[Development] Blurring the lines between Qt-Project and Digia

[Stephen Kelly]

Hi there,

https://twitter.com/qtproject/status/251262626682789888

is a tweet from the 'qtproject' twitter account, containing video from Digia 
on the QtStudios youtube account which amounts to a promotional advert by 
Digia for 'Qt Commercial'. The video opens and closes with Digia logos etc.

This could blur the lines between Digia and the Qt Project. The Qt Project 
should be where code goes to and where releases come from, but should not have 
a commercial slant.

It is also not clear who is actually doing the communications through qt-
project accounts (from the tweet: 'I added a video ...'). The qt-project 
accounts shouldn't be used as a mouthpiece for qt commercial advertisements 
and promotional videos. To do so risks the appearance of shilling[1] and 
blurring the lines between the qt-project and Digia (and therefore weakening 
the Qt Project and its credibility as a strong open contribution project).

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shill

It may be true that what's good for Qt Commercial is good for Qt Project, but 
that doesn't make it appropriate for Digia branded materials, promotional 
videos and advertisements to be promoted 'impartially' or 'anonymously' by qt-
project social media accounts. Such things should be promoted by Digia itself 
instead.

According to the bottom-left of qt-project.org, the Qt Project social media 
accounts are:

http://twitter.com/qtproject
http://www.youtube.com/user/QtStudios
http://www.facebook.com/qtbynokia
http://www.linkedin.com/groupInvitation?groupID=1531497

It is not obvious who can post from these accounts, and who the people making 
the posts represent. We should discuss how to change that.

Thanks,

-- 
Stephen Kelly <stephen.kelly at kdab.com> | Software Engineer
KDAB (Deutschland) GmbH & Co.KG, a KDAB Group Company
www.kdab.com || Germany +49-30-521325470 || Sweden (HQ) +46-563-540090
KDAB - Qt Experts - Platform-Independent Software Solutions
** Qt Developer Conference: http://qtconference.kdab.com/ **
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