Hi Stef:

I yet have not clear how the consortium will work

Money will be collected, tasks will be defined and done. Money will pay an engineer (I hope) to do a lot of work that a lot of us do not have the time nor the knowledge to do: VM, VM cleaning, VM improving, compiler, UI frameworks, and a lot of other stuff. Companies participating will be able to attend meetings if they have the time and will and discuss the agenda points. The process will be open. For example, instantiations mentioned that they would like to participate and this is ok. So we will even accept other Smalltalk representants that pay their participation because we do not see them as competitors. (especially when Pharo create young and cool Smalltalkers that can get hired by larger companies). May be you should listen my interview because http://www.jarober.com/blog/blogView?showComments=true&printTitle=IM_29:_Pha...

and what will be the implicancies for the people (as me) that is using Pharo for some projects.

For people using pharo, they will have the possibility to get a better maintained system. Else nothing will change. You can be sure that you will not be forced to use another Smalltalks :). Just Pharo will continue to get better and better just faster. Users will also have the possibility to feel engaged in pharo by joining the consortium and paying a participation fee. We are discussing how much it should be and rates so that people with a low money do not pay more proportionally than others. We will discuss all that we the community. Right now we are looking for the ok of INRIA because it could open more doors. And Pharo success can help INRIA and us inside INRIA and Pharo via us if you see what I want to say. We are also looking at morale license. I like the idea that when I use something that I really like and save my day, I can put money on the table/or time. For example, when gemstone allows dale to work on metacello this is a contribution, when sven offers Zinc to the community while he could have kept it for him, this is a contribution. So a moral license is a license that let us get a bill for your accounting system, feel good and put money on software that you value. When I buy microsoft word (not a choice) I always feel ashamed that I cannot pay for the free software I used daily (for example the texshop environment I use: why because I would like it to get better and thank the guys for their job). A moral license allow you to do that. The key point of the consortium are the following ones: - structure the community. We need to get organized, strong, recognized.... (remember that we were part of the founders of the squeak foundation). Now we want to make it real :) - give a chance to make sure that if people like eliot are not available for Smalltalk we do not get our head stuck in the ground. So this is like death insurance: some people are afraid to talk about them and when they get crushed by a car their spouse can be in big mess. Personally if I die my family is covered and I do not think that I want to die tomorrow but I'm happy to think about potential problem. So the consortium is the way to secure our/your investment in Pharo. We want to be able to pay one engineer (igor for example) to improve it in addition to what we are doing. Sideline we hope to start a company around moose and software assessment and we want to give a chance to Pharo to get better and we need a structure that can deal with the money we would like to spend because we want to support effort because for our own business we need it better. Like everyday we go to buy our bread, the consortium should be a place where people can give money to support the community and its artefact. If we are only able to rely on people free time and willingness to get something done may be we should do something else. Now the consortium will not solve all our problems. But this is the first important step. Stef

Can you explain a bit more?

Thanks! Germán.

Hi, Think of the consortium as a combination between an insurance company and a charity center. If Pharo is important enough for you to not afford to lose it, you might want to ensure that this will be around for a while. So, you will create an insurance for it. You can also choose not to. If you are a hobbyist doing something, but you care for the cause, you might want to donate for your soul. You can also choose not to. The world will still be spinning either way, and the code will still be MIT. :) Cheers, Doru On 25 May 2011, at 22:52, Germán Arduino wrote:

Thanks for the explanation (and for the efforts).

I think that lot of these things have sense and are needed.

My main concern is about the license payments or not, if the people using Pharo will be forced to pay or will be a volunteer contribution.

Exist a very different universe of Pharo users (I mean hobbystic users, home users, professional users, occasional profesional users, open source users) and really I don't see very clearly how the consortium will collect money in a fair way depending of the budget, volunteer and possibilities of each person/company (More yet being Pharo MIT).

Cheers. Germán.

2011/5/25 Stéphane Ducasse <stephane.ducasse@inria.fr>:

...

...

Hi Stef:

I yet have not clear how the consortium will work

Money will be collected, tasks will be defined and done. Money will pay an engineer (I hope) to do a lot of work that a lot of us do not have the time nor the knowledge to do: VM, VM cleaning, VM improving, compiler, UI frameworks, and a lot of other stuff.

