Jumla needs you to lead us

The first weekend of September I traveled to Florianopolis, Brazil to speak at the annual Joomladay Brazil. I was among 4 international guests who the Brazilian community had nominated as keynote speakers for this years event.

Joomla ‘for’ or ‘from’ the community

Talking to organizers and community members during and after the event I learned about their concerns, frustrations and anger around the Joomla trademark processes and policies.

I learned about the creation of Joomleiros.com (a real joomleiro), the issues with the joomla.com.br domain (official open letter), the disappointment over only receiving an apology and the feeling of letdown when being pointed to just another email address by Open Source Matters, the holder of the Joomla trademark.

We need you to lead us

These issues are not new. I have heard similar frustrations from many event organizers and community members all over the world in the past years.

I know some of you feel the Joomla! name is being kept from You and not for You. Don’t let this put you down ! All I can tell is that you need to make a choice. You can accept the rules and follow or you can challenge them and choose to lead.

There are probably a thousands reasons why you, of all people, aren’t the right one to lead? Probably. So what ? You still get to make the choice !

Once you choose to lead, you’ll be under huge pressure to reconsider your choice, to compromise, to dumb it down, or to give up. Of course you will. That’s the worlds job: to get you to be quiet and follow. The status quo is the status quo for a reason.

But once you choose to lead, you’ll also discover that it’s not so difficult. That the options available to you seem really clear, and that, in fact, you don’t need any rules nor processes to be a leader in the Joomla community.

What are you waiting for ? Go !