Subject: New Essay: "Why Closed Books are So 19th Century"

From: Shlomi Fish <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2008 17:57:07 +0300

Hi all!

See:

http://www.shlomifish.org/philosophy/philosophy/closed-books-are-so-19th-century/

for a new essay I've written that tries to convince authors to make everything 
they write publically available online (without registration, payment, etc.).

I mention Perl and Ruby there specifically.

Regards,

	Shlomi Fish

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Shlomi Fish       http://www.shlomifish.org/
Funny Anti-Terrorism Story - http://xrl.us/bjn7t

The bad thing about hardware is that it sometimes works and sometimes doesn't.
The good thing about software is that it's consistent: it always does not
work, and it always does not work in exactly the same way.

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From: "Amit Aronovitch" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2008 19:39:58 +0300

Did not read the whole thing, but what are your opinions regarding
"temporarily closed" books, like the "World Price" method used by
Travis Oliphant for the numpy book?

http://www.tramy.us
http://www.tramy.us/FAQ.html

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From: Shlomi Fish <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2008 21:42:51 +0300

> http://www.tramy.us/FAQ.html

Doesn't seem like something I'd approve of. Books should be made available 
online soon after the publication. It is possible to give some time for the 
book to be successful commercially (a few months or so) before making it 
publically available. But the "temporarily" closed model that Travis Oliphant 
proposes (while carrying licence restrictions) is not much better than 
all-the-way closed books.

Regards,

	Shlomi Fish

> > for a new essay I've written that tries to convince authors to make
> > everything they write publically available online (without registration,
> > payment, etc.).
> >

-- 
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Shlomi Fish       http://www.shlomifish.org/
"The Human Hacking Field Guide" - http://xrl.us/bjn8q