I don’t want my last post (about what I see as a negative state of the OpenBSD community culture) to stand at the forefront of my blog too long, not so much because I regret writing it, since it was an expression of my current thoughts and emotions on that subject, but because these are after all the first days of the new year and I feel I shouldn’t squander them in negativity, no matter where it originated, but rather try and focus on seeing what was positive about 2007 and what good can be done in 2008.

It is not hard to often see a given community or humanity in general as screwing itself up in many major ways, but then again if I am to bask in all of that negativity myself I’ll probably one way or another end up being part of the problem - among the screwed or among the ones screwing up.

If nothing then it is because of my own sanity and happiness that I should keep searching for positives and no matter how down I sometimes feel I can’t deny the fact that I discovered and perhaps even helped create a lot of positive things so far, and have the potential to do more. The future is waiting on us to build it.

It is all part of the process of growing. My last post shown how sensitive I can be towards what some other people may see as a normal phenomenon in a diverse ecosystem of free people (flamewars). I have a hard time accepting such ugly wars as a normal constant and the fact that they bruise some of the people I admire while not validly reducing their credibility doesn’t help.  If they were to at least provide me with enough chewable evidence to change my admirations perhaps I would feel a bit differently, but that is always very hard to come by when most of what you’re seeing is an emotional rampage rather than a civil diplomatic discussion.

Kevin, a friend on a #libervis IRC channel further helped me realize that I can’t always rely on this vision of people agreeing or at least being civil and diplomatic all the time, that sometimes wars of words and emotion in this world are inevitable.. And it rather nicely tied in to a similar theme I’ve been learning as the 2007 was expiring, through the process of organizing and running Freedomware Gamefest 2007 for instance.

As always, I set it out as a loose thing where everyone can contribute and everyone’s opinion would be considered. The ideal is to come up with the organization and the rules that everyone would agree with, if not fully then at least enough to be satisfactory. Strictness is something I rarely employ, and I am realizing now that this is not always a good policy. I almost feel like a darn child coming out into the harsh world realizing that sometimes you just have to be tough, harsh and strict to accomplish something. This is one of the realizations I already set out to employ in some of my future projects, including the potential new Freedomware Gamefest later in the year.

But what was I thinking anyway? I know everything sooner or later comes down to a balance. Nothing extreme is good. Not extreme freedom and therefore sure not extreme diplomacy, if that would be the right way to characterize it. Restrictions have to be balanced with freedom. Loose has to be balanced with strict. Friendly has to be balanced with some unfriendliness. (But no I still don’t think this lets OBSD people off the hook, as I think they disrupt that balance). Just as all fundamentals end up closing a full circle into a paradox so do all opposites rightly meet at the balancing point. Perhaps the two are even the same thing. And it would appear that living in accordance to the picture portrayed by these paradoxes and these balancing points may in fact be the best and wisest way to live.

But it’s all easy to say. Application is the key, and that may be the thing we require most growing time to master.

So, I think these kinds of realizations, among others sprinkled around my blog is what largely sums up what I learned and developed throughout 2007 and which I will try to apply in 2008.

That said, just to be a bit more practical, there have been many incredible things happening in 2007 when I look back. And of course many of these experiences one way or another helped form the realizations and opinions I am expressing today. Libervis Network achieved financial sustainability. I was on my first Free Software/Free Culture conference, the iCommons Summit 2007 in Dubrovnik. At the same occasion I for the first time met a Libervisian in Real Life, my friend Taco Buitenhuis. Near the year end we even met again, second time in a year, right here in Zagreb! I moved to an apartment now living on my own. Consequently I finally have proper high speed internet connection, enabling me to discover the world of internet video, real time multiplayer gaming and anything else always-on connectivity is able to offer. This inspired me to revive the idea which led to the Freedomware Gamefest 2007.

Libervis.com seen a significant amount of incredible discussions. Nuxified.org seen its most profound re-design ever. I started a separate blog under my own domain name which I just love! I joined GNU/Linux Matters foundation. Libernod, my VPS server, finally got to be used and there are still at least a couple of domain names ready and waiting for corresponding projects to be started on them.

It seems as if the list could go on and on.. I might not be wrong to say that 2007 was, oddly enough, the most profound year for both me and Libervis Network as my main undertaking in a long time. One has to wonder, with these foundations, what wonders could we accomplish in 2008!

Well, here are some hints… I’ve received an email from a rather well known person in the FOSS world about a project that could make the news all over the software industry. I don’t want to reveal anything just yet. Nuxified.org will see more collaborations and alliances. Libervis.com will see the most significant revamp it has ever had! Libervis Network will see at least two new projects being launched (perhaps not as big as Nuxified.org or Libervis.com, but you never know - plenty of stuff breading in our incubators). I may start differentiating my occupation more and more.

Oh and besides this whole storm of exciting stuff I might as well end up fixing my social life and find someone special. :)

Well, that’s it for my “coming back on a positive track towards the future 362 days” post. :)