[okfn-discuss] Next steps on the Open Knowledge Tagline

[Aaron Wolf]

Thanks, Rufus. I agree. The concern was initially about potential shift in
focus and concern about inclusion of the community in the decisions.

To be clear, I always thought it was great that lots of Open Data stuff was
happening, but I saw "Open Knowledge" as basically including "Free
Culture", and when I think of stuff cultural works like music and art, I
see *zero* place for that in "See how data can change the world". And I
think that will remain the case for everyone who ever sees that tagline.
Nobody will ever see that tagline and think OK has anything directly to do
with free/open art.

So the initial concern remains: Does "Open Knowledge" include art and
culture? If "See how data…" is even an option, I still have my doubts.
Maybe I was wrong all along and OK was *never* inclusive of those things…
I'm really not honestly sure now.

Respectfully,
Aaron


--
Aaron Wolf
wolftune.com


On Mon, Jun 16, 2014 at 2:38 AM, Rufus Pollock <rufus.pollock at okfn.org>
wrote:

> On 14 June 2014 16:43, Aaron Wolf <wolftune at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> While everyone has their opinions, if the tag-line that had been
>> originally chosen without so much input had been an actual call-to-action,
>> something actually decent, people might not have bothered complaining.
>>
>> I think "see how data can change the world" is clearly *disliked* by
>> lots (perhaps most) of us, the thing I've found most troubling is that it
>> wasn't scrapped.
>>
>
>
>> I have some experience with this sort of process, and I can tell you
>> this: it is extremely hard to find something everyone likes. The goal needs
>> to instead be to find something that *nobody* hates (and hopefully most
>> people like). The only reason "see how data can change the world" seems to
>> have been included in the running is because it was already there and some
>> people had early prejudice for it. Whether we end up with a main tagline or
>> 3-5 or whatever, "see how" needs to be *omitted.* It's been pointed out
>> by multiple people how passive, distancing, topic-centric, and unclear it
>> is. It doesn't qualify for "nobody hates it" status even if we hesitate to
>> use the word "hate".
>>
>
> @Aaron: as you point out a lot of people can have different opinions on
> this topic. I should say, personally, I see a reasonable amount to
> recommend the "See how ..." approach (as Rob Myers points out below). Once
> you have "see how" and you can't repeat knowledge (you're going to prefix
> with that remember!) you end up with a default choice between data and
> information and given the framing of the tagline within "Open Knowledge:
> ..." and potentially the narrative I think there is much in "See how data
> can change the world" - btw I'm not saying there is not much in other
> options, i'm just trying to explain why I think this was kept in on its
> merits :-)
>
>
>> We can go through the rest and figure out if any options nobody hates.
>> Those are the ones we can move forward with. And I'm not saying just give
>> in to haters, but when reasonable people express things that aren't "it's
>> too fluffy, or it's too chunky" but really express true dislike with
>> explanations and persistence, *then* we *need* to drop the item in
>> question.
>>
>
> I am concerned that some of the original reaction to this *tagline* was an
> (important and valuable) reaction to deeper and more complex things than
> the tagline - i.e. a sense there was some change in identity or focus.
>
> rufus
>
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