You are writing this as an April Fool thing, arenĄ¨t you ?

----- Original Message -----
From: "Benjamin J. Tilly" <ben_tilly / operamail.com>
To: "ruby-talk ML" <ruby-talk / ruby-lang.org>
Sent: Sunday, April 01, 2001 12:25 PM
Subject: [ruby-talk:13417] RE: ActiveState Ruby?


> >===== Original Message From "Daniel Berger" <djberg96 / hotmail.com> =====
> >Hi all,
> >
> >I would really like to see an ActiveState Ruby and it could happen with
your
> >help.  Why?  Free advertising.  I think one of the reasons for Python's
> >growing popularity is the fact that ActiveState has a Python distribution
> >(the other reason being O'Reilly).  If ActiveState were to create a Ruby
> >distribution, it would help "get the word out" regarding Ruby *and*
create
> >an easy, *supported*, installation package.  Ruby would become more
popular,
> >gain more adherents, more contributions would be made to the RAA,
O'Reilly
> >publishers (and others) would be more likely to publish books on Ruby,
etc,
> >etc.
>
> I wouldn't.
>
> And frankly I am saddened that people would.
>
> >If you agree, please send an email to:  Support / ActiveState.com, and
express
> >to them how you would like to see an ActiveState Ruby distribution.
> >
> >If not, well then, ignore this message and move on!
>
> How about I instead explain why I don't want this?
>
> There is persistent speculation in the Perl world that
> ActiveState has done a lot to pollute the development process.
> Whether or not that is true (I have heard stuff which is
> suggestive both ways) it is unquestionable that their
> desire is to make themselves the definitive source of all
> things Perl/Python, and to provide that in binary format.
>
> While I support having easy binary distributions available, I
> dislike intiatives to try to make people depend on binary
> distributions.  The entire point of open source (and many of
> the benefits) are lost when people are not encouraged to have
> and use the source.
>
> ActiveState in particular is a company that I distrust.  I am
> sure that as Ruby grows, they will show up.  But it won't be
> something that I particularly look forward to.  And if they
> start their usual games of compiling patched sources with
> specific compilers and not letting people know what the
> patches are, well I understand why they do that but I don't
> like it.  Not One Bit.
>
> Nor do I trust the size of the investment that Microsoft has
> made in them.  Call me paranoid, but I have to wonder to what
> extent Microsoft has decided on ActiveState as a way to
> address the ways in which open source is challenging their
> business model...
>
> Cheers,
> Ben
>