[Foundation-l] Software Policy Draft

Wed Sep 5 10:12:56 UTC 2007

On 05/09/07, Delphine Ménard <notafishz at gmail.com> wrote:

> I was a Windoze and Adaubi advocate (and I mean the word advocate
> here) not two years ago. I am running Linux on my machine and working
> with The Gimp even on a professional level today. I do not believe
> that "forcing" the "free" upon people is the way to go. Interess them,
> poke them with it, make them understand. Be pedagogic and patient.
> Don't "force" them. Teach them your "principles" rather than scare
> them with "policy".

It'll lure people in nicely, I think. I think Wikimedia is one of the
most significant sites for content in PNG form, for instance. If we
can get Greg's player everywhere for Ogg Theora video, that'll make
that no-friction, and of course downloaded Theora files play fine in
VLC just like downloaded FLVs from YouTube do.

> > I won't mind if a user using IE is faced with a white screen with a link
> > to use firefox :P

> I do, if that means this person is hindered in their access to the
> content we host.

Having stuff work properly as best as possible in all browsers is
essential (with graceful degradation). Even in Lynx you can download
the images. Though having cool stuff (e.g. useful Javascript
facilities) that only work in proper browsers (because IE is so
horrible to code for - I know so many webmasters who curse IE's
stupidities) is an incentive to upgrade, because there's a reward at
the end.

- d.