I have, in the past, waxed lyrical about the different types of “user” that we see in the IT, and more specifically Linux / Open Source community. However, another year has passed, and there have continued to be many discussions on the web, and shows like Lugradio that have skirted round one particular point that I want to highlight today.

My original post included (at the bottom) this point:

• We need to create communities that are not necessarily based on contribution, but merely on membership. Analysers of social trend say that, in this day and age, people first need to feel that they belong, then they will begin to believe, and only lastly will their behaviour change. We need to create communities where people can just belong. Once they then begin to ‘believe’ in that community, then they can recieve opportunities to take action, and ‘behave’ as a community member should.

Belong, Believe, Behave. The 3 Bs that, I believe, should become the mantra that Free software advocates live their lives by. Sadly, their current behaviour seems to suggest that they’re doing it backward - expecting people to “behave” in a particular way (yes, RMS, I’m talking about you and your GNU/Linux), then to change their beliefs, and then finally allowing them to belong to “the community”. This is backward, and, with some exceptions, will most likely fail to create long term growth within the community.

This, I reckon, is probably where I’m about to come into conflict with Aq’s viewpoint, which I, for the most part, agree with. When it comes to Linux, I believe we need to get people to feel like they belong, by ensuring that they can do everything they need to do, even if this requires proprietary codecs and/or drivers. I don’t like them, in the long term I don’t want them, but I think that to leave them out entirely means that we are requiring new users to behave before they belong (or believe). I really like the way the new Restricted Drivers applet works in Ubuntu 7.04 (Feisty Fawn), as I think this is a good way to let people “belong” first, but gives them an insight into what it means to “believe”.

So - enough of the rhetoric - what are some things that I think need to change?

1. We need to help people to simply “belong” to the community, without expecting (or impressing on) them to believe in all the facets of Free Software.
2. We need to polish our apologetics so that we can explain the whys and hows of Free software without sounding like zealots
3. We need to recognise that many people will have a period of time where they believe without fully behaving - they believe in open source drivers, but use proprietary drivers, etc.
4. We need to sensitively include elements in our software that bridges the gaps between Free software and proprietary software that:
   1. Allows for quick, simple, hands-off integration, rather than creating big obstacles, of proprietary elements
   2. Provides succinct, and practical, reasons
      why

      the proprietary elements are “bad”

That’ll do for a start. Let the flamewar comments begin.

mrBen