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Stallman vs Ken Brown
An anonymous reader writes "Richard Stallman has become the latest person to speak-out about Ken Brown's "independent" study of Linux, which accuses it of being a Minix/Unix rip-off. Stallman says Brown deliberately confused the Linux kernel vs the GNU project, although I suspect Brown simply didn't know enough to be able to differentiate between the two."
"The actual words I used were quoted correctly, but [author Kenneth Brown] deliberately confuses his terms, like 'Linux.' He confuses the Linux kernel, which I had nothing to do with, and the GNU OS project, which I launched," said Stallman, who characterized such mistakes as "deliberate."M
I believe that Brown is probably far more knowledgeable about the differentiation between the kernel and the GNU project but for the masses it is certainly not something that most people know or care to know.
Perhaps Stallman doesn't realize that it isn't a single person making the confusion it's everyone. The whole GNU/Linux bullshit doesn't help a bit either. Anyone not in the know is going to say, hmm, GNU/Linux, all one thing.
It was certainly FUD but what MS funded "study" isn't?
Brown's worst crime is confusing "Linux" with "GNU/Linux" ;-)
Is Ken Brown pregnant with Linus' love child?
*Dun Dun Dun*
How does it end? Tune in next week!
Hmmm.
Don't attribute to malice what can be explained by incompetence.
but that's just me.
He tried to kill me with a forklift!
I'm just dying to see this so called "academic study" of the history of Linux and the Open Source community get to see the light of day, and get tarnished so badly by everyone.
Mr. Brown is up for the ride of his life (probably the last one as I can't imagine anyone taking him seriously after his paper gets out).
Stop being afraid of reviews and books - the truth will let itself be seen...
(sorry for the karma whoring - this just drives me nuts!)
This is a surprise? Hell, most of the people who work with FOSS on a daily basis can't agree on whether to use "GNU/Linux" or just "Linux" and whether that means an entire distro or just the kernel. What possible hope has a shill-for-hire layperson who can't be bothered to do research like Ken Brown got?
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
That was next weeks episode you insensitive clod!
Hmmm.
Is there any chance Brown will just scrap this misbegotten report? When you look at the critiques that have already been made, there's no way he can possibly revise the report to accommodate them. Maybe he should just not publish the report.
Anything worth doing is worth doing badly -- G.K. Chesterton
Cynicism Personified got a hold of a pre-release copy of it, and we posted some similar editorial.
"All it takes to fly is to hurl yourself at the ground... and miss." - Douglas Adams
The parent post is actually funny, because the ADTI site has lots of links to Brown's "responses" to his critics, but the links don't lead anywhere.
Anything worth doing is worth doing badly -- G.K. Chesterton
...can be found here (it's inlined in the article). Not bad, for RMS. He kinda looks Jedi-ish. Or like a philosophical gnu ;)
Honey, I shrunk the Cygwin
Nice title for the book... So the author's implication is that open source is also communist?
Yeah, because doing something for the betterment of society without wanting to get rich off of it is just un-American...
Most of the community does agree. They call it Linux.
It's pretty much only Stallman that keeps trundling out this GNU/ hogwash. Unless Stallman ships a mature release of Hurd this week. (I hear it will include Duke Nukem Forever) Everyone will continue to call the whole shebang, Linux.
I can't believe I'm reading comments complaining about Stallman's use of the "GNU/Linux" moniker, when this whole Brown debacle highlights how important it is to differentiate between the GNU system and the Linux kernel.
Typical Slashdot reaction to a post about Stallman without understanding a single thing the man says.
Am I the only one that thinks of Root Mean Square when I see RMS? I mean, math is way less confusing than Stallman can be.
Ken Brown will make lots of money from this book because of the massive free publicity.
I hope the mainstream media's reviewers of this book are decent enough to mention that EVEN THE AUTHOR OF MINIX disagrees completely that Linux is a ripoff of Minix.
*Sigh* but he'll make money anyway. Sucks that you can proclaim a big lie and make mad cash from it.
One thing that stood out to me in this article:
"Torvalds' recent announcement that, in the future, Linux kernel contributors will have to certify the origins of their code before it can become part of the kernel."
Why?
Why do open source projects have to prove this for each piece of code? Proprietary projects dont have to do this right? But open source projects always have the code available for the world to check over.
Surely Linus should just accept any code and leave it up to any companys who own and IP it may infringe on to chase it up? Thats why we have patents, copyright etc right?
