Comment 213 for bug 269656

Mark,

On Mon, Sep 15, 2008 at 2:25 PM, Mark Shuttleworth <email address hidden> wrote:
> I agree that Ubuntu needs to reflect the values of the broader
> community, and decisions that are taken without a transparent community
> process undermine that. At the same time, Ubuntu needs to be able to
> engage effectively with companies that don't - and can't - operate
> transparently. And we sometimes need to engage confidentially in order
> to achieve our public goals.

Of course that's true. I hope that in my comment above I made it clear
that confidentiality is sometimes justifiable. Indeed, the Ubuntu
project itself has a number of procedures which exist to respect
confidentiality.

> For example, at the moment, we're in detailed negotiations with a
> company that makes a lot of popular hardware to release their drivers as
> free software - they are currently proprietary.

Good news!

> In this case, we have been holding extensive, sensitive and complex
> conversations with Mozilla.

Obviously, it's impossible to have a complex and sensitive
conversation with an entire community, and it's totally appropriate
that this was carried out by leaders in the project. That said, there
is a difference between having that conversation, and then taking a
decision which is internal to the Ubuntu project (i.e. what browser to
ship). The first can be done sensitively, and the second can be done
transparently.

> we have senior representatives of the project participating
> in the dialogue and examining options for the implementation of those
> agreements. Me. Matt Zimmerman. Colin Watson.

That's very reassuring to know (not that I doubted it). My concern was
more that the issue had not been communicated as well as it could have
been - there was always going to be an outpour of opinion over this
issue, so it is best to confront that head on.