Slashdot Mirror

So what would you call it then? Despite egregious twisting by modern spin doctors (cf. "Restoring Internet Freedom"), words still have meaning. If not "Ethics in Tech", then what? It's already as brief as it can possibly be. More words would muddle the statement. They've specifically mentioned UNESCOs stance in their public statement, as quoted by the FSF (and appearing in The Fucking Summary). They clearly believe that DRM is unethical. So they call themselves "Ethics in Tech".

Now I don't know anything else about this group (they seem new) but here's their mission statement:

"Local developers, thinkers, artists, and digital citizens will join together to apply public pressure on W3C ahead of Tim Berners-Lee announcement about the future of EME. Our mission is to check the enormous influence and market pressure from the Tech Industry through physical mobilization and community education. We will do this by Marching on W3C’s headquarters, located in the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL), using targeted messaging, protest signs, distributing literature. The hope is to activate and educate the community of academics around Cambridge and increase the potential damage to reputation for W3C’s political endorsement of EME."

The page also mentions there was a speech. I've done some searching but I can't turn up a transcript, so we might have to wait a day for that. At any rate, this group's beliefs about DRM clearly align with yours. So here's the sixty-four thousand dollar question again: Given the choice, what would you call the group?

So Apple fears that the servers it relies on for its business are not fully under Apple's control, as one's computers ought to be fully under the control of those who own the computer. The same would be true even if the servers weren't virtual. As I understand it, this is part of the reason why Google is keen to build their own hardware and takes some interest free software to run that hardware. As Edward Snowden pointed out in his recent LibrePlanet talk this is the same reason privacy-minded people can't use Apple's equipment either. Snowden mentioned this in terms of Microsoft ("I did not use Windows machines when I was in my operational phase because I couldn't trust them. Not because I knew there was a particular backdoor or anything like that but because I couldn't be sure." circa 5m54s or 8m33s in the prerelease video) but the same insecurity stemming from a lack of freedom issue applies to all proprietors, not just Microsoft.

In other words there's quite an irony here: the proprietor is coming to terms with the same lack of freedom it imposes on its customers. Apple's iThings include phones that aren't under the owner's exclusive control allowing someone other than the owner to update software on the device. Some other devices (perhaps Apple's as well) don't allow the computer owner to fully control the cryptographic keys used to sign software installed on the device, so these keys are used to keep the owner locked out of full control (or the proprietor from being fully locked out). The updates can and do come in Apple and non-Apple systems without the owner's consent in the name of "convenience" and "safety" (one must ask whose safety is being assured in this scheme) or (as some proprietor sycophants are sure to point out) keeping non-technical users from messing something up. The technical details of precisely where the non-free software lies (on the main computer, on a modem controller, on some other bit of hardware one uses with the system) are no excuses for not providing documented hardware, a means to install a fully free software system, and thus a means to fully own one's own computer.

So Apple fears that the servers it relies on for its business are not fully under Apple's control, as one's computers ought to be fully under the control of those who own the computer. The same would be true even if the servers weren't virtual. As I understand it, this is part of the reason why Google is keen to build their own hardware and takes some interest free software to run that hardware. As Edward Snowden pointed out in his recent LibrePlanet talk this is the same reason privacy-minded people can't use Apple's equipment either. Snowden mentioned this in terms of Microsoft ("I did not use Windows machines when I was in my operational phase because I couldn't trust them. Not because I knew there was a particular backdoor or anything like that but because I couldn't be sure." circa 5m54s or 8m33s in the prerelease video) but the same insecurity stemming from a lack of freedom issue applies to all proprietors, not just Microsoft.

In other words there's quite an irony here: the proprietor is coming to terms with the same lack of freedom it imposes on its customers. Apple's iThings include phones that aren't under the owner's exclusive control allowing someone other than the owner to update software on the device. Some other devices (perhaps Apple's as well) don't allow the computer owner to fully control the cryptographic keys used to sign software installed on the device, so these keys are used to keep the owner locked out of full control (or the proprietor from being fully locked out). The updates can and do come in Apple and non-Apple systems without the owner's consent in the name of "convenience" and "safety" (one must ask whose safety is being assured in this scheme) or (as some proprietor sycophants are sure to point out) keeping non-technical users from messing something up. The technical details of precisely where the non-free software lies (on the main computer, on a modem controller, on some other bit of hardware one uses with the system) are no excuses for not providing documented hardware, a means to install a fully free software system, and thus a means to fully own one's own computer.

You can see Edward Snowden's talk for yourself.

There are no configuration changes you can make, programs you can install, or other changes you can make to make proprietary (user-subjugating, nonfree) software trustworthy. It won't matter what the "privacy" settings say you can do; the proprietor has the upper hand and can easily write software to rat you out. Software freedom is a prerequisite for computer privacy and security and all of the other things that go into treating computer users ethically. All computer users deserve software freedom.

It's still open, they extended it to October 9, this Friday : go to https://libreplanet.org/wiki/S... and comment! Especially if you're an American citizen (I'm from Canada)

Dave Taht (best known for "bufferbloat") is working on one, as are others.
To make your own comment, go to https://libreplanet.org/wiki/S...

