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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.
This is FUN!
Richard Stallman: With free software, you are free to make a modified version and use it, and free to publish the modified version if you want to, but you are not required to publish it. That's you choice.
Freedom is the key. Intellectual property owners accuse those who copy the stuff they publish of stealing their property. They want to prosecute (persecute is a better term) those who do, fine them and/or put them in jail like common thieves.
My question is this, who's going to prosecute IP owners who steal my freedom?
Let's face it, if you can't put a fence around it, or chain it, or lock it up in some manner, it does not belong to you. It does not matter if it's music, writings, software, ideas, inventions, drawings or what have you. Once you release it, it becomes like the air that we breathe: it belongs to nobody and to everybody.
You say, "Well, I worked hard and I must get paid for my work." Right. Well there are a million things in society that you never paid a scent for and you enjoy them freely. Time for you give something back. "Well", you say "how am I gonna make a living?" Good question. It is one that you need to ask your governement.
They instituted the slavery system that you live and work in. Tell them it's no good. Tell them that everybody should be given a piece of the earth, an estate if you will, for you and your descendents. Ask them what they're going to do when AI and advanced technologies finally make human labor obsolete. How is the slave system going to work then? What will your worthless intellectual property going to support you then?
Trollaxor: Hey, RMS, what the fuck is up? I'm glad I got the opportunity to perform this interview with you...
RMS: Hello, Mr. Trollaxor... I'm glad I got the opportunity to speak to another individual, interested in Free Software, that will eventually reach millions with the message I wish to express in this interview...
Trollaxor: Yeah, whatever. Let's get this over with... Firstly, let's talk about the origins of GNU. We all know it's Not UNIX. But where, exactly, did it come from? What was your prime inspiration for such a fine, grand, practical idea?
RMS: I'm glad you asked that.
Trollaxor: I'm not.
RMS: Ah, haha... You have a unique sense of humor, comrade Trollaxor...
Trollaxor: I know. And don't call me comrade. Or your friend, ally, brother, homey... I don't like you or your body odor. Now answer the question.
RMS: Ah, heheh, yes... GNU. Well, after reading the works of Marx and Lenin, and having attended MIT and created several programs (GCC among them, of course) to which the source code was freely (as in speech, and beer) available, I began to see a certain communal effort begin to take shape among the software developers in the labs where I worked. However, the "administration" at MIT improperly thought that, since my works were created at MIT, they, and their source, belonged to MIT. This was in conflict with my embryonic philosphy--
Trollaxor: Hey, could you just cut your ideological bullshit and get to the part where you were taking a dump and farted out the GNU / Free Software concept as we know it today?
RMS: Ah, I don't think I know what you're referring to, Mr. Trollaxor... I certainly don't remember any toilet episodes being involved with the creation of GNU or Free Software...
Trollaxor: Oh really? It's hard for me to imagine a toilet not having been involved in the creation of Free Software. No, I'm talking about how one day you were sitting in a stall at MIT's grand restroom facilities, peeped thru the glory hole bored in the stall wall to look for customers, and saw a man's ass tatooed with a bull or yak or something...
RMS: WHAT!!!?
Trollaxor: Okay, okay, okay... Let's move on. How about your musical talents? From graphics posted at your homepage, it looks like you're fairly proficient on the flute. How's you obtain that talent?
RMS: That's rather simple: just a lot of practice and determination. The instruments you've seen me playing on my website are plan-pipes, actually, and not flutes. I began taking lessons from my father while him and I were still talking. I can play the flute, however, and--
Trollaxor: Skin-flute.
RMS: Excuse me?
Trollaxor: You heard me. Skin-flute. You play the skin-flute. That's why you're so good on those porn-pipes or whatever the Hell you called them. You are a skin-flute virtuoso and can play them like nobody's business. "Master skin-flutist RMS." Skin-flute.
RMS: Ah, I think this interview's getting a little off-track from its focus of Free Software and the GNU philosphy.
Trollaxor: Of course it is. And why the fuck do you begin every sentence with "ah?" Anyway, I'll indulge you. New question. What's all this I hear about you dropping acid like there's not tomorrow?
RMS: Hey, look, I'm willing to spend my time discussing and even debating about the GNU concept and Free Software. I'm a very busy man--
Trollaxor: No you're not.
RMS: I'm a very busy man and I simply cannot tolerate spending my valuable time digressing onto useless topics, much less helping you slander my good name--
Trollaxor: Shut up.
RMS: I believe we're talking at cross-purposes here and I wish to terminate this interview now.
Trollaxor: I believe your style is cross-dressing and I wish to inform you've been trolled. Do you know what a DGH is?
RMS: What? Excuse me? I said I wanted to stop this interview now!
Trollaxor: A "DGH" is a Dirty GNU Hippy. You're a DGH. You're a pinko Commy too. Learn to bath, shave, and wipe your ass properly, and we in the Ministry of Love will welcome you with open arms. Good day, Corporal Crapola of the GNU Commando!
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You like this, tinkywinky?
If you read the whole shared-source.com page there is a section on "if open source is so unsafe then hack this computer". It lists all of the software and version numbers the box is running.
It would be nice if a MS website where able to be that bold.
Ascii artist &
Yours answers are really stupids!! you should talk seriously, americans are like pinky! (pinky and brain).. I'm sorry for you guys..
"There is very little similarity between our community and the Soviet system. Our emphasis is on freedom, decentralization, and voluntary cooperation, which are not things that the Soviet Bloc was known for. It is actually the proprietary software world that resembles the Soviet system. See http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/why-free.html for more explanation of this. "
Hmmm... I think you have misunderstod something, mr Stallman.
Communism is all about freedom. Communism is about getting rid of ownership, so is Free software.
But to maintain this freedom the freedom must be enforced! This is what the sovjet union did, they insisted that people didn't own, otherwise people would be enslaved by the owners again. This is also what the Free software movement is all about.
It really depends on what you define as freedom, the western would saw it as freedom to be able to own and sell your proprietary (IP or otherwise), the sovjet block beleived that freedom is to be free from the enslavement owners impose on you.
What a laugh.
Saying things one creates or writes, which cannot be fenced in or locked up, are things one cannot own is, well, total bullshit. Do you think plagarism is okay? What if Stallman took all of Einstein's writings or Beethoven's works, changed the author's/composer's name to Richard Stallman and released them onto a website? Is that what you have in mind??
If someone took your hard work and fobbed it off as their own, you'd be pissed, I guarantee it. Source code falls under the same category. If you spend four months developing an application, you sure as hell don't want someone taking it over because they think it is now like the "air we breathe". This is why we have freakin' IP laws in the first place: To protect the natural intellectual ownwership of ideas, the very kinds of things which cannot be fenced in or locked up.
I don't like M$ products, but the answer to their crap is NOT to browbeat everyone into giving away their intellectual ownership. Sorry, but that's just FUBAR.
- Defiant