Aaron, thanks for writing. I speak for myself and do not necessarily represent anybody else or their opinion.

Regarding the instability issues, we started a conversation about that topic last night. We are aware of the claims. Much more attention will be provided toward quality assurance with the next release.

I don't believe we who are involved directly in the Trinity project have earned any den of hate reputation. Most everybody here just minds the shop. The den of hate of which you speak is maintained by reviewers and forum zealots. Why they insist on almost always comparing Trinity to KDE4 is for them to answer. We don't write those reviews. :)

If you are following this list then you know many of us are working together to keep us all focused on Trinity and not get involved in spitting contests. We had a chat session yesterday and discussed that very topic. We are reorganizing our web site, which will include a new About page with an FAQ. In our FAQ (the draft is in our etherpad) we address the issue of Trinity and KDE4 because we too are weary of the comparisons. We present facts and a statement that both desktops are beneficial to various people with different wants and needs.

With that said, there are always new people joining the list. Some people join because they are dissatisfied with what they perceive is the general direction of recent releases of desktop environments. When they join they share their opinions. This is human nature. People are social creatures and they want to belong. People tend to share opinions that help them feel they belong.

Part of that belonging process is comparing "us" vs. "them." This is a human conditioning problem that permeates deep into our social fabric all around the world in every facet of life. Much conflict in our world is caused by this process of social conditioning to compare "us" vs. "them." As a species we do not teach each other to view ourselves as a single species struggling to survive in a hostile universe. Instead we all have been conditioned to think narrowly about "us" vs. "them." That conditioning continues at this very moment. Read the headlines and watch the spin doctors on TV to see this process in action. Who knows how long we need to change that aspect of our species.

I long have seen in free/libre software the potential to break some of that social conditioning. That does not mean those attitudes evaporate through wishful thinking. They don't. :( Yet we can continue educating one another that this struggle called life is not about "us" vs. "them" but about humans surviving together. Despite the puny size of our planet in a incomprehensibly large universe, there is nonetheless plenty of room here for numerous opinions about how we go about making our world a better place.

The KDE4 people have their opinion how to do that, the Trinity people have theirs, the GNOME people theirs, the Unity people theirs, and on and on. That several hundred distros exist is an example of how this process succeeds.

Most of us here want to live in harmony with others in the free/libre software world. Yet Trinity exists because we want to maintain the older KDE3 desktop style. We want to promote healthy exchanges among everybody in all camps of free/libre software, but by golly we like Trinity and that opinion will surface in this list. :) As will similar opinions in any KDE4 discussion list. :)

The trick for all of us to learn is to express those opinions and enthusiasm without harassing people in the other groups. :) Every day every one of us has to look into the mirror, literally and figuratively. Every day we have to think about who we are. We change in increments but we change. This is a process. One day we all will get there. :)

Darrell