Here's a transcript: http://libreplanet.org/wiki/GN...

And an article written about the keynote: http://www.networkworld.com/ar...

(Thanks to 2 AC's for pointing these links out.)

The whole event was recorded and streamed, so the keynote video should be available some time soon.

(I can't see any reason why the article summary didn't include the link.)

Thanks for the link. I've noted it in the wiki that FSF hosts:

http://libreplanet.org/wiki/When_should_firmware_be_free#Hard_drive_controllers

I don't know if anyone from FSF reads that page, but I'll gather info and I'll raise it with someone in FSF next time I'm talking to them.

(Of course, this isn't the case with the drive of the laptop that FSF has endorsed.)

Thanks. I've made a page on the libreplanet.org wiki and added Disconnect:

http://libreplanet.org/wiki/Privacy_addons_for_web_browsers

And I've emailed the gnuzilla folks asking them to add it to their list of free addons:

https://www.gnu.org/software/gnuzilla/addons.html

Usually trolls should not be answered but...

1) Stallman has never advocated "open source". Free software is what he's promoting. https://libreplanet.org/wiki/Why_Free_Software_is_better_than_Open_Source

2) Stallman didn't mention windoze or Micro$oft. His advice is very sound.

EA makes every day "Fuck You, You're Going To Buy Our Games Anyway" Day.

Exhibit A:

Best Sellers in PC-compatible Games

We begin with the Slashdot tradition of promoting an event on the day of the event.

There are four events scheduled, one in Bangladesh.

The FOSS Bangladesh are suspending their website (www.fossbd.org) with an image banner, focusing the Day Against DRM-2013 and its cruel effects on IT world, activated from today, 30 April, 2013. Join us on a roadside stands as a Human ties with banners, plackerds and festoons in front of the TSC area at "Raju Circle". As it to exposes the Day Aganists DRM and why we are against DRM and DRM on HTML5.

Day Against DRM - May 3rd, 2013

You cannot make this stuff up.

There will be the inevitable petitions to the W3C and handouts outside the Microsoft Store in Seattle and that is pretty much it.

I was pleased to discover that the EFF page for the International Day Against DRM links to 2009's Windows7 Sins. campaign.

Who can forget --- Windows 7 Sins --- The Video?

On that HW poisoning thing, here's some info http://libreplanet.org/wiki/Group:Hardware/Mini_PCIe_slot_restrictions_on_wireless_cards

"At least Dell, HP, Lenovo (IBM) and Toshiba have been implicated."

I recommend replacing "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2" which can be interpreted either as an FPS supporting realistic guns, an FPS with good graphics, a generic FPS, or a rehashed FPS.

I was using it as an example of a first-person shooter with 1. realistic guns, 2. good graphics, and 3. compatibility with a computing device already connected to the user's living-room TV monitor. Apart from hardcore geeks and trailer trash, nobody wants to connect a gaming PC to a TV. Any replacement of console games with freely licensed games would have to include replacement of the console with a device capable of running freely licensed games.

Wow, did someone use the "you write them" argument?

The anon who posted in the thread from two years ago isn't the only one to use that argument. Mr. Stallman is using that argument too, promoting free vaporware over non-free releases. From the article: "If you want to promote freedom, please take care not to talk about the availability of these games on GNU/Linux as support for our cause. Instead you could tell people about the Liberated Pixel Cup free game contest" (that is, claim that a freely licensed game that doesn't exist yet is a substitute for the thousands of non-free games that do exist) "and the LibrePlanet Gaming Collective free gaming night" (whose playlist consists of one game).

And also ignoring that he mentioned it to someone who already released open source software?

Yes, I have released a few free NES games, including competent alternatives to Tetris and Missile Command, which run in the free emulator FCEUX. Some Slashdot users (especially CronoCloud) claim that they're a net negative on my CV because they're close substitutes for commercial games.

The difference is that Windows is non-free and chromium-browser is free software. (Google Chrome is chromium-browser plus Flash and a couple other minor non-free bits.)

Actually chromium-browser isn't entirely free software:
http://libreplanet.org/wiki/List_of_software_that_does_not_respect_the_Free_System_Distribution_Guidelines#chromium-browser

> business is done differently here.

Yeh, that's a funny thing. In Europe, we spent seven years building a movement and fighting software patents. In India, they were proposed, and fought over for three weeks, and discussed in the media for maybe one week, and the government retracted the software patents proposal.

The issue isn't over, but things are certainly done different over there. I discussed it with some locals there and they told me that foreign interference doesn't go down well. Not at all. Red Hat sent a letter to the Indian government saying that software patents are dumb. (Well done Red Hat! You were our only supporter!) Locals told me that Red Hat took a chance with that letter. Other companies that try too hard to pressure the government get kicked out.

The software patent battle there is still in progress there, but foreigners should be wary of their preconceptions of how lobbying is done.

• India
• EU software patents directive
• A talk I gave about ESP and lobbying