[info]dkmnow in [info]07refugees

Damage control?

This just in from BoingBoing.

While Ben and Mena Trott, along with the rest of Six Apart, surely made a handsome profit on the sale of LJ to SUP, I think it's safe to say that their public and corporate image did not fare so well. Despite a conspicuous lack of detail in the following, it's not hard to read between the lines...

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http://www.boingboing.net/2007/12/12/movable-type-now-und.html

Movable Type now under a free license
Posted by Cory Doctorow, December 12, 2007 11:41 PM

Movable Type, the popular blogging software, has gone free/open, relicensing its code under the GPL, the gold standard for free licenses. We've used MT ever since we migrated away from Blogger (and Ben Trott, MT's co-founder, personally did the migration for us!) and it's great to see the company adopting best practices with its code-base. Even better is the company's statement about why they've adopted a free license: because they want to promote freedom.

"Like many of us on the team, some of you have been waiting for this moment for years. For a business, an open source license affects boring things like how a product is created, updated, and distributed. But the open source movement has always been about something more important: Freedom. With a name like "Movable Type", we've always been keenly aware of the importance of freedom, as that name echoes both the birth of the printing press and the creation of independent media that an individual can control.

"Our goal has always been to create the best blogging platform in the world and to put that power in the hands of as many people as possible."

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Yes, you read that right. We only want to bring happiness and joy to all the little children of the world. Excuse me - I have to go to the bathroom.
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Posted on Dec. 13th, 2007 at 04:04 am | | Leave a comment | Add to Memories | Tell a Friend

Comments


[info]nosselinfea

*giggles*

Translated from:
"Our goal has always been to create the best blogging platform in the world and to put that power in the hands of as many people as possible - except Livejournallers, because they're all crazy and they scare us."
Posted on Dec. 13th, 2007 11:11 am (UTC) | | Thread | Reply

[info]keieeeye

Re: *giggles*

"And certainly not those damn Snarry fans!"

:P

I'm allowed to blatantly over-simplify the matter, it's half past midnight. And with this I depart to bed.
Posted on Dec. 13th, 2007 11:21 am (UTC) | | Parent | Reply

[info]lady_ganesh

Re: *giggles*

Yes, exactly! We are all crazy, though. Aren't we?
Posted on Dec. 16th, 2007 04:30 pm (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]nosselinfea

Re: *giggles*

We are! but crazy in a GOOD way
Posted on Dec. 16th, 2007 07:01 pm (UTC) | | Parent | Reply

[info]alleyne

I think I just lost my dinner.
Posted on Dec. 13th, 2007 11:22 am (UTC) | | Reply

[info]pen

I admit it. I started musing over the specifics f the GPL then started thinking about the differences between the GPL and GPL3. Then I considered the LGPL and LGPLv3. That's a pretty broad license they're granting.

I guess they realized they better give it away because no one wants to pay anymore.
Posted on Dec. 13th, 2007 01:24 pm (UTC) | | Thread | Reply

[info]dkmnow

Well, IIRC, there was always a free version. But yeah, among those in the know, the general consensus seems to be "too late, MT, tooooo late!"

I figure Doctorow is a personal chum of the Trotts. Or something.
Posted on Dec. 13th, 2007 02:28 pm (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]pen

It's time has come and gone.

It just makes me laugh that they did it now.
Posted on Dec. 13th, 2007 02:35 pm (UTC) | | Parent | Reply

[info]sukeban

"I figure Doctorow is a personal chum of the Trotts. Or something."

Cory says right there in the post that Ben personally helped him set up his blog...
Posted on Dec. 15th, 2007 10:16 am (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]dkmnow

Which, by itself, proves nothing. Trott was not swimming in corporate cash at the time, and as a small businessman, migrating someone's blog is hardly tantamount to being "best man" at their wedding. Doctorow's pollyannish tone and conspicuous omissions, on the other hand, are far more suggestive that they might be friends. Dig?
Posted on Dec. 15th, 2007 11:15 am (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]sukeban

OK then :)
Posted on Dec. 15th, 2007 02:14 pm (UTC) | | Parent | Reply

[info]blue_rose

This whole sitch reminds me of my first job and the company I worked for. That was the awesomest company ever with a president who was genuinely cool, caring, loved working with people and was a big, happy ball of energy. REALLY unlike anything you typically see in the corporate world.

One bad decision to be bought by one of a few companies who had made a bid ground the company into the dirt and beyond. This was your standard dot-com before the bubble burst, buying out companies like a kid with their first credit card, never thinking that real money had to manifest in order to actually deal with the purchase--and mismanaging them right and left because they had no clue what they bought.

It was awful. I felt so bad for the guy, mourned for the company... and left it for another company in the area when I could.

Diff sitch, yeah, but definitely a case of where "Squee! Someone who looks cool on paper wants to buy us!" turns into a terrible business lesson for the owners.
Posted on Dec. 13th, 2007 02:21 pm (UTC) | | Thread | Reply

[info]dkmnow

Unfortunately, the "lesson" would seem entirely lost on all the key players in this sorry spectacle. Top-tier 6A sycophant Anil Dash, whose blog entry was quoted in the report, seems to be living in a fantasy world, and even Brad Fitz himself just can't seem to grok the damage to his reputation, having he's sold his own baby -- and customers' loyalty -- into state/corporate slavery and prostitution.

But they may yet learn -- betrayal has an uncanny knack for finding its way back home.
Posted on Dec. 13th, 2007 03:12 pm (UTC) | | Parent | Thread | Reply

[info]dkmnow

*Fitzpatrick

whatever

:-p
Posted on Dec. 13th, 2007 03:18 pm (UTC) | | Parent | Reply

[info]wolfsilveroak

They want to promote freedom???
BULLSHIT, that's why they started censoring and then added flagging before selling liveJournal overseas.

Lying sacks of shit. I hope they get nothing but coal for Yule and even that would be too good for them.
Posted on Dec. 13th, 2007 02:52 pm (UTC) | | Reply

[info]verveopera

Yeah, that's about the biggest load of BS I've ever heard in my entire life. If they wanted us to be happy they never would have sold us to SUP -- there was a reason the Russian's were flipping out about getting put on their servers before it even happened.
Posted on Dec. 13th, 2007 09:09 pm (UTC) | | Reply

[info]sapphoq

oh snap


Freedom and El Jay equals oxymoron.
spike
Posted on Dec. 14th, 2007 04:53 am (UTC) | | Reply

[info]sukeban

Unfortunately, the opening up of MT4 is just trying to reverse the disastrous policy of setting a pricing scheme for MT just when WordPress was finally getting usable, and free as in open source.

I frankly doubt they can regain their former position, because nowadays pretty much every programmer interested in developing open source blogging software is already tinkering with WP. Furthermore, I remember that when the MT4 beta was released it was an awful mess of legacy code and had hundreds of festering bugs. But it had a nice user interface, that I can grant you.

/happy wordpress user
Posted on Dec. 15th, 2007 10:28 am (UTC) | | Reply

[info]scorpio

"Even better is the company's statement about why they've adopted a free license: because they want to promote freedom."

.... my mind is officially boggled... WHAT.THE.FUCK.
Posted on Dec. 16th, 2007 07:22 pm (UTC) | | Reply