Re: There is a scary discussion on the Ubuntu Developers mail list.
From the second post in the discussion:
Originally Posted by
Ian Jackson
Our users' collective ability to escape our control is one thing that
keeps us honest. Another of course is our own conscience but I hope
you'll agree that what I'm proposing here is very much that we should
exercise that conscience.
Tyrants aren't known for their willingness to hold open discussions about their policies, or be willing to let those whom they set out to tyrannize escape those policies upfront.
I think this simple fact needs more emphasis: nobody is setting out to lock anyone out of anything in the sense that Microsoft and Apple are locking their users out of certain software and services. People are simply discussing measures to prevent problems that are present today, which will presumably grow at least as fast as Ubuntu grows.
Originally Posted by
p_quarles
2) It's open source software. The only barrier to doing anything you want to it/with it is your own level of knowledge. No Ubuntu developer can "tyrannize" you by offering a feature which you don't like. You don't even have to be a very advanced user to put together your own customized installation of Ubuntu or whatever other distro you like.
From the first post:
Originally Posted by
Ian Jackson
What is of course also necessary is an ability for power users to
specify additional third-parties without any blessing from Ubuntu.
However *this facility must not to be accessible to naive users*.
The line of thinking here is that there should be a facility to enable the user to override the SAFTM (Scary Anti-Freedom Tyranny Mechanism) which is easily discoverable and usable by power users, but out of reach of inexperienced users. In other words, SAFTM's killswitch would be in the hands of the user, not the vendor, and the user wouldn't have to modify source code to get unrestricted functionality.
Microsoft, huh?
Last edited by 23meg; October 2nd, 2007 at 09:19 PM.
Previously known as 23meg
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