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FSF's non-blob criteria is incompatible with being able to boot modern PC's on modern CPU's.

A binary blob is a binary blob. If there's source code behind that blob, then how could they follow their principles and say it's ok? Debian has finally stopped shipping binary blobs too, by the way.

If this was really a concern they'd work hard on advancing the PC architecture to the point that it didn't need such reliance on firmware uploaders.

http://www.fsf.org/resources/hw

I don't know just how much you expect out of the FSF. I don't think they have the resources to do much else.

On how charitable givers should insist on a post-scarcity copyright and patent policy for the results of anything they fund in whole or in part (from a document I wrote):
http://www.pdfernhout.net/on-funding-digital-public-works.html
"For example, where can one go to get a freely modifiable design including CAD files for even a simple health-related appliance like a wheelchair? Or worse, where is the community freely collaborating on improving wheel chair designs? Are a few dozen intentionally-vague patents on wheel chair design the best to be hoped for given the trillions of dollars of investments into public works, including vast amount of money spent on medical research? ... This physical public works paradigm is unfortunately then applied to thinking about most digital public works, and there is a major flaw in the analogy. A bridge does not require much marketing. ...
Consider again the self-driving cars mentioned earlier which now cruise some streets in small numbers. The software "intelligence" doing the driving was primarily developed by public money given to universities, which generally own the copyrights and patents as the contractors. Obviously there are related scientific publications, but in practice these fail to do justice to the complexity of such systems. The truest physical representation of the knowledge learned by such work is the codebase plus email discussions of it (plus what developers carry in their heads).
We are about to see the emergence of companies licensing that publicly funded software and selling modified versions of such software as proprietary products. There will eventually be hundreds or thousands of paid automotive software engineers working on such software no matter how it is funded, because there will be great value in having such self-driving vehicles given the result of America's horrendous urban planning policies leaving the car as generally the most efficient means of transport in the suburb. The question is, will the results of the work be open for inspection and contribution by the public? Essentially, will those engineers and their employers be "owners" of the software, or will they instead be "stewards" of a larger free and open community development process?
Open source software is typically eventually of much higher quality
http://www.fsf.org/software/reliability.html
and reliability because more eyes look over the code for problems and more voices contribute to adding innovative solutions. About 35,000 Americans are killed every year in driving fatalities, and hundreds of thousands more are seriously injured. Should the software that keeps people safe on roads, and which has already been created primarily with public funds, not also be kept under continuous public scrutiny? ..."

A shorter version of that:
http://www.pdfernhout.net/open-letter-to-grantmakers-and-donors-on-copyright-policy.html
"Foundations, other grantmaking agencies handling public tax-exempt dollars, and charitable donors need to consider the implications for their grantmaking or donation policies if they use a now obsolete charitable model of subsidizing proprietary publishing and proprietary research. In order to improve the effectiveness and collaborativeness of the non-profit sector overall, it is suggested these grantmaking organizations and donors move to requiring grantees to make any resulting copyrighted digital materials freely available on the internet, including free licenses granting the right for others to make and redistribute new derivative works without further permission. It is also suggested patents resulting from charitably subsidized research research also be made freely

http://blogs.computerworld.com/15254/sflc_hammers_gpl_violators

http://www.fsf.org/news/2008-12-cisco-suit

http://blogs.computerworld.com/15254/sflc_hammers_gpl_violators
http://www.fsf.org/news/2008-12-cisco-suit

But (AFAIK) if you pay for an open source (as OSI defines it) product, you are allowed to copy and give it away at no cost.

However, there could be an open source license that doesn't allow this. Find a counter-example is left as a problem for the reader.

You (and the GP) have completely misunderstood the meaning of Open Source. It's not your fault; Bruce Perens and the OSI have been lying to you about what it means literally for years. The GP's statement ("as OSI defines it") is at the heart of the problem; Bruce Perens does not have the right to redefine the term "Open Source", and by extension neither does the OSI. That's because Bruce Perens did not invent the term. As per the link, the earliest use of the term "Open Source" that I can find pertains to Caldera (I know, right?) OpenDOS, in 1996. Perens claims to have invented the term in 1997 but my research indicates that his first recorded claimed use was in 1998. So not only does he not have a good claim to the term, but his claim is not even as good as he says it is.

