Email to the Apache Software Foundation

Today I learned about the organization Natives In Tech and their websites (1, 2) about the naming of the Apache Software Foundation.

I agree wholeheartedly with the sentiments expressed and stand in solidarity with the Natives in Tech organization in this effort. I believe that a name change is important for software inclusivity as well as mitigating the insulting nature of the current name.

To that end, I added my name to the list of signatories on endasfmascotry.com and wrote the following email to the list of email addresses listed on that page:

Subject: Please consider ending the use of the Apache name

From: Travis Briggs audiodude@gmail.com

To: board@apache.org, trademarks@apache.org, ke4qqq@apache.org, suehle@apache.org, jzb@apache.org, katia@apache.org

Hello fellow open source enthusiasts.

Today I came across this article from the organization Natives in Tech: https://blog.nativesintech.org/apache-appropriation/

Of course I was previously aware of the Apache Software Foundation, and generally knew that it referred to Native Americans. It never really bothered me in the past. However, after reading the article and associated materials, I believe it is time for ASF to seriously reconsider its naming and plan a path forward that includes a rename.

The fact that ASF feels the need to have an "About Our Name" page (https://www.apache.org/apache-name/), to potentially deflect inquiries such as my own, is almost evidence enough that the name is problematic. Linux, Mozilla, Android: none of these organizations or software suites have need for anything similar.

I recognize as an open source software developer that a rename would be hard and painful. Loss of brand recognition, the need to register new trademarks and domain names, etc. However, as stated above, I believe ASF has a moral imperative to begin this process. And as you know there are precedents in this process across many open source technologies as well as other organizations such as sports teams.

Please consider the example your amazing software sets in the open source community, and the immense value a rename would have in setting a positive one.

Thank you,

Travis Briggs
Software Developer
San Francisco, CA, USA
https://travisbriggs.com