The ethics of Open Source FUD

Before I can continue this blog, I have to make a confession. I am and have been a fan of the Doors since 1990. The Doors was a band in the nineteen-sixties, notorious for their inappropriate behavior and language on and off stage. Jim Morrison was arrested on stage in New Haven for foul language which he had directed toward police at the concert. The most infamous incident occurred at the March 1, 1969 Dinner Key Auditorium concert in Miami, Florida. Morrison allegedly exposed himself during the performance. He was accused of lewd and lascivious behavior, indecent exposure, open profanity and drunkenness, and consequently trialled and convicted.

I regret to say, that I have been unable to disassociate my private life sufficiently from their cultural and philosophical heritage. On more than one occasion I have been under the influence of alcoholic beverages, used controlled substances (although I didn't inhale) and have had sexual relationships with women that were not my spouse (I never was married).

It was wrong. It constituted a critical lapse in judgment and a personal failure on my part for which I am solely and completely responsible. And so I ask you to repair the fabric of our mutual cause, and to return our attention to all the challenges and all the promise of Free and Open Source Software. I hope this will encourage others to come forward and distance themselves from their questionable musical taste. I know for instance, that L. is a big fan of Abba and R. likes to listen to 'The Village People' from time to time.

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Just kiddin', but I think you all know what I'm talking about. I know I've touched a nerve that seemingly nobody ever touched before and I have to address it.

When I was a kid, I was bullied by the son of the headmaster. My notes were perfect and although I never bragged about them, he thought I had to be learned a lesson. After all, he was the son of the headmaster, wasn't he? Of course, I tried to reason with him, explaining that these actions were inappropriate and futile. Unable to call in a higher authority, I began to master the art of self defense and it didn't take too long or I was able to beat the cr*p out of him. So I did. I haven't resorted to violence in almost thirty years, because I still believe that diplomacy is the way to resolve conflicts and violence is in essence primitive and barbaric.

I don't have to argue here that the FOSS community has been the victim of FUD tactics a number of times. To name a few myths: no support, open to attack, unprofessional, viral licenses and so on. Each and every time the community has answered in a appropriate, accurate and responsible way. But how effective has that been? Well, not. We're fighting it every day.

The main problem are the media, the large 'professional' websites. These are the websites managers read. And what do they read there? "Is Linux ready for the desktop?" or worse: "Linux is not ready for the desktop".

Long haired College Dropout and Self-Confessed Hippie Hacker Wants to Create a Communist IT Landscape and Destroy a National Industry

And not your average blogger, but editors. Guys, if this had been the fifties, we'd all be shaking hands with Senator McCarthy and his committee for 'Unamerican activities'.

Our response is usually on Groklaw, LXer, Linux.org and LinuxToday, to name a few. Those people don't read what is posted there, so they never read our response. We all agree to some extent that we've professionally countered all arguments and we're very satisfied about ourselves, but our message doesn't come across.

All we've accomplished so far with our 'measured responses' is that we've moved from "religious zealots" via "flaming Linux bigots" to "Open Source advocates". There are still lots of 'editors' who claim that it is impossible to publish any story about Open Source (read: a bunch of FUD) without getting flamed to death (read: getting comments). If that isn't FUD in itself, I don't know. And pointing the finger to a group doesn't make it any less personal. Note 'they' didn't have any problem to make it personal. Remember what has been written about Richard Stallman and in particular about Pamela Jones of Groklaw. Those accusations weren't even true.

Obviously, reacting in a professional and responsible way doesn't get us any prime time. I make an offer to any editor that is afraid to do a FOSS story. Select a well-received article that responds to yours from any of our major websites and publish it in its entirety – not just a link. Give us a fighting chance to react. There are so many well-researched and well-written articles on the web, exposing the vulnerabilities of Windows, the 'Get the facts' campaign, the 'dangers' of Open Source licenses, etc. Why do these need to remain hidden in the bowels of the Google cache. Why are these not of 'general interest' or 'suited for a large public'?

And give us some acceptable editors. Why does Neil McAllister do "Open Source" at InfoWorld, for Pete's sake? Why can eWeek have his Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols, and not ZDNet, for instance. IMHO, if it needs a little FUD to achieve that, I'm happy to pay the price. But this imbalance in news coverage must be fixed, one way or another.

The FUD doesn't seem to stop and it doesn't stop at these so-called 'professional' websites. In the previous blog, I've shown you how closed-source companies try to tighten their grip on the press even further. The bullying goes on, and although subtle and hidden from the public eye, we haven't seen anything yet. I'm deeply concerned about this and the effects it might have for our community and our projects.

DC Parris wrote: "The other thing is that I'm not sure we (our community) should stoop to the level of others, i.e., spreading FUD about them just because they spread FUD about us. I strive to achieve a higher level than that". It may surprise you, but I agree with him. We have our ethics. If we find a bug or a vulnerability, we fix it instead of lying about it. We listen to our users and try our very best to accommodate their enhancement requests. We don't make the easy choices, but try to make the best ones. We will not obfuscate our programs, change our protocols or patent our inventions. And we will certainly not go closed source!

And even if we do write 'Open Source FUD' every now and then, are we really that bad? Of course, I can only speak for myself, but I challenge everyone to read my recent blogs and find any misrepresented facts. I like to think of myself as an integer person, who gives a great deal of thought before he makes a decision or writes a line. I always check at least two independent sources before I use any information and when I can, I provide the links. I don't manipulate results and I certainly don't lie. Everyone can and may comment (even anonymously), the comments become visible right away, I don't edit them (apart from inappropriate language) and I don't remove them. I can't say all websites have the same policy.

We are always defending ourselves, reacting to the attack of others. We're in our stronghold, on siege. In military science, that is not a favorable position. For almost fifty years the Soviet Union and the United States had a massive amount of nuclear firepower pointed at each other. Still, no shot was fired during that period. It was a MAD situation, but it worked. MAD means "Mutual Assured Destruction" and that is exactly what is was. Nobody moved, because they all were afraid of retaliation.

We've been nuked for years now by lawyers, spin-doctors, publicity moguls and politicians. And you still want me to play mr. Nice Guy?

Comments

[IQ150]

FOSS has some really radical elements that must be addressed before FUD goes away. Go read more at http://www.tyrannyofidiots.com

[Ken Holmes]

Well said, Travis. It seems a modest amount of research is a bit too much for some.

I agree with you completely that The Beez is someone worth reading.

FOSS needs persons who do good research and speak clearly.

[Travis]

"trialled" is British English. You know, the "real" english that us yanks ripped off and messed up. If you google "trialled" you'll notice every site that comes up is from the UK or AU. Come on, stop attacking people for not using American English, it's unbecoming.

That said, loved the article Beez :) You're on my watch list!

[Bub]

oops, I meant "nuclear"

[Bub]

dictionary.com doesn't list an entry for trialed or trialled. Just because google finds an incorrect spelling, doesn't make it right. It's king of like George Bush saying "nucular" when he really means "neclear"

[Ken Holmes]

Dearest Bumpy,

Perhaps you can Google the word trialled. Use any search engine. Take time to do a modest amount of research. Learn something new. It's easy. You have what it takes. You can do it!

This article was spot on wouldn't you say.

Best regards,
Ken

[bumpy]

>> trialled and convicted

There is no such word. He was tried and convicted.