"Open Source" means that those who receive the binary can receive the source, that is all. The right to redistribute is part of the rights of Free Software, not Open Source.

Can we finally put this dog to bed, please?

On the same website, FSF lists what it identifies as the ten most important free software to complete :
http://www.fsf.org/campaigns/priority-projects/
I, for one, believe CoreBoot to be the most important of them

you asked:

http://www.fsf.org/resources/jobs/listing

Although the focus is on arists of media and music, the implications to the software industry are staggering. Imagine if GPL, CC, APL, and many other licenses were deemed to be invalid as a result of ASCAP and similar lobbying. All that work you and I have put into creating a free software ecosystem are for nought, because some some media execs want to get paid for performances by musicians who didn't sign with them.

I donated to Creative Commons, EFF, and FSF for the first time today. You might not care about the media aspects but our industry absolutely depends on copyleft licenses and creative freedom, so I encourage all of you to do the same.

I suspect that ASCAP is not going to ask congress to stop people giving away their work with no restrictions (hence allowjng other "artists" to make money from it), rather they will ask the lawmakers to remove copyright protection from works that people want to release under a Creative Commons or similar license.

In other words, it is an attack on the GPL and similar licenses.

Although the focus is on arists of media and music, the implications to the software industry are staggering. Imagine if GPL, CC, APL, and many other licenses were deemed to be invalid. All that work you and I have put into creating a free software ecosystem are for nought, because some some media execs want to get paid for performances by musicians who didn't sign with them.

I donated to Creative Commons, EFF, and FSF for the first time today. You might not care about the media aspects but our industry absolutely depends on copyleft licenses and creative freedom, so I encourage all of you to do the same.

Well, the primary thing that I can think of is "TiVoizion" (see http://gplv3.fsf.org/pipermail/info-gplv3/2006-February/000001.html ) of taking Open Source software and then bundling it with restrictions in the hardware to prevent you from actually using the software, just look at Android for a major example and phones like the Motorola Backflip in particular.

Then look at the article on Trusted Computing ( http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/can-you-trust.html ) and then look at the Kindle remotely deleting copies of purchased e-books, restrictions on various cell phones, etc.

Also, look at some of the articles on non-free file formats, the same things RMS was predicting has come true not in file formats but in social networking sites like Facebook, the root cause being the same: when you entrust your information to a format you can't control you lose control of that information.

Then of course the things against software patents, the Java trap is now quickly coming to "the Cloud" and controlled marketplaces like Apple's App store, etc.

I'm always glad to hear about mono being used less on Linux.

Yup. I've got nothing against people using it, but I completely agree with the FSF and would never use or install Mono myself.

We've still got people like Horacio Gutierrez (Corporate Vice President and Deputy General Counsel) making statements like this:

...smartphones are a product of the ‘open innovation’ paradigm – device manufacturers do not do all of their development in-house, but add their own innovations to those of others to create a product that users want. Open innovation is only possible through the licensing of third party IP rights, which ensures that those who develop the building blocks that make a new technology possible are properly compensated for their investments in research and development. After all, technology just doesn’t appear, fully-developed, from Zeus’s head. It requires lots of hard work and resources to create.
...now the industry is in the process of sorting out what royalties will be for the software stack, which now represents the principal value proposition for smartphones. In the next few years, as the IP situation settles in this space and licensing takes off, we will see the patent royalties applicable to the smartphone software stack settle at a level that reflects the increasing importance software has as a portion of the overall value of the device.
(16 March 2010)

Do you still think Microsoft will allow competitors like Google (Android) and Nokia/Intel (MeeGo) to use Mono's .NET implementations for free?

