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I've suggested this before (and not done much about it), but that is not going to stop me suggesting it again. How about a crowd-sourced 'Siracusa style' revie

I've suggested this before (and not done much about it), but that is not going to stop me suggesting it again. How about a crowd-sourced 'Siracusa style' review of Ubuntu 12.04? Or Debian Wheezy, or Fedora (large integer, preferably 18 because that is the version that RHEL 7 will be based on)? Or the safe and conservative CentOS/SciLi/PUIAS version 6.3, now being targeted by Oracle. Or your favourite GNU/Linux, or BSD? So many of the free software reviews are shallow. I think the Penguins have done enough work to merit something with depth

keithpeter 14y ago
OK, upvotes are occurring, so what do we do? https://dl.dropbox.com/u/8403291/unityessay2.html https://dl.dropbox.com/u/8403291/unityessay2.html for an inadequate and partial outline for the 12.04/unity gui Challenge: put your suggestions/contributions on dropbox or githib or wherever and post here and I'll attempt a synthesis.
masklinn 14y ago
> How about a crowd-sourced 'Siracusa style' review I don't think a crowd-sourced review could ever be that, as it most likely won't be a cohesive work and will have a hard time finding talented writers (which I hold Siracusa to be). And will probably fail to balance the emphasis (at all) between features of differing importance and levels of interest. Furthermore, Siracusa's reviews are also the result of more than a decade of writing these things. Don't aim to write "Siracusa-style" reviews, aim to write in-depth reviews which are not complete dreck. That will probably work better. Or work at all, for that matter.
- keithpeter 14y ago
  "Don't aim to write "Siracusa-style" reviews, aim to write in-depth reviews which are not complete dreck. That will probably work better. Or work at all, for that matter" OK, challenge still stands, even this would be an improvement in what we see in Linux reviews
- JonnieCache 14y ago
  Maybe there could be a kickstarter to just pay Siracusa to write 26,000 words about ubuntu?
  - keithpeter 14y ago
    That is touching my open source nerve, the penguins ought to be able to assemble something like this themselves.
    - Tloewald 14y ago
      This is hilarious. Mythical man ymonth applied to writing. Let's crowd source some more Tolstoy novels while we're at it.
      - keithpeter 14y ago
        A review of a computer system is hardly a major work of art. Brooks' n(n+1)/2 won't kick in until we exceed five or ten people I think.
  - alexwlchan 14y ago
    Even if you could raise the money, I doubt that he would do it, or that it would be comparable to his OS X articles. If you listen to Hypercritical (his weekly 5by5 podcast), you'll have heard that he struggles just getting the OS X reviews out the door. Since Apple is trying to move to a yearly release cycle, that’s just going to get harder. When’s he going to get the time to write an Ubuntu review? It’s also worth considering that, “He has been a Mac user since 1984” (from his Ars bio). Part of what makes his reviews so good is his deep-rooted knowledge of the Mac platform, and having watched OS X (and previous versions of Mac OS) “grow up”, so to speak. I don’t know how much experience he has with Ubuntu, but I bet it’s not as extensive as OS X. And that’s putting aside all the arguments of whether it’s a good thing to do, or whether the Ubuntu community would want him to write such a thing.
- Tloewald 14y ago
  A crowd sourced review for a crowd sourced user experience.
rat87 14y ago
They (Ars) did a massive in depth review of gimp 2.6 including fair positive and negative points. Now that gimp is finally close to getting 16 bit mode after all these years(in the upcoming 2.10 release) it would be cool if they could do a followup. http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2009/01/gimp-2-6-review/ http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2009/01/gimp-2... Suite freedom: a review of GIMP 2.6.4 Ars brings you a massive, in-depth review of one of the most popular cross- …

keithpeter 14y ago

OK, upvotes are occurring, so what do we do? https://dl.dropbox.com/u/8403291/unityessay2.html https://dl.dropbox.com/u/8403291/unityessay2.html for an inadequate and partial outline for the 12.04/unity gui Challenge: put your suggestions/contributions on dropbox or githib or wherever and post here and I'll attempt a synthesis.

masklinn 14y ago

> How about a crowd-sourced 'Siracusa style' review I don't think a crowd-sourced review could ever be that, as it most likely won't be a cohesive work and will have a hard time finding talented writers (which I hold Siracusa to be). And will probably fail to balance the emphasis (at all) between features of differing importance and levels of interest. Furthermore, Siracusa's reviews are also the result of more than a decade of writing these things. Don't aim to write "Siracusa-style" reviews, aim to write in-depth reviews which are not complete dreck. That will probably work better. Or work at all, for that matter.

keithpeter 14y ago
"Don't aim to write "Siracusa-style" reviews, aim to write in-depth reviews which are not complete dreck. That will probably work better. Or work at all, for that matter" OK, challenge still stands, even this would be an improvement in what we see in Linux reviews
JonnieCache 14y ago
Maybe there could be a kickstarter to just pay Siracusa to write 26,000 words about ubuntu?
- keithpeter 14y ago
  That is touching my open source nerve, the penguins ought to be able to assemble something like this themselves.
  - Tloewald 14y ago
    This is hilarious. Mythical man ymonth applied to writing. Let's crowd source some more Tolstoy novels while we're at it.
    - keithpeter 14y ago
      A review of a computer system is hardly a major work of art. Brooks' n(n+1)/2 won't kick in until we exceed five or ten people I think.
- alexwlchan 14y ago
  Even if you could raise the money, I doubt that he would do it, or that it would be comparable to his OS X articles. If you listen to Hypercritical (his weekly 5by5 podcast), you'll have heard that he struggles just getting the OS X reviews out the door. Since Apple is trying to move to a yearly release cycle, that’s just going to get harder. When’s he going to get the time to write an Ubuntu review? It’s also worth considering that, “He has been a Mac user since 1984” (from his Ars bio). Part of what makes his reviews so good is his deep-rooted knowledge of the Mac platform, and having watched OS X (and previous versions of Mac OS) “grow up”, so to speak. I don’t know how much experience he has with Ubuntu, but I bet it’s not as extensive as OS X. And that’s putting aside all the arguments of whether it’s a good thing to do, or whether the Ubuntu community would want him to write such a thing.
Tloewald 14y ago
A crowd sourced review for a crowd sourced user experience.

rat87 14y ago

They (Ars) did a massive in depth review of gimp 2.6 including fair positive and negative points. Now that gimp is finally close to getting 16 bit mode after all these years(in the upcoming 2.10 release) it would be cool if they could do a followup. http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2009/01/gimp-2-6-review/ http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2009/01/gimp-2... Suite freedom: a review of GIMP 2.6.4 Ars brings you a massive, in-depth review of one of the most popular cross- …