Hackers and filkers

[mdlbear]

After reading this article at Linux.com titled "The FOSS community makes new users feel welcome", I was struck by how similar it is to the fannish and filkish community.

After being semi-comfortably ensconced in the world of Microsoft products since the days of Windows 3.0, I recently joined the growing ranks of people who realize the value in switching to open source software. What surprised me most about changing operating systems wasn't the myriad of different Linux distributions (how refreshing) nor the vast control they give users over their systems (what liberation). No, what surprised me most was how friendly and welcoming the open source community has been.
[...]
In every chat room, mailing list, and forum -- almost without exception -- my questions and comments have been received with patience, grace, and humor. I doubt I would be alone in saying that the friendly assistance I've received across the board has been the saving grace during some rather trying installation difficulties I've encountered in recent weeks.

See what I mean?

Comments

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

Ummm, yeah... having been a Penguinista long before I was a filker, that's part of it. There started out being a certain amount of elitism, but along about 1999 folks realized this stuff was for real and there was a shot at World Domination if we were *nice* about it... thus began the installfests, the wide-open mailing lists, LUGs, etc...

Fandom and the Open Source movement are both about the freedom of ideas. The attitudes simply follow; they have to, for the movements to flourish.

(And, yeah, I heartily encourage cross-pollination.)

[mithriltabby]

Just don’t try contributing to Cygwin...