The real issue is with patents. Stallman wrote about this last year.
http://www.fsf.org/news/dont-depend-on-mono

Similar to WINE in a way, it's good to have an open source project to allow us to run more software. However, that doesn't mean that software developers should make their applications depend on them when specifically targeting a GNU/Linux environment - it's an unnecessary risk.

"Dr. Stallman? There's someone on the phone who says they're from Apple's Legal Department, and they insist on speaking to you immediately. They said that if you're not on the phone in ninety seconds, the next time they chat with you, you'll be in front of a judge as the defendant in a multimillion dollar civil suit for defamation and interference with their trade. They also said something about turning our building into the Boston Apple Store, and giving every FSF employee a free iPod before they threw us all out into the street. I think you'd better talk to them."

"Dr. Stallman? There's someone on the phone who says they're from Apple's Legal Department, and they insist on speaking to you immediately. They said that if you're not on the phone in ninety seconds, the next time they chat with you, you'll be in front of a judge as the defendant in a multimillion dollar civil suit for defamation and interference with their trade. They also said something about turning our building into the Boston Apple Store, and giving every FSF employee a free iPod before they threw us all out into the street. I think you'd better talk to them."

Note that WebM is, however, FSF-approved Free Software.

The FSF is rather more active than the OSI, and is unlikely to, e.g., get its corporate registration suspended just because they were too arse-disabled to get their paperwork in.

We do need some sort of organisation like the OSI, perhaps even the OSI itself. But I'm entirely unsurprised someone would consider the present OSI just not to have its shit together enough to be taken seriously.

Those terms don't attempt to bind third parties to anything, they limit what third parties can do with the code released under the GPL.

Apple is doing nothing with the code. They receive a binary from the developer.

They still need to comply with the terms of the GPL. You really need to go read the license, read the FAQ (which clarifies many of the misconceptions under which you appear to be labouring), and possible read the article, then come back and see if you can actually contribute a post to this discussion that isn't factually incorrect.

If you can't be bothered to do any of that, I think I'm going to have to assume you're a troll.

Yeah, you just have to know where to connect. Similarly with searching: You have to know whom to ask, so you ask the one who'll know whom to ask and that's the server.

However, I don't think the original poster isn't talking about random file sharing - such as BitTorrent. He is perhaps talking about decentralized (social) networks with peers/users/friends having their own servers (see SheevaPlug), and controlling both data and software on it (see http://ur1.ca/lch5 and http://groups.fsf.org/wiki/Group:GNU_Social/Project_Comparison - the right part of this page).

Alright, I know that a few projects like Diaspora are supposed to utilize this but I am still largely confused by this.

Among other projects wit different aims like I2P, FreeNet, bittorent, aMule, OpenID and many more that could interact together in very interesting ways:

http://groups.fsf.org/wiki/Group:GNU_Social/Project_Comparison

So this seems to imply that you need to either have this disseminated to other peers in order for people to access it while you're offline.

Yep, and you could have close friend in your circle mirror your files / profiles and share them as needed... Or an encrypted fast repository (think, maybe, Firefox weave?) to which you lend a key to those you want to read it.

On top of that if you're disseminating photos or videos, this could get crazy for upload speed.

Well, Bittorent totally solved that issue and with friend mirroring you it'd be awesome.
Also, this would help weed out asymmetrical connection in the long run, giving back citizens the expressive voice they deserve.
(Fiber to the home is the only viable way forward...)

So then your stuff is on another person's machine and who knows if they didn't just take and modified the Diaspora code to record all your stuff.

They have what you allowed them to have, you won't backup your sex life on your ex's computer if you don't want to... ;-)
They can hack all they want, a well thought out system with crypto will solve any such issue.

Can you trust their node anymore than Facebook?

Definitively, why would you trust the middle man more than the person with whom you want to share your data?
Who are you afraid is going to spy on you, the person who you are sending the data to anyway or the middle man?

Sure, it might be encrypted but it's hard to believe that it wouldn't be susceptible to a man in the middle attack or eventually crack the encryption by brute force.

As discussed, don't share what you don't want where you don't want it and use proper encryption.

