Re: [Fsfe-uk] BBC trial of embedded Flash video

[Ciaran O'Riordan]

Jon Grant <address@hidden> writes:
> GNU supporting Adobe's Flash format is a shame.

The goal of the GNU project is to make it as easy as possible for people to
choose to never use non-free software.  This means we need free software to
do the jobs that people use their computers for.

> If I were them, I would
> have put all my effort into

This is where campaigns differ from corporate initiatives.  When a
corporation starts an initiative, they know how much resources they have.
With campaigns, you're relying on external support, and you can't predict
what that will amount to.

On this issue, both approaches were tried.

Gnash is the GNU project to develop a free Flash player.  Surprisingly, its
developers have raised ten million euro in funding for it's development.  So
this effort has been more effective than any planner could have predicted.

For the other approach, FSF have launched http://playogg.org

> GNU don't promote Word
> documents now that OOo has great support for the file-format:
> http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/no-word-attachments.html

True, and I don't think they will ever promote Flash either.

-- 
Ciarán O'Riordan __________________ \ http://fsfeurope.org/projects/gplv3
http://ciaran.compsoc.com/ _________ \  GPLv3 and other work supported by
http://fsfe.org/fellows/ciaran/weblog \   Fellowship: http://www.fsfe.org