Controversy Arises Over SPI Project, Fighting With Elementary OS

[eidolon]

I happened to find an old interview Bryan Lunduke did with Daniel For?. 1:20-21:20 covers the financial side. In addition to "servers, merch to resell, and occasionally conference/travel costs and development hardware" and taxes, at least some of the money goes to https://www.bountysource.com/teams/elementary/bounties. 32:30-37:00 focuses on bounties specifically.

[emblemparade]

This is actually a case of both sides being right.

Joshua Drake (SPI director) was behaving a bit childishly: if ElementaryOS had agreed to join SPI, I'm sure he would never blog anything negative about them. It's only because they said no (and possibly answered arrogantly) that he decided to dig up some old complaints about them. It's a bit like asking someone out on a date (because you like them!), and then saying bad things about them online when they reject you.

But it's also true that there was some merit in the old complaints about ElementaryOS. Cassidy James of ElementaryOS made a blog post explaining the donation system. He, too, was behaving a bit childishly when he called people who type in "$0" "cheaters." He obviously got a lot of negative responses to that, and so changed the wording, though the attitude is still pretty much there: it's clear that he believes that people who use eOS (or any free software) should consider paying for it, even if it's just a little. Actually, that attitude is very widespread in the free (libre) software world. He just used really exaggerated wording originally!

I think eOS comes out better here: they made a mistake and quickly changed it. Mistakes happen. SPI is being very un-classy here because of sour grapes: why dig up a deleted word, and why do it when you get rejected for a business offer?