Students Of Success

“I will lie with my forefathers, and you shall carry me out of
Egypt, and you shall bury me in their grave.” And he (Joseph)
said, “I will do as you say.” And he (Jacob) said , “Swear to
me.” So he swore to him, and Israel prostrated himself on the
head of the bed. (Bereishit - Chapter 47: 30,31)

The Ramban states: Jacob did not suspect that his righteous and
beloved son would disobey his father’s command and renege on the
matter, which he had promised him. Rather Jacob spoke in order
to strengthen the matter in the eyes of Pharaoh, as perhaps he
might not give Joseph permission to leave him… It may be, that
Pharaoh would want the prophet (Jacob) to be buried in his
country as an honor and privilege to them. It was for this
reason that he made him swear, for then it would not be proper
for him to force Joseph to violate his oath. Joseph too would
feel more obligated to fulfill his father’s wish on account of
the oath.’ Such indeed was the case, as Pharaoh said, Go up, and
bury thy father, as he made you swear.

The question on the Ramban is: Why did Joseph need an oath to
feel “more obligated”? Joseph already stated, “I will do as you
say”. Yet we can infer from the end of the Ramban that if Joseph
did not swear he may not have had the fortitude to defy Pharaoh.
Let’s not forget that this was Jacob’s final wish on his
deathbed. Is there any doubt that Joseph would not do everything
in is power to succeed at his father’s final command?

Rav Henach Leibowitz explains that the oath served to give
Joseph the extra energy and push he needed to fulfill the wish
of his father. It is the quality of responsibility which opens
up new and inconceivable possibilities to succeed. Jacob wanted
to make sure that Joseph would have the special abilities of
someone who “must succeed.”

The amazing thing about this is that it is the responsibility
itself which releases the potential to get the job done. This
also means that many failures may have nothing to do with waning
abilities but are simply caused by a lack of care and
responsibly.

Application:

Make of list of two areas of your life where you feel you are
failing. Write down some notes on how you can take more
responsibility in these areas. Complete these sentence stems:

To really succeed in this area I must …

If I believed, I could succeed I would …

The people who succeed in this area …

What?
Contributor License Agreements — or CLA’s — are a fairly new phenomenon in the Open Source world. IANAL, but I am going to make an attempt to explain what a CLA is, and why it is necessary today, where it previously was not.

The most commonly used CLA is that of the Apache Software Foundation (ASF), and the purpose appears right at the top of the agreement:
“In order to clarify the intellectual property license granted with Contributions from any person or entity, the Foundation must have a Contributor License Agreement (”CLA”) on file that has been signed by each Contributor, indicating agreement to the license terms below.”

The agreement continues to in great detail explain that the person signing the document must both be the author (or hold rights or permission by the author), and be the copyright owner of the contributions they are planning on making to the project in question. It is clarified that the rights to use the contributions will always and forever remain with the contributor, and that the CLA simply extends this right to the project as well.

In other words, if you submit stolen code, you are breaking the CLA, but if you refrain from such follery, nothing’s changed. You’re still the copyright owner of your submissions, but you grant the other party these rights as well. Simple enough.

In the past, this has been a presumed agreement between the involved parties. If I help you out and patch up your code to make it run better, or submit documentation that makes your code more useful, or whatever, you and I both presume that I didn’t steal the code from someplace and handed it to you in evil. This presumption is no longer enough, for good or worse.

Why?
CLA’s became necessary as a direct effect of the SCO vs. Linux court case(s), which, summarized, are about: “SCO claims a bunch of contributors to the Linux source code stole that code without permission from SCO, and that thus, SCO is now the owner of Linux and may at their whim request that all users of Linux pay a royalty fee.” Pretty scary, huh? Be that as it may, the court negotiations are as of this writing ongoing, but things are looking bad for SCO (for what it’s worth).
But regardless, SCO’s claim was a bucket of cold water in the face of the many maintainers of and contributors to various Open Source projects out there, as a legal matter was suddenly making things a tad more complicated. What if someone helps you out and gives you a bunch of really good, professional code, and what if that code is ripped out of some commercial, copyrighted very-much-not-open-sourced product somewhere? How would you know? How could you possibly know?

