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Is anyone else concerned about the lack of information available from the foundation recently?

GreenYamo

Up until the launch of the Pi, I thought the communication from the Foundation was brilliant. First class and an example to other similar projects.

 

However, since the launch day, there seems to have been a deafening roar of....silence.

 

I can appreciate that things can (and have) go wrong and I think most people can live with that, as long as they are kept informed. It is a game changing product and every project like this is going to hit snags.

 

What I can't seem to understand is the fact that at the moment, there is very little information coming from the Foundation, and I think this may even extend to keeping Farnell informed. I know that they will say there are no updates, first 10,000 is still be fixed etc, but even this is an update of a kind.

 

I also find it hard to believe that there isn't more granular information available, appreciating that the Foundation and / or Farnell can't be 100% open for business reasons. I think the lack of hard, official communication from the Foundation is leading to a lot of unnecessary but justified annoyance on the part of us, the customer and also a lot speculation based on half truths, but this is going to happen (to my mind) to fill the vacuum left by the official sources ?

 

So, is it just me ?

  • It may not be just you, but if you followed them on Twitter you'd know that they are on holiday in the US.  There can't be that much news anyway - the modified first release will be sent out as soon as they're fixed (if you were lucky enough to get one - I wasn't) and the rest will have to wait until Farnell/RS get them into production.  The Fedora Remix is out, and still being worked on, and there have been blog posts periodically since the launch, including the detailed pricing update earlier this week.  Personally I wish people would stop bleating and show more appreciation for the years of work put in by a small number of people to bring this project to fruition.  The limitations they have been under have been well documented.  I'm sorry if you don't have the patience to wait a few more weeks, having waited months or years to get to this point.

  • in reply to Former Member

    Hello Simon,

     

    I think you have kind of missed my point. At several points above, I noted what a great product it is, that things go wrong and that we can live with that. I don't think any of that counts as 'bleating'?

     

    I do follow them on twitter, however this went quiet long before the recent holiday. I also think that twitter is not suitable as the main channel of communication. The Fedora remix was withdrawn AFAIK, not that it matters too much as there isn't anything to use it on at the moment. The blog posts regarding the pricing were long, and didn't tell me much I couldn't get from looking at with the web site or my pre-order with Farnell.

    You make a fundamental assumption that 'There can't be that much news anyway' and there is where my first point really aims for - we don't know, so make assumptions based on what ? I surely hope something is happening, I think I could have desoldered and resoldered a large amount of the 10,000 jacks myself in the time that has elapsed since we were notified of this.

     

    To reiterate, i'm not bleating about waiting for the device, i've got other things to play with in the mean time, but what I don't understand is why things have gone so quiet. Note, I'm not moaning, it is a genuine question. I have been in customer facing roles for 20 years and one of the worse things you can do is not supply the customer with information regarding a product.

  • in reply to GreenYamo

    Don't worry we haven't gone away.

    We are pedalling hard, and will bring news as soon as we can.

    Highest priority is ramping production, and that takes time and energy.

    Work is going on documentation, tutorials, global approvals, other testing and software development

    Besides we have to keep up with flood the emails and tweets - the firehose is still running at several a minute, as well as mundane things like accounants, VAT inspections (we passed), legals and issuing takedown notices to scammers and their ISP.

     

    Jack

    Raspberry Pi Foundation

  • in reply to Former Member

    Jack,

     

    Thank you for your reply, I hope that I wasn't coming across as critical of the Foundation, as i'll state again, I think the Pi is a wonderful device and at an unparalleled price point. I realise that there are several parallel activities that must be going on behind the scenes, it is just I prefer one piece of offical news to 100 bits of assmuption and at the current time, we seem to be getting plenty of the latter image

     

    I'd be happy to wait another six months as long as I am told that at the outset.

     

    Best of luck with everything going on there.

  • Hi Guys.

     

    We've been in touch with the guys from the Raspberry Pi Foundation since launch, and-- no surprise --they have been thrilled and overwhelmed with the response. We just launched an exclusive webinar which will be led by Raspberry Pi co-founder Eben Upton in about two weeks. Eben will walk through the board, and take your questions about the Raspberry Pi. The webinar is completely free; you just need to join element14 if you haven't already done so.

     

    Hope this helps!

     

    Sagar

  • I have to confess I'm somewhat disappointed with the way this has gone in the past few weeks.

     

    I registered with Raspberry Pi on their site some time ago, and put myself on the list for the product, as did others that I know. But I've heard absolutely nothing from them, and nor has anyone else I have kept in contact with. I was most surprised to read reports in the press recently that units have actually been shipped to end customers, and even more so when I went to the site only to find it had been blanked out and viewers referred to RS and Farnell.

     

    I did like the charitable aspirations of the project. Very much so. But for them to then go and involve two large distributors, one of which must be just about the most mercenary in the electonics business, seems to be sending mixed messages - to put it mildly.

     

    I hope I am wrong, but the ideals that were set out only a comparatively short time ago seem doomed. Anyway, we can judge by what happens to the pricing over the medium/long term, and who the deliveries are prioritised to. Will the people who demonstrated their support early on be supported in turn? Judging by the lack of feedback to those who registered, and recent developments,I wouldn't like to rely on it.

     

    I suspect there is such a large amount to be gained by those with business interests, that we will be fed with some 'interesting' stories over the coming months to justify policy changes.