[okfn-discuss] Help shape the future of the Open Knowledge Foundation

Thu Nov 28 23:07:42 UTC 2013

This is an important issue. I use Googlemail and I don't feel comfortable.
I don't use FaceBook or most social sites. I do use Microsoft technology
and have taken their money (and have given my apologia
http://blogs.ch.cam.ac.uk/pmr/2010/05/13/should-i-work-with-microsoft/ -
many of you will disagree with me). I eat meet, but I would go to jail
rather than be conscripted into the armed forces.

We all have a spectrum of values, and everyone's is slightly different.

What I would find useful is a collation of non-open infrastructure and
possible alternatives, with informed commentary. For example, is there a
viable alternative to Word , Excel, .etc. ? (please don't answer in this
thread). And an indication of the effort involved. Could we have hackathons
where we showed each other better ways of doing things and had support
groups?

It's particularly difficult when it's OKF business rather than  personal
life or enjoyment. If a closed technology makes an organisation more
efficient, there's a pragmatic argument. But the organisation may therefore
be missing a chance to promote openness.

P.

On Thu, Nov 28, 2013 at 10:56 AM, William Waites <ww at eris.okfn.org> wrote:

> On Thu, 28 Nov 2013 11:43:05 +0100, stef <s at ctrlc.hu> said:
>
>     > On Thu, Nov 28, 2013 at 10:13:42AM +0000, Heather Leson wrote:
>     >>
>     >>
> https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1dCH7omEGGqhNq5JiBGdW-6sbFw6LKDlMS3Wa-1mfnCE/viewform
>     >>
>
>     > one thing you could do to serve "me" better is not to put these
>     > queries on google. there's people who try to avoid the tentacles
>     > of the US spying machine
>
> Strongly argree. The OKF uses far too much compromised proprietary
> software in its day to day activities. This has been pointed out
> before but maybe now that we have evidence of it not being paranoia
> and that the OKF is far less UK-centric [1] than it has been in the
> past, we can work on finding ways of working that are more compatible
> with the organisation's own ideals?
>
> To be clear, not that it should need clarifying, writing in a personal
> capacity here, though I would be delighted if someone made a sysadmin
> support ticket that said, "please give us a better way of doing
> surveys".
>
> Happy hacking,
> -w
>
>
> [1] This is speculation, but I think it matters because, having lived
>     in the UK for a while now, even after the recent news stories it
>     still seems to be very much a minority viewpoint that there is
>     anything wrong with surveilance and spying on the citizenry. When
>     an organisation is heavily UK-based, I speculate that this
>     societal bias will continue to affect its way of working and
>     perception of what is and isn't acceptable.
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-- 
Peter Murray-Rust
Reader in Molecular Informatics
Unilever Centre, Dep. Of Chemistry
University of Cambridge
CB2 1EW, UK
+44-1223-763069
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