[Talk] Re: [Linux-aus] SCO position - Pia's thread

[Leon Brooks]

On Mon, 26 May 2003 06:54, Pia Smith wrote:
> It just occured to me that maybe our tactic should be supporting the
> opinions made from people like Raymond and Perens,

Yes, but not just duplicating what they say or there is no point.

> Is it more effective to shoot 1000 bullets or to combine our
> efforts into a bomb?

That depends on the situation. One bomb in thick jungle is next to 
useless because the foliage absorbs the shock.

Chasing the analogy further, nuclear bombs do not scale linearly because 
the bigger the bomb is, the more of its energy is wasted fighting 
itself - you get a hotter, denser core to the explosion but not much 
more damage.

Binding the analogy back to real life again, I think we need to make 
some combined statements which support rather than replicate the 
existing efforts. Analogous to ringing the original detonation with a 
salvo of small bombs.

> I think that a coordinated effort from LA and AUUG is a great idea,
> but we should certainly snip the Microsoft talk, as there is no
> proof. While that is not definite, focusing on them makes it seem
> that we are avoiding the claims made.

Good idea. But would it defuse (or diffuse) our efforts at all if I 
carefully crafted a me-only corporate statement which looks askance at 
Microsoft's response and released it either before or after a group 
response?

As I hear it the fee they paid to SCO was of the order of 10-20 million 
dollars, chicken feed to Microsoft but apparently not far short of the 
paper value of SCO. The obvious message behind that is that they like 
what SCO's doing and are keeping the company alive as long as they are 
a nuisance to Linux and to IBM.

I'd like to make my own separate statement along the lines of "it's next 
to impossible to be sure, but it looks to our corporate cynical eyes as 
if..." because me losing global karma points isn't going to be the 
problem it would be for LA/AUUG/SLPWA/etc. I do want to make points 
which our groups want to keep clean hands on, but don't want it to 
detract from any group statement.

> Maybe a statement quoting some comments made by some of our people,
> and then supporting them and extrapolating slightly is better

Certainly! Care to make a quotable statement? (-:

Actually, one sound-ish bite each from you, Jeremy and Grog (Presidents 
all) would be a good foundation for a release.

Cheers; Leon

-- 
http://cyberknights.com.au/     Modern tools; traditional dedication
http://plug.linux.org.au/       Committee Member, Perth Linux User Group
http://slpwa.asn.au/            Committee Member, Linux Professionals WA
http://linux.org.au/            Committee Member, Linux Australia