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LAVA Under New Management


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Dear LAVA Members,

Lately, some of you have noticed more activity on the forums from National Instruments employees. This is no coincidence. The LAVA site in its current form will cease to function as of Midnight tonight. Starting tomorrow, LAVA will be under new management. National Instruments Corporation has offered to purchase all the LAVA content, logo and all associated rights. I have agreed to this offer. The offer currently cannot be disclosed but more information will be released in the coming weeks.

In order to comply with the new purchasing agreement, LAVA has agreed to shutdown certain sections of the forums. Starting Monday, the VI Scripting forum will no longer be accessible and all the content purged from our system. Also any postings regarding LabVIEW 8 and its deficiencies will also be deleted. The xnodes.lavag.org sub domain will also be removed. It is regrettable to see this content go but sacrifices have to be made in an effort to keep the site running. In addition NI has agreed to take over the LAVA Buglist, Wish List and FAQ forums. These forums will be assimilated into the existing NI website.

This is an exciting moment for LAVA I hope everyone will help support this transition.

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Well, that is definitely somewhat sad and it doesn't sound good.

I'm definitely not suspecting Michael of selling out, as I'm sure maintaning this community is a costly issue and not having even paid to be a premium member I'm probably not one to complain, but it would be a shame to see a proper independent site become less so. I would like to deeply thank Michael and anyone else involved in the forums for the time and effort spent and I just hope that the forums will maintain some level of independence and free speech. As for the removed stuff, I guess I will just have to go through the scripting board and extract the good stuff. At least we got a heads-up.

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So will LabView start having a scripting forum since it will be a licensed tool?

It seems a shame to completely lose the ability to collaborate on a highly profitable area of LabVIEW development. If NI hasn't built the tool (such as diagram coloring or tunnel wizard) just build it yourself!! Hopefully there might be some avenue for continued community effort in this area. I was just about done with my first tool and I was so excited to post it and see what people thought. ;)

Anyway, thanks for the heads-up. I too will be pulling off all those scripting gems...

David

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:(

I think what made this site so great was that it wasn't run by NI. The freedom allowed in this site was awesome! Even though there will be less freedom, we may get better visibility on our questions by NI which is a positive.

It is probably a very good business decision by Michael. When you develop something as great as this website you should be compensated for your hard work. Bravo for putting together an excellent forum. :thumbup:

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BTW, Michael, I have a question on an important point, since you and Jim seemed to be advocates for this - what happens to the licensing under the creative commons license? What happens to the posts made up until now and what will happen to posts made from now on?

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I just like to squatter my 250th post to attatch:

how can content be bought, that is published under the commons creative license?

some lawyers around here?

I am REALLY p*ssed OFF!

(sorry, I could have chosen polite, respectful words, but since I am a person, who is used to say what I think, I did not ...)

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Since I was addressed directly, I will respond. I had no knowledge of this and I am extremely upset. Michael must take us for a bunch of fools, if he thinks we are going to sit back and let this happen. I have notified my attorney, to better understand our rights and the implications of Michael's decision -- I will let you all know, as soon as I hear back.

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  Jim Kring said:
Michael must take us for a bunch of fools...

A bunch of fools?!?

I, for one, am elated that NI, LAVA and Michael are taking this step! LAVA has, for too long, been stagnating, and I look forward to more NI-driven topics in the near future. I also think it's a great idea that NI is taking control over the content here - weeding out all of the forum topics that detract from the main thrust of what this site should be all about: LabVIEW and how awesomely great it is, and how awesomely great NI is for giving it to us!

Remember: if you're not with us, you're against us...

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OK, Jim, since you and Michael don't seem to be in on this together, would it be possible to use the JKI site to host the deleted content (not as active forums, but as an archive)? Or maybe OpenG?

I realize this is mixing unconnected entities and scrounging (and I have no idea whether this is legally possible), but it would be a real shame to see this content go down the trash can of history.

Edit - Yeah, I saw the april fools post now and I do feel like one now. :(

Yes, I have to admit that than having a complete disregard for the calender, I also tend to believe people when they say something and was not even set back by the obvious signs like Michael signature. Yes, I am that gullible. I believe serious people.

And yes, I actually did spend some time downloading some valuable stuff, which I will not consider a waste of time, since I have found some good stuff I missed on previous rounds.

