Hi,
Hong Feng (hongfeng@gnu.org) is working hard on the first issue of "Free Software Magazine", to be published in Jan 2002. It will be written in English (and probably also in Chinese since Hong Feng is chinese and lives in China ;-). There will be an online version and printed copies.
Hong Feng is looking for opportunities to distribute it in European countries. Advertisement could be inserted in the printed/online version, provided someone is able/willing to devote some time to this.
This is all I know of the current state of this magazine. Such a magazine would be really nice to have, IMHO. If you have questions, ideas or suggestions please speak up, Hong Feng is listening ;-)
Cheers,
On Monday 03 December 2001 17:44, Loic Dachary wrote:
Hi,
Hong Feng (hongfeng@gnu.org) is working hard on the first issue of "Free Software Magazine", to be published in Jan 2002. It will be written in English (and probably also in Chinese since Hong Feng is chinese and lives in China ;-). There will be an online version and printed copies.
Hong Feng is looking for opportunities to distribute it in European countries. Advertisement could be inserted in the printed/online version, provided someone is able/willing to devote some time to this.
This is all I know of the current state of this magazine. Such a magazine would be really nice to have, IMHO. If you have questions, ideas or suggestions please speak up, Hong Feng is listening ;-)
Can we submit articles? What is the general content? Technical, strictly non-technical, philisophical, practical...? I know you said thats all you know, but I'll ask anyway :P
Dunno if you were wanting to charge for it or what, but if not you could get the first issue to be put inside one of the linux magazins - I doubt you would be stepping in their turf :)
JohnFlux
Cheers,
Can we submit articles? What is the general content? Technical, strictly non-technical, philisophical, practical...? I know you said thats all you know, but I'll ask anyway :P
Welcome you submit articles for Free Software Magazine!
This magazine is about our community, and it is belong to our community, it publishes articles to free softwre philosophy discussions, points and views, comments, feedbacks, background of free software projects, programming skills and tricks, market analyses... anything related with our community.
Note, though, before you submit, please have a look to our guidelines, pls pay a visit to http://www.rons.net.cn/english/FSM/issue01, if you have any question, pls drop me an email.
Dunno if you were wanting to charge for it or what, but if not you could get the first issue to be put inside one of the linux magazins - I doubt you would be stepping in their turf :)
There are 2 versions -- online web version and hard paper copies.
Most of the articles of Free Software Magazine are under GNU FDL license, some are using freely verbatim copy and redistributable as long as the copyright notice reserved.
For your interest of put it inside another magazine, I think there is no legal problem to do so as long as the carrier magazine obey the same license requirement.
We do want to charge for the paper copies, all the subscription fees will be used for pay our columnists and suport MNM Project (MNM's Not Millions), i.e. to support our free software community.
But we've promised, the cost will be kept at a low level, so that all hackers in the world (including those in the world poor countries like Viet Nam, India, China...) could afford it too.
Best, Frederic
On Tue, Dec 04, 2001 at 03:02:19PM +0800, Hong Feng wrote:
This magazine is about our community, and it is belong to our community, it publishes articles to free softwre philosophy discussions, points and views, comments, feedbacks, background of free software projects, programming skills and tricks, market analyses... anything related with our community.
the free softare hackers are usually quite well informed about all the issues, infos around free software. IMO a magazine should more focus on reaching the typical users (who read magazines) and provide them with solid information about free software. The FSM should be an instrument to communicate to others rather then to ourselves.
A free software magazine is missing since all the Linux magazines turn to proprietary products more and more. Most appear not capable to explain free software, some authors even have not understood the concept.
Jan
Jan-Oliver Wagner writes:
A free software magazine is missing since all the Linux magazines turn to proprietary products more and more.
Is this referring to the copyright of the magazines themselves or the fact that most of them report often approvingly popular proprietary software that happens to run on GNU/Linux, such as kylix, oracle, netscape communic.?
Most appear not capable to explain free software, some authors even have not understood the concept.
That's especially dangerous in comments about lets say the MS Fud against GPL. Some 'Linux' Magazines respond to this by praising companies whose business partly consists of trickily proprietarized distribution of free software, using euphemisms like 'value added'.
Klaus Schilling
On Tue, Dec 04, 2001 at 08:35:30AM +0100, Klaus Schilling wrote:
Jan-Oliver Wagner writes:
A free software magazine is missing since all the Linux magazines turn to proprietary products more and more.
Is this referring to the copyright of the magazines themselves or the fact that most of them report often approvingly popular proprietary software that happens to run on GNU/Linux, such as kylix, oracle, netscape communic.?
I meant the reports on proprietary products. While it is unavoidable for the magazines to mention such products, it is more and more the case that for a product type proprietary solutions are presented and good free software product are neglected in the list.
Another important point is that proprietary products are not identified as such when reporting on them. A good example was the VShop article in a recent issue of the German Linux Magazine. Some people might believe now that VShop is Free Software and that it is the best of the Free Software solutions.
Jan
Moin!
Jan-Oliver Wagner wrote:
the free softare hackers are usually quite well informed about all the issues, infos around free software.
My experience as editor of a weekly news report is that many people can't stay up with everything which is going on there. It's just too much. I often get reports from people who like to thank me for our summaries -- and this is only for one large project, we don't cover the entire free software universe.
Hence, I believe a free software magazine could be appreciated by a lot of hackers as well, if it is produced and delivered properly[1].
IMO a magazine should more focus on reaching the typical users (who read magazines) and provide them with solid information about free software. The FSM should be an instrument to communicate to others rather then to ourselves.
A free software magazine is missing since all the Linux magazines turn to proprietary products more and more. Most appear not capable to explain free software, some authors even have not understood the concept.
(GNU/)Linux-Gazette comes to my mind. Then again, I haven't read it yet. However, afaik it was a community effort.
Regards,
Joey
[1] to be discussed and decided :)