Re: [Patents] Re: FFII: Brussels 2004-04-14 Events

[Marcel Martin <mm@ellipsa.net>]

Hartmut Pilch a écrit :
> 
> > Et je prétends que réunir 500 personnes à Bruxelles, ce n'est même
> > pas "faire du vent".
> 
> Even if it was not so negative it would be slightly off-topic on this
> list.

This is not negative just to be negative. The goal was to be 
sarcastic (you and me, we know why).
Now, no, this is not off-topic. At least, much less than the  
epistemologico-crappy delirium of a Greg.

> 
> There are other lists for planning actions, such as bxl, and there are
> wikis such as the addenda wiki for
> 
>         http://swpat.ffii.org/group/todo/index.en.html
> 
>         http://kwiki.ffii.org/SwpatgunkaEn
>         http://kwiki.ffii.org/SwpatgunkaFr
> 
> which can be used for these suggestions.
> 
> We have been writing to all supporters, inciting them to do quite a lot of
> different things, not only coming to BXL, and collecting feedback on the
> actions.
> 
> If we had had a list of politicians to whom they could write postcards,
> we would have pushed that forward as well.  But nobody has compiled such
> a list.

Setting up such an action would at most take you half an hour. All
you have to do (you or someone else at FFII) is to send to all 
Eurolinux petitioners a post with
1) the postal address of the European Commission;
2) a date to send a postcard on which the sender would have written
his/her name, address, profession, and the message "NO SOFTWARE 
PATENTS IN EUROPE". 

> But all this requires a lot of work, and just dumping "todo" requests onto
> a neutral news discussion forum is one of the things we need least.  It is
> also one of the things that can make a well-functioning group lose much of
> its strength.  When people feel an urge to do something, it is essential
> that they control this urge and either turn it into disciplined action or
> keep silent about it.  Otherwise good intentions pave the way to hell.

It perfectly summarizes the problem. I know that you have a lot of 
work and that sometimes suggestions made by people who don't clearly 
understand the situation might be boring. But reacting the way you do, 
in short "I know what is good for you whereas you you don't know, so 
the best is that you do what I say and you shut up", is definitely 
not a good communication strategy. 

mm