137 lines
5.9 KiB
HTML
137 lines
5.9 KiB
HTML
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
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<html>
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<version>1</version>
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<head>
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<title>PDFreaders - Follow Up</title>
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</head>
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<body>
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<p id="category"><a href="pdfreaders.html">Free Software PDF Readers</a></p>
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<h1>PDFreaders - Follow Up</h1>
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<p>In November 2010, during the <a href="/activities/pdfreaders">the PDFreaders
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campaign</a>, FSFE has sent a <a
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href="/activities/pdfreaders/letter.html">letter</a> to all the public
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institutions on our <a href="/activities/pdfreaders/buglist.html">buglist</a>
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asking them to either remove their advertising for proprietary software or run
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concurrent advertising for Free Software, so that website users realise they
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have a choice.</p>
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<p>Some of the institutions already answered to our requests but others have
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not answered yet. As we, as Free Software activists and European citizens,
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spent time and money to send these letters, we want to get an answer, whatever
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it would be.</p>
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<p>Here is how you can get active and send some emails to the institutions of
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your country asking them to remove advertisements to non-free software from
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their websites.</p>
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<h2>Check before</h2>
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<p>Before start sending emails take a look to the website of the institution
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reported in the <a href="/activities/pdfreaders/buglist.html">buglist</a> and
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check if they have removed the advertise. If you do not see any advertise do
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the following:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>Check with a search engine if another "adobe" or "acrobat" is on the
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domain, (e.g. with site:www.example.com). If there is one, update the
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buglist with the new URL in "bugs-XY.xml" (you can also write an e-mail to
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<a href="mailto:web@lists.fsfe.org">our web team</a> if you have no access
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to modify the website).</li>
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<li>If there is none, write to <a
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href="mailto:pdfreaders@lists.fsfe.org">pdfreaders@lists.fsfe.org</a>,
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report your success and ask to mark the bug as fixed.</li>
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<li>Then write a short thank you e-mail to public body.</li>
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</ul>
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<p>If the advertise is still visible on the website of the public body you can
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get active by sending an email <a
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href="/activities/pdfreaders/letter.html">based on our model letter</a> to
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them.</p>
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<h2>Always be kind</h2>
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<p>Getting angry will not help at all. We sent a letter making a kind and
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motivated proposal. What we have to do now is to keep the same attitude and
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friendly ask the institutions to take our letter into consideration. It may
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happen that someone will respond you with a rude criticism: that is not
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important! Always be kind and take into account that our goal is to convince
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them to correct an obvious neutrality problem on their website. Do not answer
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to criticism not related to our goal.</p>
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<h2>Find the right person to contact</h2>
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<p>Take some time to look at their website. If you find the <strong>webmaster's
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email</strong>, that is certainly the best person to contact. If the website
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has been made by an external company, you will probably get nothing from them:
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it is not in their interests to let the public institution know that the site
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they have made has a problem of neutrality.</p>
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<p>If you are not able to find the webmaster, you could look for a
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<strong>webform for contact</strong>. Be also aware that many public
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institutions have a <strong>Public Relations Office</strong> and that some of
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them should keep track of the emails they receive as for the standard
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letters.</p>
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<p>If you are not able to find any of above mentioned contacts, you may write
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to the <strong>Mayor or to the Administration office</strong> of the
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institution. These people certainly have the greatest powers in the
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institutions, but keep in mind that they could be very busy and they would not
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directly modify the site. So, to get a reply from them can take much time.</p>
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<h2>Choose the right subject for your email</h2>
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<p>People employed in public institutions receive dozens of emails every day
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(including spam). We want them to read our email, so it is important to choose
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the right subject. A good subject could be: <strong>"Unanswered letter of FSFE
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from 2010"</strong>.</p>
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<h2>Write your email</h2>
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<p>Write your email to remind them about the letter we have sent. If you want,
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you can use <strong><a href="/activities/pdfreaders/letter.html">our model
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letter and translations</a></strong>, but, please, remember to change the
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part inside the brace { }</p>
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<h2>What's happening next?</h2>
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<p>After 15 days check again the website if something has changed.</p>
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<p><strong>CASE 1: nothing has changed</strong>: Do not worry, even Rome was
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not built in a day. Write them again and check again after 15 days. You could
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also try to write to a different email address.</p>
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<p><strong>CASE 2: the bug has been removed</strong>: Check if there are other
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bug pages on their website. If so, write them again. If not, you were
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successful! Write an email to thank them for their efforts and also <a
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href="mailto:pdfreaders@lists.fsfe.org">inform us</a> about your success so
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we can update the <a href="/activities/pdfreaders/buglist.html">buglist</a>.</p>
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<p><strong>CASE 3: you received an email from the institution with some
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questions</strong>: Some institutions do not understand our letter. Reply to
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them, always be kind and try explain our proposal. If you do not know what to
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answer, <a href="mailto:pdfreaders@lists.fsfe.org">contact us</a>.</p>
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<p><strong>CASE 4: you received an email from the institution that told you
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that they have corrected the page but the page is still unchanged</strong>.
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Wait for few days then write them again.</p>
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<h2>Final considerations</h2>
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<p>It is easy to achieve good results for the PDFreaders campaign in your
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country. Before receiving our letter, many of the institutions have not even
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realised that they were advertising any software on their website and many
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of them will thank you to point it out. So, the hardest part is to capture
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their attention. To do this, we need your patience and your determination. </p>
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</body>
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</html>
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