I get the opportunity I'll introduce myself to you in person, so you know who has been harrassing you all this time. ;-)

And so I get the chance to shake the hand of someone who has indeed made this world a better place, there's no question about that. I don't mind that we don't exactly see eye to eye on some points, like I said: this is nothing personal.

Open Source Parking

Posted Apr 20, 2006 16:53 UTC (Thu) by Democrates (guest, #37235) [Link]

Good for you buddy, alternatives are good. But is it an either or question? Why not join forces and do both? Sounds to me like two good men who can set aside differences for the greater good.

Personally I'd be delighted if domain registration, parking, hosting, payment processing etc. were available via foss-supporting organisations. 1&1 Hosting in the uk for example helped in the fight against swpats in the EU.

I'd have a different approach to the organisations legal structure though. I'm enhusiastic about for-profit worker-cooperatives without shareholders, founded on strong principles that give 10% of pretax profits to good causes, eg. the foss movement. I call it a free enterprise. If the livelihood motive is there people will go through hoops to make sure the business thrives. Semco has gone part of the way, see wikipedia.

As my grandfather used to say "whoever controls the purse strings, controls the house". Unless the concentration of financial and thereby political power issue is tackled, the foss movement along with other endeavours will be swept away by the wave of ever increasing corporate influence. That's the big elephant in the corner. I'm particularly concerned about control of the internet and software, because these are enablers for people tackling wider survival and justice issues.

Hence I think free enterprises are the vehicles that will ultimately enable people to regain appropriate influence in their lives, and it seems free software and free enterprises should have a symbiotic evolution.

Bruces idea could be a free enterprise, offering domain services at first but then diversifying into related services. It could also deliver a portal, aiming at a free enterprise in a box, and enabling entrepreneurs to network and replicate around the globe just as free software has. Every person joining a free enterprise is one less unit of labour propping up the concentrators.

If someone else doesn't do it I will. I've just started out on my own and have a lot of coding to do, but 10% of this years modest profits will go to the free software movement.