[Foundation-l] PediaPress

[Joe Corneli]

What people seem to have been stepping around in this thread so far is
the fact that Pediapress's software chain includes some components
that they have NOT released as open source.  There seems to be ongoing
confusion about this.  If there was an open source toolchain for doing
what Pediapress currently does, then Wikimedia itself or any third
party organization or individual could use it to create manuscripts
suitable for printing, and use any printer they liked to achieve that
end.  I think the crux of the argument should be: is it OK for
Wikimedia to have a partnership with a service provider who uses
closed source software as an integral part of the service they
provide.  Pediapress sets a precedent that says "yes, that's
completely fine".  And maybe it is, but it is then just wrong to refer
to this as an "open source" way of working.

On Fri, Nov 12, 2010 at 6:07 AM, Liam Wyatt <liamwyatt at gmail.com> wrote:
> If we're concerned about the WMF referring in its blog to a for-profit
> organisation that happens to be working with us in a way that is
> open-source, offline and furthering our mission to distribute our content
> widely, why did no one complain about the OpenMoko Wikireader being in the
> WMF blog: