I didn’t make a posting yesterday because if I had, I would have burst out ranting and raving but even after a day’s delay (is that equivalent to counting to a hundred? <g>) I still am sizzling and can’t contain the onset of a major rant.
I was involved with LiteStep for a very long time because I believed in the project and believed that I was doing something worthwhile and contributing to a cause that helped people. But the longer I was there, the more I began to see that it was becoming a forum for people to show off and to bicker. I moved on to a different project – DarkStep – and dropped that too since I didn’t have the time for it. But recently I have been somewhat drawn back to the happenings in the LiteStep community because of a controversy surrounding WareWolf selling a compilation CD of LiteStep themes, modules etc. People who did themes and distributed it for free are suddenly saying “You should not profit from my work …”. Now I can understand that attitude perfectly if somebody was doing that just for profit. But when somebody is out of work and is just trying to make some money to support their family, *I* would think that people would put all of these petty concerns aside but I guess it is not to be so.
People who uploaded themes for others to use for free are suddenly saying, no you can’t use my theme to make a little money – if somebody could make money selling these CD’s in the first place … which I think isn’t going to work in the bulk that it would have to if WareWolf is to make tons and tons of cash as the whiners seem to think. These people say, that they should get some share of the profit for their work. So should I start asking people for royalties each time they use LiteStep on their machines because I put about a year of work into LiteStep? It is at times like these that I really feel like abandoning work on free software completely and either code for myself and not distribute any of my work or start charging for it (not that I will because I know there are still a lot of good people out there – both in LiteStep and just generally …).
I can’t say that I’m feeling very good about people in general at the moment or about the LiteStep “community”. It is so easy for people to make suggestions and talk about alternatives without doing anything to help somebody. I would like to see any of the people doing all the talking taking some action. Ah well … as usual, why do I even bother? The world is going to the selfish, mindless and the childish … God have mercy on the future …
You’ve already noticed that those that have been the most negative actually have usually been around the least amount of time. I for one am perfectly happy for anyone to sell compilations of LS themes, etc. including LDE itself. The only stipulation would be that it not be modified, be credited correctly and also not associated with any illegal / illicit material of any kind. Being aware of distribution would be nice, but not required.
The CD proposed by WW has no such problems (apart from notification, but then LDE will not be present AFAIK), so all’s well.
It’s no different to the public domain libraries of old, software was provided for free & distributed for a minimal profit…. Go to it WW and make us proud!
As I don’t have all the facts, I may be off base here but it seems to me that situations like this boil down into two simple categories:
If these themes and so forth were all published to the public domain then as long as WW is adhering to whatever stipulations may be in place (like you can give this away to anyone as long as you tell them who made, or whatever) then he has every right to do exactly as he is.
OTOH, if he’s grabbed anything that specifically states it may not be included in any commercial distribution without the express permission of the author, he’s toast.
Why do I have this sneaky suspicion that the first scenario is most likely?
I would expect anyone to make reasonable efforts to ensure that this would be the case although in the case of the huge amount of data involved in this operation, it might prove more satisfactory to request that those not wishing to have work included then simply email WW to ask to have the data removed.
Reasonable efforts would include this approach & perhaps a small link via LiteStep.com.
If he weren’t using PayPal (which I don’t really like), then I would be quite willing to request a CD simply for the convenience factor. Indeed, one thing that has been overlooked is that CDs like this would prevent (to a large extent) the problems we have seen with LS.net’s downtime…..backups would already be present and widely available.
I think the “profit” thing is whats sending up red flags. A better way to take this pill would be to use the phrase “cover expenses.” Websites like litestep.com are not free and without them Litestep would disappear all together. People upload to these sites for 2 reasons (okay there maybe others but 2 main reasons) – 1) To stroke ego – lets face it, other people wanting your product is pretty cool. 2) To share their creation (which really ties in pretty snuggly with reason 1). Given these two facts and the fact that Warewolf facilitated their wishes, selling a compilation disc is really no big deal and just think – someone might be actually paying money to have your theme – wow what a nice little stroke! All the major themer’s out there seem to be hunkydory with it and if Warewolf can actually take home some change from the deal – bully for him – he deserves it. Come on people – get along or get out. People like Warewolf do all this out of their own pockets and then get dumped on by someone who seems to think he/she is the ruler of the “free” world and everything should run the way their narrow, selfish, little mind wants it too. I’d say more but what’s the point? Nearly everyone reading this probably pretty much agrees with me anyway. Love ya WareWolf – good luck!
Thanks for the words ppl’s! I appreciate them. Thanks go out to ALLLL who have ever coded things inside the themes, and any modules, as well as the coders of LS itself (without whom this cd set wouldn’t be possible). Phil: I’m happy to hear you say the things you did. Fahim: you’ll always be a GOD in my book – if only a binary one! 8)
I think what’s caused so much hostility is not the fact that he’s selling these CDs, but the heavy-handed way in which he’s going about it…taking the themes from djCricket, for instance. Not seeing how the community felt about the idea first – imagine if jalist had announced on ls2k, without discussion, that he needed some extra money so he was now setting up a paypal account – I bet he wouldn’t have got nearly as much support as he did by doing it that way.
That’s the only problem I have with what Warewolf is doing – not the selling of CDs, which I happen to think is a pretty good idea. Just the method…