[foundation-board] Thread with Iconomical (was: Fwd: terms of code release)

Tue Feb 1 20:45:36 UTC 2011

>From this thread, the issue appears to be that they are withholding
source code and you are withholding payment, but it sounded from the
email they cc'ed to Board members' private email address like they
were withholding code from a current project because OKFN was
withholding payment from a previous project. Are you confident that
the Board do not need to be aware of this situation, or would you mind
providing a brief summary of the state of affairs with Iconomical?

Thanks

Becky

On 1 February 2011 20:36, Rufus Pollock <rufus.pollock at okfn.org> wrote:
> For the board's information. Here was the latest thread (stretching
> back to November). There's obviously discussion prior to that.
>
> Rufus
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Rufus Pollock <rufus.pollock at okfn.org>
> Date: 30 January 2011 12:24
> Subject: Re: terms of code release
> To: Liz Turner <liz at iconomical.com>, dave Boyce <dave at iconomical.com>
> Cc: Edo Broeksma <edo at mediagilde.nl>
>
>
> Hi Guys,
>
> Hope I have not missed an email or something has got spammed.
>
> If I do not hear from you soon we will be forced to consider the code
> you have produced in the second phase of this project unusable from
> our perspective due to lack of access to the source code (we are
> already seriously considering a complete rewrite in pure javascript
> simply so we are in a position to take the project forward in a timely
> manner).
>
> In this situation there will be serious questions over any payment to
> Iconomical for the second phase of the work. (It is already the case
> that the uncertainty and delay have impacted negatively on the project
> which may result in financial consequences).
>
> Regards,
>
> Rufus
> On 23 December 2010 12:55, Rufus Pollock <rufus.pollock at okfn.org> wrote:
>> Hi Liz,
>>
>> I responded on this email nearly a month ago now and had no response.
>> What is happening here?
>>
>> As you (or Dave) might have seen we have community members who are
>> eager to contribute to the flash code -- something that will be of
>> benefit to you as well as us. However, at the moment I have to tell
>> them that they can't do anything because the source code has not been
>> made available yet.
>>
>> I would continue to ask that this code be pushed to the svn repo asap
>> (and failing that is there any way we can just get a tar.gz of the
>> latest source so we can share with the community member who'd like to
>> work on it -- we can always ask him not to share it further for the
>> time being).
>>
>> Regards,
>>
>> Rufus
>>
>> On 29 November 2010 16:28, Rufus Pollock <rufus.pollock at okfn.org> wrote:
>>> On 26 November 2010 11:13, Liz Turner <liz at iconomical.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Dear Rufus,
>>>> I met yesterday with the business manager of the Media Guild, during which
>>>> time we clarified the position regarding the forthcoming code release, which
>>>> is as follows.
>>>> As you may be aware, at the moment, iconomical are under contract to the
>>>> Media Guild. The terms of our agreement stipulate that all intellectual
>>>
>>> No I had no idea about this.
>>>
>>>> property produced by iconomical defaults to the Media Guild Foundation. This
>>>> means that we are bound by law, and any code we release without their
>>>> permission will be in breach of said agreement.
>>>
>>> Right. As I have now repeated several times I have been requesting
>>> more frequent code release since August. I am rather astonished to
>>> have this fact raised now but so be it!
>>>
>>>> Media Guild have indicated that they will gladly accommodate your
>>>> requirements, as long as a contract has been agreed by all parties regarding
>>>> the exact scope of outstanding work, and payment made for services rendered.
>>>
>>> I would be happy to agree about the scope of existing work -- my one
>>> concern is that there will be inevitably be bugs and polishing to be
>>> done that it is hard to predict (none of this is about new features of
>>> functionality).
>>>
>>> Usually, I would have thought you guys would have done this (ie. gone
>>> through the app with a fine tooth-comb, dotting the 'i's and crossing
>>> the 't's). However, this hasn't occurred and as a result we keep
>>> coming back with requests to fix up this or correct that (a recent
>>> case in point: how does the iconography work in the bubble chart when
>>> we aren't using cofog -- as is the case when we use the bubble diagram
>>> in other situations e.g. barnet, dfid etc? I don't know exactly but
>>> you guys are obviously aware of this requirement so I would imagine
>>> you have considered it but if you haven't it will be something that
>>> gets raised as a bug. Similarly, I didn't even know there was
>>> drill-down in the compar-o-tron until the other day - at which point
>>> there were some issues (e.g. no hover effect etc))
>>>
>>>> At this point, code can be released and rights granted to use such code to
>>>> provide derivative services under an appropriate open source license.
>>>
>>> I don't quite understand what you are saying here. Is this an
>>> agreement to make code release asap (so e.g. build checking can be
>>> done) prior to final fixes or do it after or ...?
>>>
>>> Obviously I'm requesting the former so if that is what you are
>>> proposing then we are all in agreement.
>>>
>>> Rufus
>>>
>>>> This does not apply to the previous dashboard release, which was done with
>>>> Media Guild's full co-operation.
>>>> kind regards,
>>>>
>>>> Liz Turner
>>>> +31627495149
>>>> δt.software
>>>> timelines for the
>>>> semantic web
>>>> http://www.iconomical.com/
>>>> are against image worship
>>>> Keizersgracht 8 - II A
>>>> 1015 CN Amsterdam
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Co-Founder, Open Knowledge Foundation
>>> Promoting Open Knowledge in a Digital Age
>>> http://www.okfn.org/ - http://blog.okfn.org/
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Co-Founder, Open Knowledge Foundation
>> Promoting Open Knowledge in a Digital Age
>> http://www.okfn.org/ - http://blog.okfn.org/
>>
>
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-board mailing list
> foundation-board at lists.okfn.org
> http://lists.okfn.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-board
>