So you're kind of at that point back to the same problem as you are with entrusting Google or Facebook with your data. Otherwise you need to pay for a dedicated hosting server and they're not going to be cheap if you're miss popular with thousands of photos and that's not really P2P.

see above ...

So how was P2P supposed to fix this problem? Especially for people with just a laptop or even like my parents who have a dial up connection out on a farm house with very tiny upload bandwidth. I'm just not getting a clear picture of how the average person would handle this.

dial up are really on the way out but even with that, their initial upload is akin to sharing it with someone else that might help afterward with spreading the file to whoever else you'd want it shared.

Also, at some point, you can't control the information you release to someone, trying to build a social-DRM system is not going to work anymore than it did for bluray, DVD, music and whatnot ...

The discrepancy bothered me and I think I'm wrong again. I looked through the GPL v3 website which has various drafts and rationales leading up to the creation of GPL v3. The requirement that source code "must be in a format that is publicly documented" was intended to refer to the way it is packaged (a zip file or whatever), not the programming language.

So there seems to be no prohibition on using a private language and compiler, whether in a user product or not.

The section on "System Libraries" does seem to imply that any runtime library used by a private language must be GPLed, but that's not much help.

This project (and others like it*) has to succeed, we need something that makes the net lean toward P2P as an organisational structure.

Without these types of fights the net is in the long term going to suffer a lot from corporate control and stifle people's ability to start new ventures.

* http://groups.fsf.org/wiki/Group:GNU_Social/Project_Comparison

There are quite a few projects to create this:

http://www.elgg.org/ though it is not distributed (they are working on it)

http://onesocialweb.org/ is xmpp based, i have set up my own instance.

http://groups.fsf.org/wiki/Group:GNU_Social has just started and is a gnu project.

There are some standards to help this kind of thing but most are not complete.
you may want to look into foaf for storing a social graph for example.

Please chat with other people if you find this interesting.
IRC chat: #social on freenode

http://groups.fsf.org/wiki/Group:GNU_Social

I'm all for FSF, opensource, and freedoms in general. But, FFS, there IS NO HURD!! Go on, I challenge. Download that HURD kernel[...]

I won't take that challenge. Since when it is necessary to create a kernel to promote an ideology - specially if there is another mature kernel that works for that? Luckily, the ones making that claim are the zealots against the FSF, and not the FSF. In Stallman's own words:

Given the years of work we had already put into the Hurd, we decided to finish it rather than throw them away.

If we did face the question that people ask---if Linux were already available, and we were considering whether to start writing another kernel---we would not do it. Instead we would choose another project, something to do a job that no existing free software can do.

Hurd is not even in the FSF's priority project list. Do you still believe that Stallman & others are the blind zealots?

Why was this modded insightful? As the originator of the free software movement Stallman simply wants the software people receive on the phone to be "free." See the definition of that here: http://www.fsf.org/about/what-is-free-software This has nothing to do with the ridiculous notion that people must write any software themselves (though they could if they chose to). For an example that comes closer to the mark, see Android.

For follow up, and because the licensing terms are not publicly available, here is the FSF's collection of information about the h.264 patent license:

http://www.fsf.org/licensing/h264-patent-license

>>>it would be useful to just release to the public domain, but in the world we live now, your works could be repackaged against users.

Why does that matter? The original code you released is still public domain. Users may choose the repackaged product, or choose your public domain product, however they desire. The novel Tom Sawyer is in the public domain, and while someone might choose to rework it and copyright it, that doesn't stop Sawyer from still being public domain.

Your example is right. About your question, well, you are asking why proprietary software is harmful to users. I know you, and I think you already know that, you might not agree, but you can start reading about it here anyhow: http://www.fsf.org/about//

It didn't make sense and it still doesn't. It's an Antifeature.

Anyone who is outraged by this is an idiot. Apple has a history of doing this kind of thing. I don't understand why Apple did this particularly, but this is how they are. If it bothers you, Linux is a good option. Android is a good option. Stop putting yourself in situations where you're going to get burned.

