[beyond-licensing] potential practical outcomes

[Karl Fogel]

Allison Randal <allison at opensource.org> writes:
>Here are a few that have come up already, with my own best guess on the
>type of outcome they'd be:
>
>- Program: OSaaS standard (w/ logo etc)

No reservations on this idea -- I think it'd be really useful.

Some reservations about the second idea, though:

>- Campaign: persuade companies to stop using "community" when they
>really mean "open source", and stop using "enterprise" when they really
>mean "proprietary"

Even though it was my rant (though one I'm sure many of us share!), I'm not sure this one is politically a good thing for the OSI to undertake -- at least as one of the first things beyond licensing.

A lot of companies who support the OSI, and who might even support OSI financially, would suddenly feel that OSI is trying shame them into not using marketing language that seems perfectly natural & effective to them.  This would be campaign that has the potential to turn allies into enemies.

Now, granted, currently those allies are doing something that is mildly destructive to open source... So maybe the way to go about it is to seek private consultation with some of those companies first, and try to cooperatively explore solutions with them.  Even if only a few companies cooperate at first, that's a good start, and is something that can be pointed to in each discussion with a new company, for a possible snowball effect.

I guess I'm just saying that "campaign" might not be the best way to approach this, initially.  A behind-the-scenes effort, starting with companies most likely to be receptive to changing this aspect of their marketing, might be the way to start.  Once enough of them are doing it, *then* maybe a public campaign becomes practical.

Best regards,
-Karl