It seems obvious that it is important to reach as many Couchsurfers as possible with Open Couchsurfing. If nothing else, it allows us to see the community’s thoughts and opinions on the topic.
For this exact reason, we have proposed a news item on Couchsurfing.com.
Mattthew Brauer posted the following in reply: “Constructive criticism is great and needed, but the purpose of the news is to inspire people and promote CouchSurfing, not to highlight the things that may or may not need improving.”
There are couple of things wrong with this attitude:
- There is no good way for the community at large to understand what’s going on if this kind of news is effectively shielded from them. While not every discussion is worthy of news, this surely is it seems.
- Quite often in Couchsurfing we hear the argument to “not be so negative”. This is certainly one form of that. And certainly, if there were channels where we could get answers to some pressing questions, we would take it there. However “don’t be negative” often just means “shut up”.
Help us publish this news item. Write Mattthew Brauer to show your support.
Thomas, we lived together at the Collective. We have some insight into each other’s personality. We ate at the same dinner table. I think we respect each other, even though our opinions differ.
Given that intimacy, I’m offended that you accuse me of “censoring” information. Censorship mean the intentional suppression of information on behalf of a regime because that regime deems the information a threat to its survival. That is simply not the case here.
I explained my exact reasoning to you in the Community Voice group for why I think it’s not appropriate to post a homepage news article about OpenCouchSurfing.org. Nowhere in my explanation did I say information about OCS is a threat that must be suppressed. Unless you think my reasoning was a lie, it’s unfair for you to accuse me of censorship.
To answer your question: where do I stand?
* I support the right of all members to safety, privacy, civil liberties, and the right to be a part of the discussion of how to run CS.
* I support a leadership team that is transparent about how it works, what it’s up to, and that provides that all members can influence its decisions.
That is why I signed the petition to help make CS more open. Where we disagree is here:
* I support CS owning and using proprietary source-code.
* I support an NDA that gives CS ownership of volunteer contributions and that asks volunteers not to work for competing organizations.
-ttt
I agree with mattthew: the news page is not for public announcements that do not concern the majority of users. it is for what is used now, IMHO. That would be just weird to announce political discussions on the home page.
And if anybody will ask me of the right price of crude oil that will encourage investment, I think $140 per barrel will be appropriate. ,
Not really happy with them. ,
“Matttew”, May 8, 2007 at 2:06 am – “I support an NDA that gives CS ownership of volunteer contributions and that asks volunteers not to work for competing organizations.”
That’s crazy talk. Good luck finding volunteer coders with any significant ability or talent, willing to pour our their efforts and also agree to those expectations. The reality is, they keep defecting in waves. Why do you think that is, exactly?
It’s not even coders, it’s any volunteer, for nearly any situation. I’ve volunteered and solicited and encouraged volunteers for several org’s. You want a coder to provide something his masters will (and haven proven to want to) personally profit from, for no compensation?
And the reason for “not work[ing] for competing org’s” is so that CaseyInc. can then exclude any kind of “competitor” from making use of some of the same talent. This is a recipe for failure and rejection if I ever saw one.
And it’s the word “competitor” because Casey sees his collection of spaghetti code as something he can run as a business, like a business, only without actually compensating the people he tries to dupe into making him rich.
The (still) underlying cancer that consumes CaseyInc. (and sadly nearly everyone else who comes into close contact with “management” or the upper castes) is that he quite obviously expects as many other people as he can convince or manipulate, to expend their efforts not to help the greater good of HospEx, but to slave away on something he can personally own and benefit from. Some benefits exclusive to him alone, like actual cash profit or total power and control.
And he’s spent most of his own efforts on either gagging people, denying this, or working desperately on counter-spin and propaganda (to try) to keep this fact unknown. To no avail.
That, is why this site was founded – to allow even trolls and imbeciles to have a chance to speak, right, wrong, crazy… or even you. Something CaseyInc. has feared like a vampire fears sunlight from the beginning, for exactly the reasons I cited.
Casey Fenton is a selfish, deceitful, manipulative, egomaniacal, smug, shameless, remorseless waste of carbon and water. If there was any good at all to come out of “the great con” that is CS, it’s that it inspired new networks that came after to prohibit by design so many of the poisonous traps that have been the hallmark of Casey’s self-serving project.
I don’t like “users” and consider them a cancer on society, and if they’re bold and sociopathic enough, I also thoroughly enjoy firebombing their efforts and egos.
Several years ago (at CS), many people asked why the books and music they listed in their profiles or mentioned on the message boards always linked to a “buy it at Amazon.com” URL. A unique link, for every instance in which they posted words for something that Amazon had for sale.
Casey’s response? Pure deceit, claiming he didn’t know anything about it, or know how that detail was implemented, or otherwise he completely ignored the unanimous requests that it be removed.
That tells the entire story, in a single example.