Unlike Solaris, Java is open. It's GPL'd. If that's not good enough, you can get JDKs from other vendors like IBM. Oracle might try to close Java development. However, it could then be forked by open source developers. An outdated FAQ seems to show some binary only pieces remaining in the JDK downloads, but I'm not sure how critical they are. And they may have been replaced by now anyway. Hopefully they are less problematic than "Open" Solaris's closed bits.

Some people call this an antifeature.

There really isn't any argument dude, as pretty much anybody with eyes can tell that Theora is about equal to H.263 but H.264 kicks its ass. That is why the FSF put out that open letter to Google to free VP8 which does kick ass compared to H.264, at least IMHO. Of course I personally think they are wasting their time, as Google keeps the best stuff for themselves (like their in house file system) and I don't see them giving up the ON2 tech.

Of course the elephant in the room is hardware acceleration. Every box I build, even the cheapest duals, comes with H.26x, WMV 7-9, and MPG 2 as well as Xvid/DivX accelerated out of the box and believe me it does make a BIG difference to user experience. Video is smoother, the machine is more responsive, and even with the lowest Radeon onboards it is just better for the user. And that doesn't count all the mobile devices coming out from PMPs to cell phones with built in H.264 and ZERO support for Theora. Does Theora even have hardware acceleration yet on any platform at all?

As someone who deal with end users all day I can say that patents don't mean squat to Joe Public, all he cares about is does it work, is it easy, and is it convenient, and just as MP3 won against FLAC and Vorbis so too do I predict that H.264 will win this battle, if the battle isn't already won which I personally believe it is. Sorry FOSS guys, but you really should have jumped on hardware acceleration and been in talks with manufacturers.

even staying with Evil H.264, the video-tag/HTML5 is still a huge moral win over Evil Proprietary Flash.

I agree that using the video tag would be preferable to using Flash, at least for just an online movie player (ala YouTube), but I largely believe in taking a multi-pronged approach here.

First, there's a huge quantity of Flash content out there and people developing using Flash. Free Software enthusiasts can't even play that stuff unless they have some kind of tool, and that's why stuff like Gnash and Lightspark must be important parts of our overall roadmap.

For web video we need to start pushing the video tag in conjunction with free formats. Ogg Theora is one possibility, trying to get Google to open the vp8 codec for YouTube is another. I think that there's still a hope (small, but possible) to get widespread support for Ogg Theora alongside widespread support for H.264.

And of course there's the software patent front: We need to chug forward and get the courts (or legislature, if necessary) to get rid of software patents once and for all. Getting rid of software patents would make codec support possible for thing such as H.264, mp3, Sorenson Spark, and vp6, and would remove the threat of shakedowns from companies like Microsoft for things like the FAT patents.

We need to push forward on all of these fronts if we want to make real progress towards our twin goals of free and open formats on the web and the ability for FOSS browsers to implement all relevant technologies without fear of patent litigation.

/pulls up flame proof long johns/ "crack dealers"?Can we pleeease quit with MSFT being the "big bad" crap already? Yeah old Bill was a bad mofo, but he has been retired for how many years now? Ballmer monkey is about as threatening as the PHB on Dilbert, throwing buzzword bingo at everything and hoping something will stick.

I case you missed the memo it is 2010 and the web is the arena, NOT the desktop. And on the web MSFT sucks, has always sucked, and doesn't look to be changing that anytime soon. Cell phones? MSFT sucks. Search? Wow, major suckage. Acting like MSFT is the big bad is like saying you are afraid of Netscape taking over the web. The game has changed, they missed the boat, game over. Sure MSFT will probably keep their 90% of the desktop, but so fricking what? Everyone around me is surfing the web from cell phones, the new ARM tablets if they hit the magic $100 price point are gonna slaughter, and while IE9 is actually looking like it might be pretty cool they are too far behind Chrome and Firefox and even Opera is gaining share like mad thanks to the EU.

