[ale] Canonical makes Apple look so good...

[Wolf Halton]

Hi Y'all

I only know what I read on the Internet, and I have not seen anybody who 
is actually close to the action talking at all in real terms.  The blog 
by Shuttleworth shows signs of having been written too quickly without 
editorial overview.  I think public relations should be left to the 
experts, but that was not the case here.

The percentages we are throwing around really mean nothing without 
actual dollar amounts (or euro amounts) attached.  100% of nothing = 
nothing.  If the current flow to Gnome was $100 per year from Banshee, 
and this 'evil plan' was expected to send $200 per year plus something 
from Ubuntu1, then tell me who was hurt, really?

If anybody wants to double the annual donations to the sourcefreedom 
project without any of us having to do twice as much work, I would be 
pleased to accept.

Wolf

P.S. Marketing organizations (specialty retailers, direct-salespeople, 
etc) consistently want between 20% and 50% of list to market a product.  
Retail markup of jewelry is 80% to the retailer - this is why they can 
survive and do these 50%-off sales.  Canonical is talking about 
collecting .075% of the list price to distribute the product, and the 
developers do not have to pay anything to Canonical.

On 03/08/2011 09:42 PM, Michael B. Trausch wrote:
> On Tue, 2011-03-08 at 19:14 -0500, Dan Lambert wrote:
>> I am amazed at this group sometimes.
>>
>> Virtually every commercial entity that is mentioned on here is
>> vilified and criticized to the extreme. If any of them don't meet the
>> expectations of this group in every regard, they are instantly put on
>> par with the most despised corporations on the planet.
> I can't speak for others, but that is hardly my position; I'm just of
> the position that for-profits need not take money out of the pockets of
> non-profits.  Just because an entity is a non-profit does not mean that
> it is fit to have money pulled from its pockets by some for-profit
> somewhere.
>
>> I understand and appreciate the superior efforts of FOSS devotees, and
>> am particularly impressed by the Debian team of developers, and their
>> contributions to the open source community.
>>
>> I want to remind everyone of the fact that BUSINESSES are in BUSINESS
>> to make a PROFIT. They are not charities, and some (most) of them use
>> any opportunity possible to extract a small percentage of profit from
>> every aspect they can.
> And that they should, so long as it's not stepping on the toes (or
> indeed, plainly kicking to the curb) some other entity, for-profit,
> non-profit, individual, or otherwise.  Even in business, there are
> ethical considerations.  Being a for-profit does not exempt an entity
> from those ethical considerations.
>
>> If any of you are in the management of, or own a corporation, you are
>> fully aware of the need to make a profit, or you go out of business.
> Indeed.
>
>> If any of you want to blast me for my position, go ahead. I work for
>> one of those evil FOR PROFIT businesses. It's kept my family fed, and
>> put my children through school. I used to own my own business, and I
>> can tell you for a fact that working in the corporate world is a hell
>> of a lot easier, because I don't have to worry about how to meet
>> payroll, or how to eke enough profit out to pay my own bills.
> To each their own.  I'd rather not deal with the drama or the politics
> if at all I can avoid it.  That said, if it came down to working a W-2
> position again or not eating, I'd obviously take the W-2 over not
> eating.
>
> Do I think that there are nasty corporations out there?  You bet'cha.  I
> don't subscribe to the view that corporations have to acquire their
> revenue by taking it from others.  Quite the contrary, I think that
> corporations should get their revenue by providing the best service they
> can and making the customer as happy as reasonable without sacrificing
> itself.  Happy customers come back; forced customers also come back, but
> only grudgingly, and only until there are other viable options.  It is
> better to build a business on happy customers than it is to build a
> business on the notion that you're the only game in town.
>
> It's also better to build a business through honest work, and not by
> turning the revenue stream for non-profits down.
>
> Or said another say, just because one *can* do something, does not mean
> that one *should* or *ought to*.  Canonical certainly *can* take money
> away from the GNOME Foundation; Banshee is licensed under the terms of
> the MIT license.  That neither means that it is a morally (or ethically)
> proper action, nor that they should or ought to.  If they are
> struggling, there are other ways to survive (and truly, if Canonical
> cannot survive by honorable means, it should survive by no means at
> all).
>
> Integrity and honor are arguably as important in the world of business
> as outside of it.  Should we disagree on that, however, then we've
> nothing further to converse about.
>
> 	--- Mike
>
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