lobby-buddy was: Re: [fab] Pimping Fluendo for MP3 support

[David Malcolm]

On Wed, 2006-05-17 at 11:59 -0400, Greg DeKoenigsberg wrote:
> On Wed, 17 May 2006, Jeremy Katz wrote:
> 
> > > What if there were a big link on the default desktop that said "Do you 
> > > want MP3?"  And then the user clicks on a link, and the link tells a 
> > > story.
> > 
> > Frankly, I don't think they'll read it.  Which is a shame, but I don't
> > know how to change habits of users which have existed since the dawn of
> > time.  
> 
> We'll lose 100% of the users we don't try to convince.  If we want to
> educate people, and maybe change their minds, then we need to fight for 
> it.
> 
> We say we want to be pure -- but 95% of the people who could be using 
> Fedora don't know or don't care about that purity.
> 
> > And I also don't think that cluttering the desktop is the way forward (I
> > also expect that cluttering the desktop would be met with cries of anger
> > and pitchforks from the maintainers of the desktop ;)
> 
> Yeah, you're probably right.  So maybe it's a default helper app; when you 
> try to play an MP3, it opens up a Firefox page telling the story and 
> pointing to Fluendo.
> 
For a while I've been toying with the idea of an analogue to
"bug-buggy" (the app that pops up when something crashes that lates you
report bugs) called "lobby-buddy", which would pop up every time a user
tries to do something for which we can't redistribute Free software.  It
could look up the user's address in evolution-data-server, figure out
their elected representative and language, and generate a letter for
them to print out, sign, and send, explaining what the problem is (since
I believe written communication has more weight with politicians that
email)

Dave