[okfn-discuss] non google non microsoft

[Tim McNamara]

Listing tools is not going to help much yet.

I would like this discussion to focus on the second part of PM-R's email,
discussing how to spread a culture of open source within the OKF. He
mentioned hackathons, but there are many things we could do. Let's list
those.

Google and others have been very successful at building ecosystems of
products which are highly reliable, easy to use and easy to discover. We
need to make sure that we have enough social infrastructure to support the
adoption and continued use of a useful toolset. There are actually many
viable alternatives to well-marketed, closed software. The difficult part
is building workflows and practices within our distributed organisation to
make use of those tools.

The OKF has actively made successive decisions to use non-open tools to
promote openness. I don't believe there is any maliciousness about this.
The use of Google Docs, Skype, Meetup.com, etc has been driven due (IMO) to
1) ease of use to people new to open culture and 2) efficiency gains.

In order for the OKF to continue to make openness accessible to people
outside of its community, it needs to be welcoming. How can we remain
welcoming to people who encounter unfamiliar systems? Getting everyone to
use MediaWiki has been tried wiki.okfn.org continues to languish.



Tim McNamara
@timClicks <http://twitter.com/timClicks> | timmcnamara.co.nz



On 29 November 2013 12:21, Gene Shackman <eval_gene at yahoo.com> wrote:

> "(please don't answer in this thread)"
>
> Yes, a separate discussion of non google non MS. Perhaps there can be a
> discussion on the future of the OKF?
>
> Gene
>
>
>  ------------------------------
>  *From:* Peter Murray-Rust <pm286 at cam.ac.uk>
> *To:* Open Knowledge Foundation discussion list <
> okfn-discuss at lists.okfn.org>
> *Sent:* Thursday, November 28, 2013 6:07 PM
> *Subject:* Re: [okfn-discuss] Help shape the future of the Open Knowledge
> Foundation
>
> 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?
>
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