I cant believe that the SCO lawsuit and MS FUD has lead to this... extra work for Linus.... he should be left to concentrate on producing kernel code not dealing IP issues.
Fine, MS can continue to charge as much as they like for their OS, but from now on it should include the source code so we can check the codes "origins".
What is the big deal here? From my reading of the history of Linux and the statements of Torvalds, the entire point of linux was to reverse engineer Unix so that Torvalds could have an affordable personal unix.
That was also the point behind the development of Minix as well.
Bear in mind that at the time Unix licenses cost many thousands of dollars.
Ahh, in this world of uncertainty at least you can count on good old Stallman to filter EVERY SINGLE THING that ever happens through the Linux vs. GNU/Linux argument.
Ken Brown is a Troll, hired by MicroSoft.... ...And we have ALL taken the bait!
I don't care if the Pope speaks out about this book -- we've beaten this dead horse enough.
Am I part of the core demographic for Swedish Fish?
Yeah, I thought that too. Like the late Jim Morrison or Che. I was always thinking he looks like an old fat man, but this makes him look like an old, cool man. The Jediphrase fits quite too, lets recast him for Star Wars Episode III already. ;-)
The thing that boggles my mind about all of this is that it seems like Brown thinks or wants to convince others that Linux ``magically'' appeared in a robust form.
I started using Linux in December 1991 with version 0.11. Stable and mature aren't quite the words I would use for that version, especially when you consider that I had to reinstall it about twice a day and it didn't even have login or a proper shutdown command.
(S(SKK)(SKK))(S(SKK)(SKK))
First there was the Lignux & GNU/Linux campaign, now RMS positively detests Linus' benign neglect of GPL enforcement vs NVidia.
So why does it matter?
Why should we even bother reading such FUD if we already know the author doesn't posses the capability to make a reasoned argument? And whose fault is it if we get mad at what they say?
It is pieces like this which say far more about Microsoft than they do about Linux. This is as bad as people criticizing Microsoft carte-blanche with no rationale whatsoever.
I suppose these articles are useful as flame-fodder, but they do very little toward actually providing enlightment concerning the issues facing both Windows and Linux.
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
A. Tanenbaum has recently posted an email he received. Interesting stuff, in which you'll discover the way K. Brown does his analysis.
stuff here
blah
... I thought it was going to be a WWF match. I could only imagine what the commentary would sound like with interviews from their sponsors/trainers.
Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
- http://findu.com
Another software writer's perspective on software writing. Not quite off-topic, more of a sidebar.The only thing new in this world is the history that you don't know.[Harry Truman]
It's being "rewritten", apparently. Was mentioned in an article a couple of days ago. Allegedly to add in Browns answer to the criticism he's recieved, and the news of Linus wanting more source history control in his tree.
My guess is that it will lose all the debunked bullshit and instead consist of "Look, Linus Torvalds want better source history control in the Linux OS (confusing the kernel with the OS, again), therefore we were right all along no matter what we said! Based on this we draw the conclusion that so there! Greetz to Team McBride and Billy The Goatsex"
Belief is the currency of delusion.
As I read the user comments on this article, the top of the page is showing an ad saying that Windows 2003 is 400% faster than Linux...
It is clear that Brown is doing one of two things. Trying to dumb things down for the non-*nix savvy, or trying to propigate negative opinions for the pervayours of Open Source. Both will cause problems for the Open Source community. People who read dumbed down versions of any subject, will end up more confused than if they read a detailed version but can only digest a few sentences or paragraphs. Having someone who is propigating misinformation about a subject, again underminds the proper understanding of that subject and can perpetuate myths that cause fear and confusion. I also believe that a technical subject, by it's nature can never be simplified for easier understanding. The only goal should be better understanding, and the way to accomplish that is by taking smaller morsels of the information and re-enforcing it more often. So, I agree. Brown needs to get his facts straight, whatever his motivation is.
Don't help them beta test their FUD please.
I wish that Linus, Tannenbaum and the whole damn FSF crew would finally go see a lawyer and sue these people for libel. Given that both Tannenbaum and Linus agree on this point they might even be able to subpoena Alexis de Fuckville's mail correspendence with repsect to Microsoft.
I pray for this, in all honesty.
How is it news when Stallman once again complains that no one seems to get the difference between GNU and Linux?
Stallman regurgitating rhetoric about the difference between "Free as in speech" and "Free as in beer". There's another bit of news that Slashdot can report every single day and still remain reputable.
