Re: [Fsuk-manchester] Announcing the "Federation of Free Software UK

[Pete Morris]

> Personally, I think the problem with AF for FFSUK will be the
> revolutionary communist association, not the anarchist one.
> http://www.af-north.org/?q=aims+and+principles

...that and the fact that 99% of people rightly or wrongly associate  
the word "anarchism" with violent clashes between the BNF and Unite  
Against Fascism and windows getting smashed.

Philosophy is all well and good, but when you're trying to pitch to  
your boss why having Debian on the web box is beneficial to his  
business and profits, having the word "anarchism" mentioned anywhere  
in the business case is not going to do you any favours.

Me: "Free software is great because it has the latest features and  
security patches developed by a huge community rather than having to  
wait for a single-point-of-failure development house"
Boss: "I like it, have a pay rise"

Me: "Free software is great because together, comrades, we will use it  
to smash the oppressive forces of tyranny and overthrow the government  
with our iron fist of protest"
Boss: "Ummm, right, I've been meaning to have a chat with you about  
some redundancies we've got to make in the company"

Pete