Companies participating will be able to attend meetings if they have the time and will and discuss the agenda points. The process will be open. For example, instantiations mentioned that they would like to participate and this is ok. So we will even accept other Smalltalk representants that pay their participation because we do not see them as competitors. (especially when Pharo create young and cool Smalltalkers that can get hired by larger companies).

May be you should listen my interview because http://www.jarober.com/blog/blogView?showComments=true&printTitle=IM_29:_Pha...

...

and what will be the implicancies for the people (as me) that is using Pharo for some projects.

For people using pharo, they will have the possibility to get a better maintained system. Else nothing will change. You can be sure that you will not be forced to use another Smalltalks :). Just Pharo will continue to get better and better just faster.

Users will also have the possibility to feel engaged in pharo by joining the consortium and paying a participation fee. We are discussing how much it should be and rates so that people with a low money do not pay more proportionally than others. We will discuss all that we the community. Right now we are looking for the ok of INRIA because it could open more doors. And Pharo success can help INRIA and us inside INRIA and Pharo via us if you see what I want to say.

We are also looking at morale license. I like the idea that when I use something that I really like and save my day, I can put money on the table/or time. For example, when gemstone allows dale to work on metacello this is a contribution, when sven offers Zinc to the community while he could have kept it for him, this is a contribution. So a moral license is a license that let us get a bill for your accounting system, feel good and put money on software that you value. When I buy microsoft word (not a choice) I always feel ashamed that I cannot pay for the free software I used daily (for example the texshop environment I use: why because I would like it to get better and thank the guys for their job). A moral license allow you to do that.

The key point of the consortium are the following ones: - structure the community. We need to get organized, strong, recognized.... (remember that we were part of the founders of the squeak foundation). Now we want to make it real :)

- give a chance to make sure that if people like eliot are not available for Smalltalk we do not get our head stuck in the ground. So this is like death insurance: some people are afraid to talk about them and when they get crushed by a car their spouse can be in big mess. Personally if I die my family is covered and I do not think that I want to die tomorrow but I'm happy to think about potential problem. So the consortium is the way to secure our/your investment in Pharo. We want to be able to pay one engineer (igor for example) to improve it in addition to what we are doing.

Sideline we hope to start a company around moose and software assessment and we want to give a chance to Pharo to get better and we need a structure that can deal with the money we would like to spend because we want to support effort because for our own business we need it better.

Like everyday we go to buy our bread, the consortium should be a place where people can give money to support the community and its artefact. If we are only able to rely on people free time and willingness to get something done may be we should do something else. Now the consortium will not solve all our problems. But this is the first important step.

Stef

...

Can you explain a bit more?

Thanks! Germán.

-- www.tudorgirba.com "There are no old things, there are only old ways of looking at them."

On May 25, 2011, at 10:52 PM, Germán Arduino wrote:

Thanks for the explanation (and for the efforts).

I think that lot of these things have sense and are needed.

My main concern is about the license payments or not, if the people using Pharo will be forced to pay or will be a volunteer contribution.

nobody will be forced to do anything. :)

Exist a very different universe of Pharo users (I mean hobbystic users, home users, professional users, occasional profesional users, open source users) and really I don't see very clearly how the consortium will collect money in a fair way depending of the budget, volunteer and possibilities of each person/company (More yet being Pharo MIT).

Simple. do you think that the metallica tickets are expensive but you still want to get in or not. Same here except that metallica does not have to be that expensive. Personally I saw them several times but when they started to have too much dollars in their eyes I stopped. So fairness is not the objective, we should find a way that people are ok to contribute and that it makes sense. Now seriously what I imagine (just writing a bit now about it) The goal is to collect around 55Keuros and to ask INRIA if this is possible to backup in case where we do not succeed. Companies size / country = a price (we may get some prices but not too many) for 3000 Euros as a startup entry for a large company Europe/US and cheaper for countries where the change is bad 1000 for smaller company Individual: may be something like 100 Euros students or a free membership for individual. Research groups: Core: 500 Euros Member: 200 Euros After we have the moral license. All in all this is a challenge. We should find 30 companies willing to pay 2000 Euros or all the other combinations. Stef

Cheers. Germán.

