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Stallman And Bero Interviewed
Juraj Bednar writes: "I have done two interviews: one with Bero from RedHat and one with Richard
Stallman, the GNU and FSF founder. I usually write in my native language, but since these interviews were done in English, I asked myself why not to share them" Readers may want to also visit Bero's shared-source.com, and bookmark it as a FUD antidote.
Bullshit alert!
First of all, they are not selling other people's work. They are charging a reasonable fee for the distribution of Free Software (not to mention that it takes considerable effort to build and compile the hundreds of different pieces of software on a Red Hat system and testing them to make sure they work). It's not like they're out there selling software they have no right to distribute. They are doing exactly as anyone who distributed his or her software under the GPL intended!
Second, Red Hat employs Free Software developers. One of them was even interviewed for this article. Were you paying any attention at all? Yes, Linus wrote the core of Linux, but over the years do you think the kernel would be where it is if not for people like Bero and some other developers employed by Red Hat? Along these lines, do you really think that RPM is such a minor feat? It is Free Software, no? While you may have enjoyed finding and downloading and compiling the source to every Free package you wanted to use, and building your Linux system from scratch, most of us are not so inclined.
Third, I don't know when the last time you actually read Red Hat's annual report was, but they don't seem to be raking it in, like some proprietary software houses we might name. In fact, they are struggling to break even and have done so because they have taken on a lot of work besides selling Linux distributions. Don't forget the enormous expense that goes into maintaining servers where anyone can download the entire Red Hat software for no charge (and they even conveniently provide images to burn CD-ROMs). I mean, have you priced the cost of hosting something like that lately? You have to sell a lot of boxed sets at $99 a pop to cover that expense-- and don't forget that most companies only need to buy one boxed set, which they can copy in-house easily, or simply install multiple systems from that single image.
So who the fuck are you anyway? Craig Mundie? Bill Gates? The only people who oppose what Red Hat is doing are either braindead zealots (you'll notice that even hardliners like RMS seem to be in favor of companies like Red Hat, so where these zealots are coming from is beyond me) or people who want to equate selling software they didn't write with piracy. And either of these is a distortion that is not healthy for Free Software.
If you really don't like what Red Hat is doing, then send your donations to the FSF and Debian. Don't download Linux from RH, use something else. But as long as they are playing by the rules of the GPL, leave them alone and stop trying to infer that they are acting unethically. Free Software is about user freedom, nothing else-- and Red Hat is doing a pretty decent job of making sure that users can get into the Free world.
I do not have a signature
It amazes me how eagerly people will believe that the kool-aid they are being fed doesn't contain poison. Why do you find my points to be so controversial that I need to back them up? Have you never bothered to think about these issues yourself?
Free as in Speech is clearly a misnomer, as Free Software has little if anything to do with Free Speech. It's a rather poor attempt to misdirect criticism by wrapping oneself in the flag.
As far as my last paragraph, maybe you need to go read the GNU Manifesto again:
"What the facts show is that people will program for reasons other than riches; but if given a chance to make a lot of money as well, they will come to expect and demand it. Low-paying organizations do poorly in competition with high-paying ones, but they do not have to do badly if the high-paying ones are banned. "
Are you familiar with the definition of the word banned?
Go read Levy on your own.
Using laws of scarcity to govern the infinite is foolish.
The problem is that ideas aren't infinite in the sense that you're using the term. You can't just reach in the air and pull out a good idea for containable nuclear fusion, for example.
The truly marvelous and useful ideas are normally the result of a tremendous amounts of hard work, brilliance, and/or extraordinary luck. They have a uniqueness that is quite analogous to the uniqueness of physical objects.
To disregard the value of that uniqueness is to disregard the work and brilliance of the mind that created it. Besides being a disservice to that mind, it's also a disservice to a society that seeks to cultivate such minds to create more and better ideas.
Why are you letting these clowns ruin our country?
This nutball gets 'insightful'? This guy has obviously skipped his medication today, and he gets 'insightful'?
I just have to shake my head and chuckle whenever I read anything from Stallman. Does he always have to be so intense and extreme?
I mean, I like "Free" software, and I've devoted some of my time to its creation and improvement - but when I see Stallman throwing around the word "freedom" as though the only thing between utopia and the world are those evil non-free software writers, I'm just more than a bit turned off to the rest of his message.
Free software is great for hackers sharing some code and for people who just like doing things that way. But it's not always the answer. Who's going to write the crappy quilting software that my 60-year-old mom enjoys using so much? A bunch of Linux heads? Yeah, right. If someone wants to write a piece of quilting software and sell it to my mom without giving away the source, than more power to them.
