Revealing Errors

Short Description
===================

This talk will describe how advocates can make a strong for open source
and free software to "normal" users by focusing on the way that
technology does not work. It will try to show why open source and free
software is important by revealing the power of technological decisions
by revealing technologies revealed by errors.

Full Version
==============

Anyone who has seen a famous "Blue Screen of Death" on a public screen
or terminal knows how errors can thrust the technical details of
previously invisible systems into view. Nobody knows that their ATM runs
Windows until the system crashes. Of course, the operating system chosen
for a sign or bank machine might have important implications for its
users. Faced with a crashed ATM, a consumer might ask herself if, with
its rampant viruses and security holes, should she really trust an ATM
running Windows?

Free software and open source advocates have struggled to make their
case to "normal users" and have, for the most part, failed to do so.
Most supporters of the FSF, the EFF, and the OSI -- and most people at
OSCON -- understand what a recursive acronym is and why it is funny. And
they have trouble communicating the importance of free and open source
software to people who do not.

Technically skilled free software and open source advocates understand
the power, importance, and limitations of technology and technological
mediation because they understand technology. Most users, meanwhile,
don't even realize that it exists. Before one can argue for the
importance of individual control over technology an audience must first
appreciate the power and effect that their technology and its designers
have. To understand the power that technology has on its users, users
must first see the technology in question. Before you can understand
why a webserver should be free, you need to understands what a webserver
is.

Errors offer an incredible opportunity as points where "invisible"
technology is thrust into view of even the least technical user. This
talk will use errors to describe one way that free software and open can
help build support for their movement by talking not about the way that
technology works but by the way that all technologies fails.

With a tour of errors, it will painting a picture of how certain
technologies facilitate certain mistakes and will show how these
technologies mediate. By revealing errors, it will reveal previously
invisible technologies and their effects. It will make a strong case for
free and open source software by revealing the important power
relationships behind technological design decisions by revealing
technologies revealed by errors.