2011/5/25 Stéphane Ducasse <stephane.ducasse@inria.fr>:

...

...

Hi Stef:

I yet have not clear how the consortium will work

Money will be collected, tasks will be defined and done. Money will pay an engineer (I hope) to do a lot of work that a lot of us do not have the time nor the knowledge to do: VM, VM cleaning, VM improving, compiler, UI frameworks, and a lot of other stuff.

Companies participating will be able to attend meetings if they have the time and will and discuss the agenda points. The process will be open. For example, instantiations mentioned that they would like to participate and this is ok. So we will even accept other Smalltalk representants that pay their participation because we do not see them as competitors. (especially when Pharo create young and cool Smalltalkers that can get hired by larger companies).

May be you should listen my interview because http://www.jarober.com/blog/blogView?showComments=true&printTitle=IM_29:_Pha...

...

and what will be the implicancies for the people (as me) that is using Pharo for some projects.

For people using pharo, they will have the possibility to get a better maintained system. Else nothing will change. You can be sure that you will not be forced to use another Smalltalks :). Just Pharo will continue to get better and better just faster.

Users will also have the possibility to feel engaged in pharo by joining the consortium and paying a participation fee. We are discussing how much it should be and rates so that people with a low money do not pay more proportionally than others. We will discuss all that we the community. Right now we are looking for the ok of INRIA because it could open more doors. And Pharo success can help INRIA and us inside INRIA and Pharo via us if you see what I want to say.

We are also looking at morale license. I like the idea that when I use something that I really like and save my day, I can put money on the table/or time. For example, when gemstone allows dale to work on metacello this is a contribution, when sven offers Zinc to the community while he could have kept it for him, this is a contribution. So a moral license is a license that let us get a bill for your accounting system, feel good and put money on software that you value. When I buy microsoft word (not a choice) I always feel ashamed that I cannot pay for the free software I used daily (for example the texshop environment I use: why because I would like it to get better and thank the guys for their job). A moral license allow you to do that.

The key point of the consortium are the following ones: - structure the community. We need to get organized, strong, recognized.... (remember that we were part of the founders of the squeak foundation). Now we want to make it real :)

- give a chance to make sure that if people like eliot are not available for Smalltalk we do not get our head stuck in the ground. So this is like death insurance: some people are afraid to talk about them and when they get crushed by a car their spouse can be in big mess. Personally if I die my family is covered and I do not think that I want to die tomorrow but I'm happy to think about potential problem. So the consortium is the way to secure our/your investment in Pharo. We want to be able to pay one engineer (igor for example) to improve it in addition to what we are doing.

Sideline we hope to start a company around moose and software assessment and we want to give a chance to Pharo to get better and we need a structure that can deal with the money we would like to spend because we want to support effort because for our own business we need it better.

Like everyday we go to buy our bread, the consortium should be a place where people can give money to support the community and its artefact. If we are only able to rely on people free time and willingness to get something done may be we should do something else. Now the consortium will not solve all our problems. But this is the first important step.

Stef

...

Can you explain a bit more?

Thanks! Germán.

Thanks a lot for your trust! For us, we receive that as gift and responsibility. We feel honored. If was never and will never be a question of ego or power. What I learned is that when you really want something to happen the best thing to do is to do it. May be people will join and you will have fun. At the minimum you will not get frustrated not to have dare to do it. We did that with ESUG, Squeak and Pharo. so there is a pattern :) Stef On May 25, 2011, at 9:56 PM, Michael Forster wrote:

On Wed, May 25, 2011 at 1:37 PM, Stéphane Ducasse <stephane.ducasse@inria.fr> wrote:

...

Hi pharoers

yesterday we got a meeting with INRIA people and we discussed the creation of an INRIA consortium. We will follow the INRIA process and propose officially the creation. For that we will have to present a proposal by end of June so we will do it. I would like to see the consortium taking life by end of the year and there are still some work to be done there.

Stef

This is great news, Stef! Thank you for your continuing efforts toward this. My company agrees with all the goals you've stated for the consortium, and we'll be there to participate.

Mike