I swear that man wastes more chances to do good than anyone else I know. Where is a statment that Linuc is not a ripe off of Minix? Where is the statment that yes you could write a kernel in six months? Where is Hurd? Is it done? Is it usable enough for you to use it for your webserver? All RMS did was talk about how Linux and GNU are not the same project. Sorry RMS less talk and more coding please. Frankly GNU has fallen from the Open Souce limelight. Open Office, Mozilla, Linux, and The Gimp have all taken the spotlight away from GNU. Why? Because they are useful. GnuCash could make a big splash and I am hoping that Gnu Banyon and GNU Enterprise will shine as well. I am still waiting for a useful version of Hurd.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Umm, Generally I would say that statement is closer to true than false.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
I think this may be the Original picture source.
He definitely cleans up better than I thought.
Want proof? In the entire review copy there isn't A SINGLE WORD that hasn't been used by other writers, sometimes writing on the VERY SAME TOPICS that Ken Brown writes on.
By the way, I'm trying to be "Insightful" more than "Funny"....
Actually, I was trying to be Insightful, not Funny.
This comment needs to be taken outside and shot.
Dude, you are violating my copyright on the oh-so-blank facial expression. Bitch.
I've exchanged email with Mr Brown. His reply gave me the impression that he set out with the intent to damage the Free software movement. If you want to get the words direct from the horses mouth (so to speak), his email address is on the Alexis de Tocqueville Institution website. He's listed as 'President' on their contacts page.
To avoid horrible confusion perhaps we should call him GNU/RMS.
an ill wind that blows no good
My favorite picture of stallman was in that cheesy Hackers Hall of Fame article slashdot had a while ago that mixed hackers and crackers.
The man
He makes himself irrelevant by making arguments that are, at best, tangentially related to the subject matter, and in the case of Ken Brown's book, Linux REALLY MEANS Linux - Linus never even claimed to have authored any of the GNU stuff that goes with a typical distro.
The Clinton plan included an increase in taxes on cigarettes from 24c per pack to 99c. Understandably, PM was not in favour of this, so a Philip Morris executive suggested an astroturf campaign, writing to one of his people:
If you want some astroturfing done, who you gonna call? The Alexis de Tocqueville Institute: And here is their proposal: And over the next two months ADTI ran a PR campaign against the Clinton plan. For the benefit of PM they documented all their activities. All the details are here.I thought my writing and grammar were bad.
Wow.
Lisa Stapleton should consider a night course or two if she continues to write professionally.
Steve
I was just browsing through Ken Brown's posts on the license-discuss archive. Along with the basically boring advocacy is a little jocular racist banter:
Here's a link. (Original from Ken is a post up in the thread.)
You know, in my old age I'm finding more and more that the bad guys really are the bad guys.
(I'm frankly dumbstruck that the president of a fake-scholarship firm would commit this type of thing to a mailing list.)
Doesn't any of these apply. Seems you can't really make much money off a big lie if that big lie happens to be about somebody else and you get sued for it. I hate lawyers, but this sounds like a good time to call one.
Problem is, that so much crap like this floats around, Linus et al are probably just used to ignoring it. Sometimes though I wish they'd step up and show that not all actions are without consequence.
I saw a shot of Stallman on some Tech news show (maybe CNN) and thought to myself, "This guy's credibility would double if he would just get a haircut!".
... wrong, gnorw, wrong!
There are even some hosting companies that advertise their services saying that you'll get a nice account on a Linux 9 server. I recall it was Interland.
BTW, if you visit CmdrTaco's Website, you may read the following thing... Linux What? You haven't heard of Linux? It's an operating system created by Linus Torvalds, and a band of hacks scattered accross the globe.
repeat with me, Linux isn't an operating system, Linux is just a kernel!
proof:
bash-2.05b$ uname -ar
Linux...
Fatal error. No userland found.
I'm sorry to tell you that Linux is just a kernel.
Go and get gnu and bsd tools so I might be something useful. Thanks!
I think Brown is somehow trying to imply that Linux is an illicit underground copy of Unix. In Soviet Russia (no this isn't a joke, really) and the East Bloc, banned books were distributed underground by copying (not only photocopying, but sometimes with a typewriter too). Samizdat could also properly be used to refer to the famous Jons Lions Book "A Commentary on the UNIX Operating System", which was driven undergound by AT&T because it contained so much UNIX source code. Salon has a story abou the Lions book and AT&Ts attempts to suppress it. In the old days, this book was secretely copied and distrubited by people who wanted to see how UNIX worked internally.