So let go of the hate dude, MSFT just ain't got the juice to change the world to suit them like they did in the IE6 days. If you want to be scared of somebody, be scared of Google, who probably knows what you ate for breakfast this morning and what color socks you are currently wearing. Sure they are playing nice now, but power corrupts and ain't nobody in the same league as Google right now. Hell the NSA would probably kill for their info.

As for TFA? From what I understand Mono doesn't support WPF so I really don't see the point. I doubt very seriously anything written straight for Windows without Mono in mind at coding time will work anyway, so no point in getting your panties in a wad over it. If you are so gung ho for being free and open I assume you are using Gnewsense yes? Because if not you aren't any more free than Mono dude. MSFT really can't hurt Linux anymore, as the desktop is yesterday's news, and Linux is kicking ass in embedded where the rest of the planet is headed.

I may not understand all the legal details, but this article: Why free software shouldn't depend on Mono or C# was clear enough.

Ah yes. Because the FSF would never be biased, right?

Hopefully Mono will now be freed from having to track Microsoft's API hell, and it can truly blossom as an open-source software stack.

I may not understand all the legal details, but this article: Why free software shouldn't depend on Mono or C# was clear enough. I paraphrase: there's nothing at all wrong with Mono per sé, but

(...) The danger is that Microsoft is probably planning to force all free C# implementations underground some day using software patents.

Slashdot blast-from-the-past: 2009-06-27 Richard Stallman says no to Mono
2009-10-06 De Icaza responds to Stallman
Suppose the USA keeps acting as if software patents are legit, wouldn't this mean that at any time Microsoft could claim that Mono infringes Microsoft patents, creating a difficult and prolonged lawsuit because after all Microsoft can show past collaboration with Novell (maybe not on Mono but we can't see from the outside), Novell signing the patent deal implying that they needed Microsoft's "intellectual property", etc. etc. It would be a nightmare as long as "in re Bilski" isn't concluded by the US Supreme Court.

http://www.fsf.org/campaigns/priority.html/#gereplacment

FSF is actively looking for people to contribute to any such project.

Richard Stallman resigns from Free Software Foundation, announces bid for GNAA presidency

This suggests Microsoft's anti-Linux patent strategy is alive and well.

For those just getting up to speed:

Microsoft doesn't feel like competing fairly against open source products. So it attempts to use dubious legal trickery instead.

This started with SCO - a failed Unix company that took Microsoft investment in exchange for executing a legal attack on Linux vendors and users (based on copyright and licensing issues). The claim: that Linux infringed on their intellectual property rights. Their conduct in the case was truly awful (making the claim but resisting an explanation about what infringed; trying to shake down any and every Linux owner). Latest status here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCO-Linux_controversies

This was only one aspect of the FUD campaign. Patents were another. Microsoft struck a patent deal with struggling Novel, and it feels very similar to what we see here. The implication: Novel agrees its use of Linux somehow infringed on Microsoft's patents, and that it (and by extension everyone else) must pay Microsoft to use Linux.

The FSF's response explains the problem:

http://www.fsf.org/news/microsoft_response

The article describes other similar cases.

Now we have Amazon making a deal. They have far fewer reasons on the surface, but I imagine we'll find out why at some point, and it probably has something to do with a much stronger, non-Linux-related, perhaps non-software patent that Microsoft holds and which they violate. In the process of being sued and settling, Microsoft enticed them to accept terms which included a similar "Linux-FUD" clause - allowing an announcement just like this.

Although software patents are utterly and obviously ridiculous, and although most first world nations besides the US don't allow them, and although even the US is moving away from them (see Bilski)... even given that many large companies such as IBM have announced that they will defend Linux with their own patent portfolios... even after Microsoft has weathered an antitrust trial (and should feel themselves on thin ice when it comes to anticompetitive behavior)... they appear to still be pursuing a legal strategy of attacking Linux via barratry.

In the deranged world of software patents, there is not exactly any such thing as sane legal reasoning. But as Microsoft convinces more companies to pay them for their use of Linux, then their patent claim gains a slimy veneer of legitimacy (or so they hope). Otherwise "why would so many people pay them?" This circular reasoning strengthens them in their eventual legal battles to come, as they attempt to hurt (or even end) the use of Linux.

