From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Message-ID: <3EF354C4.9020205@place.org> From: Stephen Wynne User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.0; en-US; rv:1.0.2) Gecko/20030208 Netscape/7.02 MIME-Version: 1.0 To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu Subject: Re: [9fans] Re: The new ridiculous license References: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Date: Fri, 20 Jun 2003 11:39:00 -0700 Topicbox-Message-UUID: d415a81c-eacb-11e9-9e20-41e7f4b1d025 Jim Choate wrote: > What we see from Lucent is typical corporate psychology. They're afraid to > let one iota more go than necessary to make a profit. It's hard to take > any argument or claim based on 'justify a trust' when the only issue at > hand is profit. I'd like to dispute the idea that trust is always absent from corporate relationships with the wider world, both in terms of civic and professional circles. I can't speak for Lucent, since I know little about its corporate culture, but suffice it to say that companies have complex motivations when it comes to their relationships to the wider world. Civic, professional, and global community environments exist in which companies must survive. They require willing professionals who can demonstrate commitment and loyalty during their terms of employment. Companies require supportive local communities for things such as roads, electricity, and fire protection for their grounds. And they also need a sense of public recognition from customers and competitors. I could go on about company community obligations, but to say that corporations only think about the immediate profits they can gain is simplistic. Of course they usually think about profits above other considerations. But all the companies I've known have had strong contingents of volunteerism, as well as charity activities among the employees, often encouraged by upper management. And each has contributed to a wider group of professionals, customers, and competitors through open source offerings, conference participation, and technical education grants. In part because companies are comprised of many individuals, each company has an opportunity to demonstrate some degree of altruism. Moreover, any perceived generosity on the part of a company can be seen as positive public relations. A good veteran marketeer will tell you that the best publicity isn't for sale. Open source gifts to the wider world offer a variety of ways for companies to demonstrate altruism and gain kudos from customers and competitors in often unmeasurable ways. An open source offering can also help to secure market share for a product that depends on the open source package. With its Plan 9 license, Lucent is doing the work of a for-profit corporation as well as demonstrating its membership in a larger community of competitors that all seek to further the state of the art through cooperation. And one could even call that selfish, because at some point in an organization's growth, market and innovative influence is critical for a company's future success. Every corporation I've ever joined was more than the sum of its parts. From executives down to hourly employees, people with whom I've worked have had their own interests in engaging with their communities, whether it were volunteering, charity donations, or technical mentoring and even open source donations. I think it's very negative to say that trust wasn't a part of these relationships, or that trust wasn't a part of their companies' relationships with their communities. There has been a lot of trust, and when the taxes are paid and the money has been spent, looking back on trust is a great experience. And in this day of fluctuating stock prices, technical employees and their organizations might be more interested in community than ever. The glass is either half empty, or half full, depending on how you see it. I prefer to see it as somewhat almost full, and able to satisfy most of the thirst.