Having been contributing to whatsup (www.whatsup.org.il) for a while now, I think it has clearly become the de-facto leader of news and support alternative to Israeli FOSS users. For the last 1.5 years I have seen it grow from a meer few dozens registered users, to full blown 800+ with over 1M hits. Weather this is an achievment or not, as it clearly seems you are not impressed., will be left for others to decided I guess.
Yehuda seem to have raised some issues regarding cooperation and consolidation of the FOSS scene in Israel if in did there's one. There are many talented people willing and ready to help, though it seems that only recently it is becomming serious enough to make a difference.
Like in many other cases FOSS's recent achivment and sucess around the world was not intiated here (linux-il or whatsup). We are meerly benefiting GNU/Linux coming of age and maturity. Though mutt, pine or emacs are still the foundatons of FOSS they are by far not the platform on which it is now making it's inroads into the the public domain.
And so you have relactently dismissed Yehuda's interest in serving the community even further offering Whatsup as a platform to use by anyone in Israel intrested in promoting FOSS including established yet some what remote linux-il, or self-appointed Ha-Makor.
I personally don't really think it is difficult to see that whatsup seems to be doing very well serving the community as over 800+ users and more the 1M hits seem to sugest. If you think this is not a good enough proposition, or Whatsup/Yehuda should be runing around collecting news from the mouths of the so called community leaders, I think you are denying what seems to be obvious so far. If you need to outreach and spread any messages you might have, you should concider Whatsup to be you 1st choice. Doing so will further establish its presence and allow consolidation of the community.
Whatsup was wize and responisble enough to co-operate, rather than compete with many other projects like the Pinguin, Ha'Makor, Kineret and LinBrew and some other sites dedictated to FOSS and by doing so gave an example of positive and healty attiude and established itself as hub for this activities in a way. I hope it'll continue so wether receiving aknowledgment for it or not. Frankly speaking I think it allready had gained it. Why don't you make the most out of it?
dittigas
Hi,
I'm not sure whether you are referring to my, or Nadav's, response. If mine, then I would like to direct your attention that I did, in fact, agree with much of what Yehuda wrote. I would also like to explain that Hamakor is not here to take credit over what whatsup is doing, or Linus Trovalds for that matter. We are here to unit the forces, out of the believe that this will be to everyone's benefit. The people from whatsup decided, for reasons of their own, to be less active in this initiative. It is their right. However, and as a result, taking offense that services they can offer are not utilized as efficiently as they could makes no sense.
If you want to do, do. If you don't want to do, at least offer criticism in a constructive (e.g. - saying "sending to [EMAIL PROTECTED] will be faster", or "we can also publish this response") rather than accusing manner. I want to hear how I can do better. I will refuse, however, to feel guilty for stepping forward and acting. If you don't like what or how I'm doing stuff, elect someone else to the board (assuming that the next time around there will be more candidates than places to fill, that is).
Shachar
-- Shachar Shemesh Open Source integration consultant Home page & resume - http://www.shemesh.biz/
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