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Date:      Tue, 28 Feb 1995 16:01:25 -0800
From:      "Jordan K. Hubbard" <jkh@freefall.cdrom.com>
To:        terry@cs.weber.edu (Terry Lambert)
Cc:        phk@ref.tfs.com (Poul-Henning Kamp), nate@trout.sri.mt.net, davidg@Root.COM, freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.org
Subject:   Re: Binary compatibility with NetBSDk 
Message-ID:  <22300.794016085@freefall.cdrom.com>
In-Reply-To: Your message of "Tue, 28 Feb 95 15:27:43 MST." <9502282227.AA09199@cs.weber.edu> 

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> only reason they were arrived at is that the real issue,
> editorial control, had to remain unvoiced so the damn thing
> dragged on long enough for a subtle difference (one that could
> be voiced) to be found.

Well then.  Why don't we all just settle for cutting to the chase and
saying that Terry's essentially right - the REAL reasons we don't
merge have nothing to do with technical or market-direction
differences.  It's all about control.

We're all a bunch of control freaks who really don't want the folks
doing NetBSD telling us what to do and we'll savagely block any
attempt to bring about another state of affairs.

There.  Now I've finally said it.  Admitted it to the world even!  All
those NetBSD and FreeBSD people reading this mailing list finally know
that we've kept the world divided for petty, personal reasons!  And
you know what?  I'm not even joking!  We *are* guilty of all the
charges I so freely admit to here.

But so what?  These are no longer the ONLY reasons, and it's also
purest fallacy to deny how ATTRACTIVE running your own show is!  Lots
of people currently here would NOT be here if they didn't feel like
they were doing their own thing with people they liked, and I'd be a
very poor "project manager" indeed if I suddenly decided that dogs and
cats SHOULD live together despite all warning indicators to the
contrary.

Unless someone can someday come up with a credible solution for THIS,
all else is pointless.  I've seen about 4 major attempts to find a
meeting point for the two groups and ALL of them have been technical
in nature.  This shouldn't be any surprise, I guess, given the nature
of the audience, but it still doesn't change the fact that technical
solutions are NOT WHAT'S NEEDED!

If a *BSD merge ever does happen, it won't be because someone like
yourself comes up with the most awesome technical reason to do so
ever.  It will be because an amazingly awesome MANAGER type comes
along who may know nothing at all about BSD but knows how to
manipulate people like nobody you ever saw.

This is not a technical problem.  This is a human factors problem.
You lack the necessary skills to solve this one, engineer, so probably
best just to leave it alone!

					Jordan



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