Further Updates on Firebird Naming DebateFriday April 25th, 2003Jonathan Walther of the Debian project has published a transcript of an interview with an anonymous Mozilla developer about the Firebird naming conflict. According to IBPhoenix, which is affiliated with the Firebird database project, Walther has offered to mediate in the dispute. IBPhoenix have also published their own update on the situation, apparently written by project administrator Ann Harrison. It would resolve this whole mess completely. Prog. Why don't just call it Mozilla X. Almost everything has an X in them these days. I could also be Mozilla X-Treme! Maybe someone would offer a brief explanation why an internal codename for a project went through a month-long trademark name check by AOL legal if it is indeed not going to be used to name the browser. Will 'Firebird' appear in the UA? On the splash screen? I see that this could have been posted to an earlier topic. So, AOL put a bunch of legal resources behind two internal codenames that will be tossed as soon as 1.5 comes out. Go figure. may be one day mozilla.org be like openoffice.org, a commericalized version would call as other product name? That might explain they are so eager to create another brand name. The same usual self-important, egotistic tone. Saying "trust me" when asked about an official announcement, which as Walther mentioned would clear up the whole mess, just shows what's wrong with many people at mozilla.org. Just because you've got a bunch of lawyers to look at months for two project names doesn't make you a big shot. It's only because you've got AOL Time Warner. "The same usual self-important, egotistic tone." Look at it this way: How else would you know that this anonymous person was really a Mozilla developer? :-) Unfortunately, nobody else seems willing to pickup the ball and develop Moz -- I know I'm not -- so I guess we have to live with the tone until someone does. I'll agree it does seem a bit detrimental to the project and pointless. BTW, the MD admits a certain browser is called Phoenix but claims this is because it was a side project that didn't push hard on naming. Yet if you look at the Release Notes, you'll know what really happened. Trying to explain it as an insignificant or non-official name is, again, dwarved by the months of investigations by AOL lawyers. It's why saying "trust me" doesn't help, besides the put-downs by many "official" developers on various forums whenever someone tries to argue an opposition view. I understood that the name phoenix that we all know and like was dropped because it was infringing on a trademark. Now we learn that such legislation doesn't extend to internal project names, which raises the interesting question what's so different about phoenix that it had to be changed to firebird but yet the the firebird name is somehow OK to keep infringing on. Either two different standards are being applied or the situation has changed and I haven't seen much evidence for that beyond some announcements. The name firebird seems to be replacing the phoenix name in the actual product. This extends to logo's, the name of the profile, the about screen, etc. #10 Confused? You will be after this episode of: SOAPby scorzonera Saturday April 26th, 2003 3:27 AM I'm glad to learn that the name of the browser and mail/news-client remains Mozilla. (I personally didn't like the names Firebird and Thunderbird at all.) What I do not understand is why all this confusion could go on for such a long time (comparatively speaking). The whole 'clarification' looks more like a cover-up then anything else, to me. I could be wrong, of course (and I don't mind if I am), but there are some elements in this 'affair' that not only created confusion with me, but certainly raised a proverbial eyebrow or two. But, Mozilla has build enough credit with me to let bye-gone's be bye-gone's. I just hope that this mess will be a valuable lesson for the Mozilla team concerning communications in general. Obviously, the Mozilla project has much more public attention and a higher profile now then it had in the early days. And this will only increase with time passing... Publishing information on the various aspects on the evolution of this awsome and fine Mozilla-project should therefor reflect this new position of public attention and carried out with much more care then ever before; that is, if the Mozilla-project wants to prevent future confusion and unnecessary obstructions or objections on it's plans for it's future development. I wish wisdom and good fortune to the Mozilla community. And a good PR department. ;-) #12 Re: Confused? You will be after this episode of: Sby bzbarsky Saturday April 26th, 2003 9:55 AM > What I do not understand is why all this confusion could go on for such a long time (comparatively speaking). Because all the people involved have day jobs (thus reducing the amount of time they can spend on the stupid naming issue), and the final names were still being debated when Asa made his "Firebird" announcement (why this announcement could not be held off until the final names were decided is beyond me). Why it lasted so long? Because the powers-that-be at mozilla.org decides to call everyone who disagrees a troll or someone with nothing better to do. The same happened when people complained for years about the splash screen. And I'd suggest they stop calling everyone trolls and flame-warriors. I can quote Kovu and lots of others who don't even bother to converse but rather say things like "give it up" or "no, we won't change it." Again, I point you to the MD in the interview, who when asked about making an official clarification, said only: "Trust me." Not exactly reassuring to me. If it is okay to steal another group's name (as long as we call it a code name) then Mozilla.org should return to calling its project Phoenix. If this is not the case then the claim that Firebird is only used as a codename is just propaganda to strenghten Mozilla.org's position in its attempt to rape the Firebird database project. To rape the FireBird database? Are you serious? how would that be benificial? Nothing to see here folks, just replying to a TROLL. I guess what people just don't get is FIREBIRD was the new name to give to the SIDE-PROJECT that was phoenix. I really doubt there would have been a Flame-War if it wasn't for the new RoadMap making Phx/FB more inportant. What people didn't realize is that once Focus shifted over to FIREBIRD, it would again be refered to as "Mozilla" (or oficially Mozilla Browser). True, this could have been made more clear for those who love to be trolls and flame-war. But this was clear to me from the start, it was even 'logical'. I do agree though, that while both Mozilla the Suite and Mozilla FireBird co-exist, the FireBird DB does have a right to complain. But what they need to think about, is the worth of doing this for what will only last a month or so. "this was clear to me from the start" Great, but it obviously wan't clear to most people. Why not clarify it sooner? >> True, this could have been made more clear for those who love to be trolls and flame-war. But this was clear to me from the start, it was even 'logical'. Like others have pointed out, it's not clear to most people, and certainly not logical. And I'd suggest you guys stop calling everyone trolls and flame-warriors. I can quote Kovu and lots of others who don't even bother to converse but rather say things like "give it up" or "no, we won't change it." Again, I point you to the MD in the interview, who when asked about making an official clarification, said only: "Trust me." They call people trolls because that is easier than proving Mozilla is right, or proving the "trolls" are wrong. Confuse everyone by rolling the "e" into an umlaut: phönix. Why didn't I think of that months ago... Don't get bad rep, call it FreeBird Browser, let FireBird be the database... |