A quick Google search on “contributor license agreement” shows 1.6 million hits. Obviously, a great deal of Open Source maintainers and organizations do care, and CLA’s are obviously the answer to this legal matter.
In the end, I think the majority of those who’ve followed the SCO vs Linux court case agree that it is exclusively a matter of halting the progress of the rapidly evolving Open Source world. Microsoft, the father of FUD, assuredly caught onto the dick-grip SCO had on Linux in particular and Open Source in general, and decided to sponsor SCO by handing $12 million dollars to SCO, “to purchase UNIX-type licenses so Microsoft customers can run UNIX-type applications” (this was in the year of 2005, and was reported by Business Week). In the end, though, did SCO win? Have they hampered the development of Open Source software?

In my opinion, yeah. They have won. They have won a fraction of what they aimed for, but yes, I believe SCO got if not the whole cake, they got a taste of it. But I also believe that what they won, the Open Source movement will ultimately benefit from. Ultimately. Eventually.
From personal experience, I know what a CLA can do to the quantity of contributors. A lot of people feel that they want to help a project out, but when they’re handed a big, scary paper which may be interpreted as giving up the rights to something you give away for free, they hesitate. And rightly so. Everyone should hesitate when prompted to sign legally binding documents; everyone should read the fine print and ensure they know what they’re getting into. But this, naturally, proffers a wholly different stage than the good old “Wanna help out? Just chuck yer code at me and I’ll eyeball it and if it looks good I’ll plop it into the svn tree, mate!” type of development.

In the long run, though, Linux and Open Source have been children until now, and it’s time to grow up and face the big crowd, and the big crowd usually wields lawyers like children wield wooden swords, and the difference is that more than a few bruises and tears are at stake. That SCO will ultimately lose to Linux I have no doubts of. And in a way, I am grateful that the world will get to see Linux prevail in court over the devil, and I believe companies worldwide will see this as a trigger to examine Open Source alternatives closer, au contraire to the belief that companies will shy away from it, due to its “run-ins with the law.”

Kalle Alm is an open source developer located in Sweden, currently working on SynchroEdit for Alacrity Management Corporation, since about a year ago. He has been using Open Source software (linux in particular) for nearly a decade. He’s blogging about this and a variety of other things at http://kallewoof.com/

Domain Name Organisations

By Clare Lawrence 29th September 2003 Clare is the CEO of
Discount Domains Ltd a leading UK Domain name registration
service.

The following are some of the important organisations in the
domain name industry.

ARIN American Registry for Internet Numbers is a a not for
profit organisation established to handle the administration and
registration of Internet Protocol (IP) addresses in North
America, some of the Caribbean, and sub-Saharan Africa.

CORE Internet Council of Registrars is a not for profit
organisation set up under Swiss law. Core is made up of domain
name registrars handling domain name registration on behalf of
customers.

IANA Internet Assigned Numbers Authority is the authority given
the initial responsibility for the oversight of IP address
allocation, the coordination of the assignment of protocol
parameters provided for in Internet technical standards, and the
management of the DNS.

ICAAN Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers is an
internationally organized, non-profit corporation that has
responsibility for Internet Protocol (IP) address space
allocation, protocol identifier assignment, generic (gTLD) and
country code (ccTLD) Top-Level Domain name system management,
and root server system management functions.

IETF Internet Engineering Task Force is an open international
community of network designers, operators, resellers, and
researchers concerned with the evolution of the Internet
architecture and the operation of the Internet. Membership is
open to any interested individual or corporation.

Nominet Nominet is the UK TLD registrar responsible for the
management and development of the .uk domain range.

W3C World Wide Web Consortium is an international industry
consortium set up to develop common protocols to promote the
evolution of the World Wide Web and ensure its smooth operation.
Services include; a repository of information about the World
Wide Web for developers and users; reference code
implementations to promote standards; and various prototype and
sample applications to demonstrate use of new technology.

I don’t know what it is but there are some smells that bring
back fond memories and one of them is the whiff of a freshly
baked cookie. I don’t have a particularly sweet tooth and can
actually survive without cakes or chocolates but once I am hit
by that cookie smell I am taken to a warm and wonderful place. I
want to enjoy the cookie all on my own and find myself a quiet
place with a cup of my favourite coffee and prepare to be in
heaven.

