[OT] TV, Internet, and Democracy

[Evan Leibovitch]

JoeHill wrote:
> Ten years ago, the people at the Ice House would have been instantly arrested
> and portrayed in the media as some kind of whacked out doomsday cult.
>   

FWIW: Ten years ago, a bunch of Toronto-area Linux advocates designed
and bought a bunch of hockey shirts emblazened with Tux and the words
"Team Linux" on the front, and wore them while giving Red Hat and
Caldera  CDs out to literally thousands of people at an IT event. They
even paid a little more than the cost of each shirt, so we could make an
extra one with the number 1 and "TORVALDS" on the back, which was
shipped off to Linus after the event. (He eventually wore it during his
first speech in Toronto some years later, though he suggested that he
might be the only Finn who hated hockey.)

> I dunno, keep in mind the crowd you hang out with. A *lot* of the people I meet
> on a daily basis really haven't the faintest clue 'what' the hell I'm talking
> about when I start babbling about 'why'.
How many have the authority (and desire) to purchase more than one PC
per year?

> That's the thing, though, right? Guaranteed is someone is committed enough to
> stand outside in the cold distributing CD's next to a giant inflated penguin,
> there's a very good chance that they are going to have the same level of
> commitment to more grassroots activities such as the ones you allude to.
>   
One can hope. The history in this regard has not indicated this
willingness for gruntwork. People want the instant gratification element
which doesn't exist for the back-room activities.

> I think that perhaps I got the impression in the earlier discussion that it
> was an either/or thing, or that the giant penguin people were just completely
> wrong.
>   
It's never either/or. All is good. But, given the relative scarcity of
people willing to do grassroots advocacy, it is fair game to suggest
that certain activites are more efficient than others at increasing use
of FOSS -- and that the person-hours spent on the stunt could have been
more _effectively_ deployed in less flamboyant activities.

- Evan

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