I think the root of this problem is Stallman's propensity to use a concept that's best maintained in a relative sense in an absolute sense. If I have absolute freedom to do anything I want, I can bash your skull in with a shovel. Yeah, now that's real freedom, right? Oops?
As with many things in life, freedom is best when it's balanced properly. As computer people, we probably like the whole binary concept, and we think it'd be great to have something like "freedom" be an on or off thing. Real life is just a bit more complicated than that.
Why are you letting these clowns ruin our country?
The most obvious problem is that plenty of hard-working people don't make enough money to afford decent housing, food, and medical care. Meanwhile, some people who seem much lazier live in luxury.
$6/hour * 40 hours/week * 50 weeks/year = $12000/year. That's barely enough to live some places in the U.S. (here in Champaign-Urbana, IL, for example), but definitely not in major urban areas.
So, how is this division of land being decided, kind of a divide the area of the earth by the number of people on it and we each get a slice of that size?
Why are you letting these clowns ruin our country?
I disagree with RMS more often than I agree with him, however, calling him a 'communist' or saying that open-source/free software has 'alot in common with communism'shows that you have not even the slightest clue as to what communism or probably any other political view/party is. open-source/free software is all about *voulentary* cooperation, and people *choosing* to work together, and people *choosing* to give part or all of their creative work to the masses. Socialism and especially communism, have absoultley nothing in common with that at all. Socialism and communism *force* you to give up your rights to your creative works, and *force* you to work together with others. open-source/free software, to give an analogy, is like donating money to your favorite cause, so you can help it reach a goal, or solve a problem Communism/socialism, is when you find that a large amount of money has been taken from your pay check, and parts of that money go towards a cause, maybe helping out not so well off people in another country, or paying to keep people on welfare (US residents only). So being against communism/socialism does *not* mean you are against sharing and voulentary cooperation, it means you are against being forced to "cooperate" through taxation, loss of ownership, having your house destroyed to allow for a road to be made, the selective service etc. Anyone well versed in politics will tell you that open-source/free software has the most in common with Anarchism and especially with Libertarian ideals. RMS, ESR, and all other open-source/free software "representitives" advocate *voulentary* cooperation, that is, people cooperating and working together from the bottom up, not "cooperation" and extortion of property/funds imposed by the government from the top down.
Fella, the reason you have a high standard of living is because, in the third world, people are working in factories or massive farms for 50 cents an hour and being beaten by security guards for complaining -- and the profits from the enterprise get sent to the USA.
Fair enough, but this has really only applied to the past fifty years- the post-colonial era. The USA emerged from WWII and the Depression as an economic superpower; it's a shame that so much of our continued development has been based on exploitation of the developing world- but much of this based on military expansion, not just global corporations. I think most of the type of abuses you're referring to are even more recent.
Most Americans don't see any of those profits; Nike may have their shoes made for $2 by impoverished Indonesian teenagers, but that doesn't make them cheaper for the consumer. It allows Nike to spend more money on endorsements from superstars [I refuse to buy Nike for this reason]. It sure as hell isn't helping my standard of living, though Michael Jordan and the Nike execs have done quite nicely from the deal.
excuse me mr moderator? could you explain what you ment by modding the parent as troll?
I don't see anything inflamitory and actualy rases some valid pro and con aspects of GUI and command line interfaces.
Ascii artist &
For instance, I would like Linux to be used even by people who sell proprietary apps. If they cannot do this for fear of having to Open Source those proprietary apps, Linux will not take off. This is the FUD that MS is sowing, and it needs to be answered with real argument, not with complaints about slavery and non-sentences like "What will your worthless intellectual property going to support you then?".
Those real arguments could be, for instance: "Point out which elements in a typical distro you can use without having to Open Source your proprietary app." We can be constructive and in doing so, achieve much more free software adoption.
Michael
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BDOS ERR ON A:>
There is value in the capitalist system, I'm sure most people would agree. To me the value is this: in the capitalist system if I contribute to society by producing something of value, I make money. If I am intelligent and work hard I can make a very good living, even become "rich". Those who are too lazy to contribute do not make money. Thus there is a very high incentive to do something worthwhile. Of course, this is in theory and there are plenty of holes in the system, but it does work.
If there is no intellectual property, the capitalist system will not work for it. Thus there will be no incentive to work on IP and loafers will get a free ride. I do not believe this really appplies to free software because it is produced by cooperation between people who need the software, I write a program because I want to use it and share it because I wish to, and it may make the program better.
There are other ways to provide incentive for IP, such as the above, or commissioned work, or street performer protocols, etc. But they won't work for every kind of IP, and there will be big problems in integrating with the capitalist system.