So, just to quote John Cleese - "That's not funny!" (to be read with a German accent). :D

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  crelf said:
A bunch of fools?!?

I, for one, am elated that NI, LAVA and Michael are taking this step! LAVA has, for too long, been stagnating, and I look forward to more NI-driven topics in the near future. I also think it's a great idea that NI is taking control over the content here - weeding out all of the forum topics that detract from the main thrust of what this site should be all about: LabVIEW and how awesomely great it is, and how awesomely great NI is for giving it to us!

Remember: if you're not with us, you're against us...

Speaking of fools, as such, I can only hope that when NI takes over, stimulating conversation like in this thread coninues to thrive. Are we going to have to turn in all are LAVA stuff as well (hats, shirts ...etc) or perhaps we could just send a check to NI, and promise to add their logo to all previously purchased merchandise.

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Hello All:

Well this seems like pretty cruddy news to me too. :ninja:

I'm very reluctant to spew at Michael-- He's put a huge amount of effort into managing the site, and I know it is really difficult to manage any group effort where the group is composed primarily of volunteers. He deserves much credit for that effort.

On the other hand, it all seems quite sudden, and lacking detail on the motivations for both buyer and seller.

As to why Michael was willing to sell the site, we have to assume that either NI had a big stick or a big carrot, or perhaps both. Either possibility seems rather unsavory. My nature is to give individuals the benefit of the doubt, and to not give corporations the same benefit, so I'm going to assume it was a big stick.

It may be possible that the site simply became too much for Micheal to manage with the resources available, if that was the case I'd expect that efforts to sell premium memberships or solicit other forms of support would have been more intense. Given that, I suspect he was given an offer he couldn't refuse.

We have a few clues as to why NI wanted to buy the site from what will be removed from it. My thoughts on that would make for a rather long post, and I've gone on for a bit already, so perhaps I'll hold my peace on that topic for now. Suffice to say, I don't think scripting or xnodes were the main issues.

Others seem to be carrying the ball on the topic as to whether the site, composed of posts we all contributed, is Michael's to sell. Since I can't recall what the terms of membership are (I did read them when I signed up) I'll hold my peace on that too, at least for now.

Finally, let's be optimistic that LAVA will remain a useful forum. :)

Best Regards to all, :wub: Louis

ljmanfredi@comcast.net

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  Jim Kring said:
I see that Mr mec (a.k.a "one hit wonder"), signed up for a new user account to anonymously spoil a very good joke. :thumbdown:

PS - Excellent work, Michael! Yes, ehhhxcellent. :worship:

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"mec" is French for "guy", that gives some hint about the identity of the anonymous coward....

Good joke Michael, unfortunately I first viewed the thread on the 2nd page where it was already spoiled.

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  jpdrolet said:
"mec" is French for "guy", that gives some hint about the identity of the anonymous coward....

Good joke Michael, unfortunately I first viewed the thread on the 2nd page where it was already spoiled.

Yes, I have to agree, this got to be one of the best april fool joke I ever seen (Michael tone was perfect). May be to make it less realistic Michael should have announce that LAVA was beeing bought by Nabisco :)

PJM

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  jpdrolet said:
"mec" is French for "guy", that gives some hint about the identity of the anonymous coward....

Good joke Michael, unfortunately I first viewed the thread on the 2nd page where it was already spoiled.

I first "heard" in a private message where someone wondered if I'd read the bad news. I've been out all day and rather preoccupied and I hit "View New Posts" and read the topic from the start.

All I can say now is, "Well done Michael", this was much better than any of NI's April Fools. :worship:

I can also say that, at the moment, while my blood pressure still needs a logarithmic scale to be read, that it's a really really good thing for you that you're on the Left Coast ...

I may need a heart transplant...

:nono:

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  Michael Ashe said:
I first "heard" in a private message where someone wondered if I'd read the bad news. I've been out all day and rather preoccupied and I hit "View New Posts" and read the topic from the start.

All I can say now is, "Well done Michael", this was much better than any of NI's April Fools. :worship:

I can also say that, at the moment, while my blood pressure still needs a logarithmic scale to be read, that it's a really really good thing for you that you're on the Left Coast ...

I may need a heart transplant...

:nono:

Add me to list of people who take this stuff too seriously.

I red the thread before Mr Guy posted and reacted in the only manner that seemed prudent at that time.

I down loaded the entire contents of the scrting forum!

Ben

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