How Name Calling can hurt Open Source.
I have been using opensource software for quite some time now. And goes without saying that I spent my fair share of time reading through community forums and blogs related to the software I use. And in all of the sites i went to, there is always a selected few who namecalls alternatives. For example, I browse a linux community forum and i find some posts wherein members “poke fun” of Microsft and Microsoft Windows (calling them Windoze, Microsucks - you get the picture). Why all the namecalling? isnt this some kind of habit preschoolers do?
Well I personally know two people who has this habit of name calling Microsoft in the forums and I do understand why they have that attitude, its their past experience with the MS products that pissed them off. Now, I am sure that a lot of people would say “im just expressing myself” and for that I respect them. But how about we look at this from a different point of view?
Don’t you think that all this namecalling can negatively affect your favorite open source software’s visibility / image on the Internet? Here are two ways namecalling can affect Open source software.
Namecalling can project a level of childishness. Granted not all communities do this but project leader of opensource software or forum moderators encouraging this type of behavior only shows the attitude of these leaders about the other alternatives. A mature open source community will always respect other people’s work even if it sucks big time.
Missed Opportunity in Terms of SEO - For those of you who knows a little a bit of Search Engine Optimization (SEO), namecalling (read: misspelling) other products make you miss opportunities to target these keywords. For example, if your group is dicussing about “Windoze Alternatives” you are missing the opportunity to reach to people who are looking for “Windows Alternatives” in the search engines.
So what do I suggest? Well there is the Golder Rule to follow. But this is just me. What do you think?
Leave your response!