[WikiEN-l] Ideas on a methodology

Mon Jul 7 17:07:20 UTC 2003

Toby Bartels wrote:

>Claudine Chionh wrote:
>
>
>>Just to throw something in to the discussion:
>>See <http://www.gnu.org/encyclopedia/>
>>
>
>This suggests that GNU would be happy
>with our using the name "GNUpedia" --
>and other comments by Jimmy suggest the same.
>It seems that there are /Wikipedians/, however,
>who aren't so happy with such a relationship.
>
>OTOH, perhaps they're merely anticipating others' unhappiness?
>Does anyone claim unhappiness on their own part?
>(Not that the English list is a survey of everybody, far from it.)
>
I can attest from personal experience that dancing a little too
closely with RMS has its downsides (*figuratively*, folks,
figuratively :-) ).  He is a great moral crusader, but weak on
tactics and personal relationships.  Everybody knows about the
GNU/Linux vs Linux thing, but he's stuck his oar into a lot of
lesser issues, for instance the details of wording and content
of GNU documentation, and he's alienated many of his own devoutest
supporters. Extrapolating from past incidents, it's even possible
that after studying Wikipedia, he could decide he's against the
NPOV policy and would start an effort to change Wikipedia content
to reflect his long-term goal of making all software free.

So my advice is to think hard about what real advantages one hopes
to get from the GNU connection (keeping in mind that few outside
the computing world have heard of GNU) that are not available
otherwise, before jumping in.

Stan