The debian-private mailing list leak, part 1. Volunteers have complained about Blackmail. Lynchings. Character assassination. Defamation. Cyberbullying. Volunteers who gave many years of their lives are picked out at random for cruel social experiments. The former DPL's girlfriend Molly de Blanc is given volunteers to experiment on for her crazy talks. These volunteers never consented to be used like lab rats. We don't either. debian-private can no longer be a safe space for the cabal. Let these monsters have nowhere to hide. Volunteers are not disposable. We stand with the victims.
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Re: open hardware certification document: second pass

On Thu, 17 Jul 1997, Bruce Perens wrote:

I like the way the intro is shaping up.

> CONDITIONS FOR ACCEPTANCE
> 
> 1. Sufficient documentation on the device must be available for a competent
>    systems programer to write a device driver. The documentation must

For some reason this sentance evokes the image of an AMD mother board with
an Intel P-133, PCI video card, Adaptec SCSI controler, and a 13.3 modem,
with, or without the 17 inch monitor, IDE and SCSI hard drives.

If the video card and the controler are "Open Hardware", can I sell this
machine with the label "Open Hardware Inside"? At what level does this
happen? Is the video card enough, or does it have to be every "major"
component, with some well defined specification on "major"?

> 
> 4. The documentation must be available via one or more of these methods:

Lawyers like to read "or==and"...in any case, "one or more" is ambiguous.
Is it "at least one", or "at least two" of the following?

> 
>    A. As a document published to the global internet and expected to
> 
>    B. In a published book currently in print and available at bookstores
> 
>    C. By mail from the manufacturer, for no more than the cost of
>       duplication of materials, shipping, and a handling fee not to
>       exceed US$20 .

Fedex just changed their overnight rates to a distance scale...inflation
is going to double that number in the next 20 years...

Handling should be points against selling price, and small. Shipping
should be going rate for service (i.e. overnight expected to be more
expensive than ground)

> 
>    D. In the same package as the device when it is sold, as a paper
>       document or a data file in HTML, plain text, PostScript, or PDF
>       format.

If "4", above, is "at least one", then the devices found in "built"
machines are unlikely to have their documentation. Although the pieces of
paper exist somewhere, and some kind soul who found them might put them on
the internet for everyone (or for the developer who is trying to
write a driver), none of that is guaranteed. This would tend to
require that the developer purchase the card. This amounts to a one-time 
royalty payment, doesn't it?

*

The form seems overly complex. You aren't going to be able to hold the
manufacturer to any of the above terms without his consent. That
reduces/elevates this contract to a "blood oath". Why not simplify the
form to something like:

We certify that xxxxxx hardware device meets the standards set forth by
the <insert appropriate title here> and qualifies as "Open Hardware".

Signed,

Soon to be rich ;-)

Note: <insert appropriate title here> would be something like "Open
Hardware Specification (1997)".

-- 
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aka   Dale Scheetz                   Phone:   1 (904) 656-9769
      Flexible Software              11000 McCrackin Road
      e-mail:  dwarf@polaris.net     Tallahassee, FL  32308

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