:: Re: [DNG] Educating people (Was: On…
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Szerző: Simon Hobson
Dátum:  
Címzett: dng
Tárgy: Re: [DNG] Educating people (Was: One week into Devuan 2.0 ASCII -- Some stats)
KatolaZ <katolaz@???> wrote:

>>> Of course they are, it's all over the Internet.
>>
>> Being pedantic, that’s not the same - and you **should** know that.
>> IMO there’s a choice to be made - do we (collectively) want to be inclusive and support all those who don’t know much about computing but want to try an alternative to Mac/Windows; or do we (collectively) want to stay elitist and show an attitude that “people should know these things” ?
>
> [cut]
>
> Unfortunately, there is no middle-ground here. We have been telling
> people for years that running proprietary software is potentially
> harmful for their privacy and security. The result is that 98% (and
> maybe more) of all the CPUs on this planet run a proprietary operating
> system with proprietary software.

<other examples deleted>

I think you missed the point.

All I’m suggesting is that on the download page there are the AMD64 images first, then a note giving very basic suggestions not to use i[3-6]86 images unless you need to AND PROVIDE LINKS TO SOME GOOD WRITEUPS. It’s not trying to force people to do anything - just give them a pointer to information that (apparently) quite a few people aren’t aware of.

There’s an analogy with a situation where I used to work. The authorities created a new one-way system that turned the road past our office into one of the main ways out of town. Most of us think it was a stupid move, and it certainly made getting out of the office car park a PITA at peak times - not to mention the hazard of trying to cross as a pedestrian.
But even after several years, we still got people going the wrong way - quite frequently. A colleague made it his mission and kept petering the local highways department sending them lots of photos, even catching up with some of the drivers (seeing where they went and popping out to speak to them) and finding out the reason for their mistake. At first, the authorities just kept repeating that the signage was there - so it’s all the drivers’ fault for not seeing the signs.
They were in the same state as some people on this “tell people or not tell them” discussion - the information is around to be seen, it’s not our responsibility to make any allowance for people not having seen it. The fundamental issue was that the signage was designed by people who knew about the one way system - and shared the same problem shared with direction signs designed by people who know the local area. At one junction, yes there’s a sign, but it not at the right height to be in the driver’s eyeline, and it’s not where they would be looking if their intention is to turn the wrong way - so it didn’t get seen
Eventually the highways department relented - made some of the signs bigger and put some “NO ENTRY” painted signs on the road surfaces. Guess what - in spite of the previous signage supposedly being quite adequate, the incidence of people going the wrong way dropped from several per week (sometimes several in a day) to perhaps as little as one/month. Just to prove the point, someone knocked down the lamp post one sign was attached to, and the incidence of people going the wrong way went up again for the very long time (many months) before the lamp post was replaced and the sign re-instated.

So people can keep complaining that others are missing information that’s “all there to be seen”, or add a one-liner along the lines of “BTW - had you missed this ?"