I agree that IP laws are becoming more draconian, but before the relatively recent WIPO treaties and associated laws there was a fairly good balance between the needs of IP producers and consumers. What will happen when this balance is disturbed? I predict that IP consumers (ie. the general public) will become more and more willing to break the restrictively laws. It could end messily unless the laws are changed, just like most regimes who have sought to enslave their citizens.
I'm serious about this - I'm not trying to be a troll.
If software is to be free, then who can we expect to write it. Obviously, I have a need for a paycheck. Since I have this need, I have an employer. In order for my employer to pay me, I have to contribute to their revenue.
Is it reasonable for companies to only make money from services, and to offer the software for free? Are there companies who are successfully doing this? (Yes I saw the RedHat Quarterly report, but that was a little number fudging - they still lost money). Do we just have to wait out a certain transition period before the idea of Free Software pervasively existing is realistic?
Capitalism, just like communism, is slavery. Communism confiscates all property and enslaves everybody. Capitalism gives all property to the givernment and a few super rich and enslaves the rest. The only value is to the slave masters. Unless you own incoime property, you are a slave. If you have to go to work for someone to make a living, you are a slave. If you think your taz burden is only 30%, think again. If you count all the hidden taxes, it's more like 60 or 70%. You are a slave and you don't even know it.
The earth has existed for billions of years before homo sapiens showed up. It belongs to nobody and should not be bought and sold as property. It should not be divided for a price. Doing so invariably ends up putting the vast majority of people into abject poverty and servitude because a few ends up owning 90% of the land and its wealth and resources. The land and its wheath should be divided as an inheritance to be passed to our children and their children. What we do with our piece of the pie is up to us. Demand freedom! Always!
What about *MY* freedom? I like the freedom to be free of possible lawsuits. I like the freedom to choose to release or not release my code.
Why should tools (source code) have more 'rights' than a human being?
Well, he wasn't asked a question he hasn't answered five hundred times. I'll bet I could find decent answers to every question in that interview on the fsf website.
If you want novel and thoughtful responses, ask novel and thoughtful questions.
There is a certain prevalent mentality that assumes the only significant motivation for doing anything is the desire to make money. There are a great many craftsmen (and women, I know) who would not say money is their prime reason to be doing what they are doing. Most of the best art falls in this category. The stuff made primarily for BIG SALES tends to suck. Britney Spears anybody?
Some people write this stuff because it is fun to run their own code. Others do it because the software in ancillary to their true goals. The Apache web server came about this way. Apache wasn't developed to make Webserver Inc a pile of money. Some webadmins needed a httpd daemon that was reliable and featureful. The original Linux kernel that Linus made available to his fellow hackers wasn't going to make anybody mounds of cash: it would barely boot a 386. The additions from volunteers was what made it valuable.
I'll agree that anybody who wants to make money trying to sell something that is free is on a fools errand. However there is nothing wrong in taking something free and using it as part of something larger that is sold. The school district that I work for uses a product called the Firebox. It is not marketed strictly as a Linux box. It is sold as an easily configured firewall and proxy server. The middle school tech guy loves that thing. Oh yeah, and they pay the guy who works on iptables. IBM and SUN are hardware companies and are all for anything that helps them sell hardware. Incidentally, the bulk of RedHat's profit doesn't come from selling the boxed distro. They also sell customization and consulting services.
Open source only fails to make sense to those who sell boxed software. It is a moneymaking or moneysaving opportunity for others with different models. Think about independent music for a monent. With the RIAA gone there wouldn't be many pop music multimillionaires. There would be and ARE a lot of people who earn honest livings writing and performing. The same is true of open source. No one will be a multibillionaire selling it but it will enable many others to earn decent livings.
> The earth has existed for billions of years before homo sapiens showed up. It belongs to nobody and should not be bought and sold as property.
Yeah. That's one of the most depressing thing out there. When a baby is born on earth, every inch of the planet is owned by someone else.
We're used to that. It is not a recent trend. But in this new millenium, things are getting worse. When all the IP laws will be harmonized, the baby will be born in a world where the ideas will belong to someone else.
Slaves, indeed.
Cheers,
--fred
Socialism: Any of various theories or systems of social organization in which the means of producing and distributing goods is owned collectively or by a centralized government that often plans and controls the economy.
Communism: A system of government in which the state plans and controls the economy and a single, often authoritarian party holds power, claiming to make progress toward a higher social order in which all goods are equally shared by the people.
I don't see where we have any authoritarian parties holding power, so please don't compare the GNU movement to the Soviet system of government.
I/O Error G-17: Aborting Installation
If you look in a Visual C++ header file, you will see something like this:
People love bringing up the Bison example to demonstrate that GPL code poses some sort of secret threat to take over everyone else's code. Yet people include header files in their C++ programs without worrying that their code will become a derived work of Microsoft's.Why is GNU held up to a higher standard than Microsoft?