Re: Proposal for an Emacs User Survey

[Richard Stallman]

[[[ To any NSA and FBI agents reading my email: please consider    ]]]
[[[ whether defending the US Constitution against all enemies,     ]]]
[[[ foreign or domestic, requires you to follow Snowden's example. ]]]

  > Since these discussions never lead to any useful or even practical
  > results, I wish people could stop trying convince one another on such
  > "on-topic" subjects.

People shouldn't bring up abstract questions here which are not
relevant to Emacs development decisions.  Please, everyone, don't
discuss such topics here.

But often nontechnical questions of our values and goals come up
precisely because they are pertinent to the paqctical decision at
hand.  Then these questions are on-topic for the list.  But they are
not questions of personal opinion if the GNU Project has a position on
them.

When people state assertions which conflict with GNU Project policies
or principles, we need to present an authoritative response.  I will
do that eventually, but I am typically more than a day behind.  Alfred
knows our policies and principles, and he often gets there long before
me.  That is useful.

But often his messages don't state that they are authoritative.  So
people may think he is just stating a personal opinion, and argue.

Alfred, when you state GNU Project policies and principles, perhaps
you should say explicitly that "This is the GNU Project's position?"
Also, could you refer to published statements of same?  That could
make your statements more effective.

-- 
Dr Richard Stallman
Chief GNUisance of the GNU Project (https://gnu.org)
Founder, Free Software Foundation (https://fsf.org)
Internet Hall-of-Famer (https://internethalloffame.org)