It isn’t just eating a freshly baked cookie that is enjoyable
but making them can be very satisfying too. Cookie baking can be
great fun if you have young kids and that is probably where some
of my earliest cookie memories come from. I remember how much I
loved helping my grandma mix all the cookie ingredients together
and then shape them on a baking tray before she put them in the
oven. I felt so special when she let me lick the mixing bowl
clean of the cookie mixture too! Anyway, the first time I
suggested that my daughter could help me bake some cookies she
was about four years old and her little face lit up. We made
quite a mess I must be honest but we really had a great time
together and the cookies didn’t turn out all that bad either.

If you have young kids in your family then why not give cookie
baking a try? You don’t have to be a wonderful cook; in fact you
can buy cookie mixes that you just have to add water to so you
have more chance of baking great cookies. You could always buy
some of the cookie dough that has become popular but I think
that the mixing process is the best bit! Making different shapes
of cookies and then decorating them afterwards is also something
that most kids love to do. You might even think about giving
some of these homemade cookies as gifts, especially if your kids
helped make them. A cookie that was decorated by a grandchild
for Christmas or any other special occasion is bound to be
enjoyed far more than a store bought one.

What makes you want to talk to anyone?

For instance, I’m sure you’ve attended a wedding or friend’s birthday party, where there are many people you don’t know. What do you typically do at these events? Do you talk to anyone you don’t know? And if so, how do you choose whom to talk to and what to say to them?

I usually start by talking to the person sitting or standing next to me. And I usually ask about how they know the host of party. It’s the easiest starting point for me! And then my curiosity takes over and gets the conversation flowing.

Other people may be drawn to talking with “strangers” because something about the other person catches their attention. For instance, something that the other person is wearing (unusual jewelry, funky tie, beautiful shoes), or something that they overheard this person saying (about where they live, how bad the traffic was that evening, how mischievious their dog or cat was that morning), etc.

What about you?

I ask, because in the business context it’s not so different.

Common things that get conversations started at business mixers are name badges. You may be intrigued by the title on a name badge and want to ask what such a job might entail. You may want to talk to a person because they work at a company that is of interest to you for some reason.

In fact, I met one of my long-time associates and friends that way. She saw my name badge and asked if I worked at SRI. I said “No, that’s my name — it’s Sri.” We had a good laugh and started talking. As we talked, I realized I’d seen her on the news on TV a few weeks before. So our conversation moved to that topic. By the time we ended our conversation, we both agreed that we should meet later to brainstorm about possible collaborations.

My point is this: people approach and talk with “strangers” quite naturally when something about the other person catches their interest.

Some common tips for “conversation starters” in the business context are, asking about:

• Primary concerns about the other person’s business
• Problems they want solved
• What unmet business needs they may have
• Areas where the solutions you provide may overlap with their needs

You may have already heard of these. But as I mentioned last time, before you can effectively use any tip or strategy, you must be clear about whether it fits your needs. In other words, would the information you get from using any of these “conversation starters” be of interest and use to you?

So the question for you is this: what is of interest to you? What (if anything) makes you curious about all the “strangers” in a room, when you attend a networking event?

(By the way, if you find that nothing interests you or makes you curious, then you might ask yourself why you chose to attend that event.)

Once you’ve identified that, you can let your curiosity guide you. You can start looking and listening for things that are of interest to you in other people, as you move through the room. And when you find these people, see how it feels to start a conversation with them. I bet it will be much easier!

And when you do find someone with whom you truly connect, be sure to get their contact information. Because these are the people you must follow up with. The rest — well, it’s up to you what you do with the rest…

Now, if you’re still uncomfortable approaching someone you know you want to talk to, and even know what you want to talk to them about, there’s another unresolved issue hiding somewhere. But that’s a topic for another day!

(c) Copyright 2006, Srirupa Dasgupta

Sri Dasgupta helps business professionals get better results from their business networking efforts through focused and relevant conversations. She is the author of the Effortless Networking, and writes regular articles offering business networking tips and related resources.