Of course, this is not just about Linux. Were Microsoft or any other company to succeed at this game, they would effectively make open source software impossible.

Is this even legal, MS is making some sort of property claims , else they are engaged in an extortion racket. What does the FSF have to say on all this ? I think a definitive statement from them would help clear the air. a statement to the effect that such secret deals are bogus and have no standing in law.

Amazon, Microsoft sign patent deal

Perhaps you've heard then of the FSF? Read here. If they eventually remove it, great. And don't count your chickens before they hatch on what they might do. I have problems with Amazon and the Kindle with their DRM scheme as well. Just because one company does it does not excuse everyone else from doing what's right.

Oh, you might want to check your caps lock key. It seems to turn on every fourth or fifth word.

gtkdiff works pretty well for me.

No I am well aware of the role that corporate contributions have played - like IBM's help with Apache, etc.

Are you really well aware of the role that corporate contributions have played? It's much more than one large company helping out with one project. The Apache Software Foundation and Free Software Foundation have significant corporate sponsorship. 75% of Linux kernel code is written by paid developers. Continued Firefox development is made possible via search royalties. Red Hat is significantly involved in many of the projects that make modern Linux systems useful.

I seriously doubt open source software would be anywhere as near as useful as it is today without the extensive corporate sponsorship and contributions. I don't think it'd be very competitive outside of perhaps academia.

However to expect a corporation to fund a project indefinitely is ludicrous

I didn't say otherwise. I really don't care about accessible open-source software.

Source is not a hat, but this page: http://www.fsf.org/campaigns/opendocument/who/

Totally delusional wingnuts.

under the pressure [of our protests] Steve Jobs dropped DRM on music.

Well, I guess it's possible that couple of fat smelly hippies (mad love to all y'all) wearing sweaty Free Dmitry Sklyarov shirts and scarfing donuts outside of Apple stores hit their sales so badly that Steve Jobs himself stepped in and changed Apple's policy.

It's also possible that when I get home, I'll find that a naked, horny Alyson Hannigan has been duct taped to my bed. By the Easter Bunny.

Dude, having the Easter Bunny duct taped to your bed is perverted enough.

Totally delusional wingnuts.

under the pressure [of our protests] Steve Jobs dropped DRM on music.

Well, I guess it's possible that couple of fat smelly hippies (mad love to all y'all) wearing sweaty Free Dmitry Sklyarov shirts and scarfing donuts outside of Apple stores hit their sales so badly that Steve Jobs himself stepped in and changed Apple's policy.

It's also possible that when I get home, I'll find that a naked, horny Alyson Hannigan has been duct taped to my bed. By the Easter Bunny.

Larry Lessig has put out a video explaining that FSF is the organisation which is really helping computer users: fsf-2009-larrylessig.ogv.

Code Plex was always just a PR move, let's not get caught up in the hype.

• Subscribe to FLOSS & related organisations and publications, eg: Linux Weekly News, Usenix, Free Software Foundation, ...
• Leave the publications around for people to read
• Go to conferences, send others in your dept to conferences
• Get together with related Govt organisations and see what s/ware you can share; set up a common repository; making that repository world visible (may be harder)
• If you produce interfaces for the public to use, fully document them so that FLOSS applications can use them

How about making your own website? Or making a website with people you know?

Not everything has to clone the old-media approach of speech and media as "content" production.

A small PC store started to include a CD of FOSS programs like Gimp, FireFox, Thunderbird, 7Zip, Putty, and other good software that everybody in the know downloads. It is a nice introduction to FOSS for the customers. Now it seems to me that the store is now responsible to keep the source code for many of those programs available to the people they gave the disk to.
At that point I just wouldn't do it since it could be a huge legal hassle and risk for no real gain to me.

You sure about that? It looks like they could just set up an FTP server and put a URL on the disk. (Of course, Linux is GPLv2, so rules are a little different, but...)

The correct link is http://www.fsf.org/philosophy/free-sw.html sorry for the typo.