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On Dienstag, 3. Juli 2007, Grant wrote: |
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> In December 2006 I started a thread titled "Is Gentoo Healthy?" in |
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> which I was roundly put down for raising the possibility that the |
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> decline in the number of Gentoo users could possibly affect the |
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> remaining Gentoo users in a negative way. |
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no. |
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gentoo was for a while the exciting new kid. And everybody flocked to it. |
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Especially 'ricers'. The 'decline' you observed is more of a pruning - the |
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type of users who always use the latest 'distri of the month' are gone, also |
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the users who really do not fit in but used gentoo because it was cool for a |
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while. |
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Every distro has that moment - ubuntu will suffer from that too. |
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> |
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> Is everyone still toeing that line? The Gentoo Weekly Newsletter |
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> hasn't been published in almost two months. |
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that is a completly different problem ;) |
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> Is Gentoo destined to be |
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> just another distro starved for contributors and struggling to stay up |
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> to date? |
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hm, couple of new devs in the last two weeks. What was your question? |
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> If so, I really misjudged it. The meta approach of Gentoo |
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> is superior to any other in my mind, and I think it's growth and |
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> potential are being stunted by the "we don't need them" attitude which |
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> perpetuates Gentoo's lack of usability features for beginners. |
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why should a beginner WANT to use gentoo? To get his hands dirty without being |
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forced to, he can start with a much more 'beginner friendly' distro. |
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There is no reason nor need to dumb down gentoo to fit everybody. |
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> |
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> Gentoo needs as many users as possible to reach its potential. |
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no. It really does not. The opposite is true. Gentoo does not need to become |
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another dumb 'userfriendly' distro - there are hundreds of them already. It |
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does not need the 'I don't want to learn anything' or 'I don't read |
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documentation' type of user. It does not need the standard-ubuntu-dau that |
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askeds the same stupid (stupid because it is explained in a sticky topic on |
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top of the forum) question again and again and again, because he is too lazy |
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to read an existing thread or use the search feature (look into the nvnews |
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forum for an example). |
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Gentoo needs users who want to use gentoo for its technical merits, not |
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because it is is 'cool'. We lost the 'cool distro of the month' users and it |
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was a good thing. |
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> It's a |
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> short-sighted mistake to think that non-contributing users do Gentoo |
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> no good. Non-contributing users become contributors as time passes. |
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> Car mechanics all start as car drivers. |
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There are users and users. There are users who try to help in mailing lists |
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and forums and file bugs. There are users who help fellow gentoo users among |
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their friends. |
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And there are the ones who do nothing at all -except complaining if something |
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does not work (even if it is their own fault). |
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Gentoo needs the first kind of users - and I would go so far to say, that it |
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got them. Gentoo does NOT need the second kind - and we lost a lot of them. |
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I call that win-win. |
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-- |
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