[kde-community] finding a clear vision for KDE - second draft for discussion

[Alexander Neundorf]

On Sunday, February 28, 2016 23:59:12 Ingo Klöcker wrote:
> On Saturday 27 February 2016 21:29:10 Alexander Neundorf wrote:
...
> > The user still depends on the company to continue the product, to not
> > change the terms and conditions, etc.
> > The user still is forced to use a device where the software runs, and
> > has lost if the app is e.g. not ported to the new mobile OS of the
> > day, to some new processor, etc.
> > To me, this is not satisfying.
> > 
> > Or, IOW, the technology should be available similar to how pen and
> > paper are available today - very cheap, not dependent on a single
> > company, notes written today will be still readable in 100 years, the
> > knowledge how to create them is no secret, etc.
> > 
> > Does that make clearer what I mean.
> 
> IMO, WhatsApp cannot give its users control over their digital life
> precisely for the reasons you write above. The user is a WhatsApp's
> mercy. This is the exact opposite of user control. The user's digital
> life is under the control of WhatsApp. They can delete the user's
> digital life whenever they want to.

yes, that's the problem I see.
I just think that this is not very clearly expressed by "have control", it 
needs some interpretation and may be considered a bit far fetched by some.
Devils advovate: _in the moment_ a user is using the app, and the provider 
doesn't change its conditions, the user can indeed be in full control.
I guess many proprietary software vendors will argue this way. I might even do 
so for the stuff I do at work: we try to make our users as much in control of 
their data in our application as possible, and the users even have the chance 
to influence the future development of our application. But still they depend 
on us that we continue to do what we do.

Can we express the "not be at the mercy of some company" clearer than "have 
full control" ?

Alex