Wonder when it was taken? But yeah, he doesn't look like the scary, dirty hippy everyone says he does in that photo.
If my answers frighten you, stop asking scary questions.
Welcome to the real world of marketing.
HAND.
> this whole Brown debacle highlights how important it is to differentiate between the GNU system and the Linux kernel.
I agree that it is important to differentiate.
But since this debate is aimed at the general public (or at least, IT managers and CEOs), then it is important to set the debate it in terms that the general public understands.
So when Brown uses the term Linux, without distinguishing between the kernel and the overall system (or distribution), then Brown is muddying the water. I am certain that he is doing it intentionally.
Likewise, it's not helpful when Stallman uses this opportunity to promote his own preference for the term GNU/Linux, instead of Linux, when referring to the overall system. It's not helpful, because GNU/Linux is _not_ the term that the public knows and understands, so Stallman's use of "GNU/Linux" will also muddy the water. If ever there was a time for Stallman to set ego aside, and speak in terms that the public understands, this was it... but he didn't. (Stallman could have maintained his integrity by simply including a statement about his preference for the term GNU/Linux, instead of trying to make his name debate central to the Ken Brown debate, which it's not.)
Getting back to the original point, it is important to distinguish between the kernel and the overall system.
Thus, Ken Brown, if he were honest, should have explained that the term Linux is used to refer to either a Linux distribution, or to the Linux kernel, depending on the context.
He should have further clarified that a Linux distribution consists of a number of major components, inclusing:
1. The Linux kernel.
2. The GNU utilties, CLI, and GCC.
3. The X Window graphics system.
4. Other language interpreters, such as PERL.
5. Various window managers.
6. And so on.
Brown could have then gone on to explain that the only part of that Linux system that was written by Torvalds alone was an early release of the Linux kernel.
But, as I said, that assumes that Ken Brown is honest, and that he actually wants the public to understand the truth.
Unfortunately, in my opinion, he isn't, and he doesn't.
Since when is one person's rant about another a 'vs'?
It seems to me that the community has already given this guy a lot more consideration (and free press) than he deserves. The guy is a hack. The "institution", as far as I can see, is an unconvincing sham perpetrated by a couple guys in their basement who were just barely smart enough to realize that, when unencumbered by morals, it's trivially easy to hack the media and make them print whatever BS your "sponsors" want distributed.
It's necessary to respond, of course, and do so in a way the media can understand, but enough is enough. If we ignore him, and persuade the media that he's an uninformed kook, he'll go away.
This is the grudge match of the century. And, in the left corner! RMS! (cheers) And in the right corner! Mr. Brown! And you know where he got that name, right wrestling fans? (boo! boo!)
Or action figures maybe.
GNUOL - GNUOL's not Unix or Linux
Vote for Pedro
Stallman's arguement isn't that selling the software is unethical just that prohibiting others from owning it is.
No one prohibits you from modifying a car you buy because you own the car. But with proprietary software you're not allowed to modify it when you buy it, because you don't own it.
It's like buying a car but only being able to drive it if you rent software from the car dealer so you can start it up. That would be silly, and yet before the FSF we could only run computer hardware by renting the software used to make the computer run.
I happen to have a system here with icc, uclibc, and BSD make & textutils, running on Linux. If I gave John Q. User an account on this box he would not know or care that I don't use the GNU tools (well, maybe he would if he liked Emacs).
Once upon a time, RMS was right that Linux was only a small part of the equation and that most of the credit was due to the GNU team. However, the roles have reversed now: Linux is what is keeping gcc, glibc, Gnome, etc. afloat (doesn't RH actually fund gcc development, for that matter?).
All's true that is mistrusted
Everyone looks around, some point at the servers, some point at the VP, some think they've figured it out and point at themselves.
The VP pulls out an air tank and breathing mask and says, "Wrong." as the giant vacuum outside cuts in...
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
We'll end up as wage slaves for the new world order, thank you Mr. Stallman.
Those pictures of RMS are a bit out of date. When he is not looking like a grizzled maniac, he likes playing dress up.
Personally, I like this picture of Stallman (from this site, although that hardly seems the original source).
He has a more quiet and wise look in that picture than he does in most other pictures.
I first saw this image on the cover of Sam Williams's book Free as in Freedom. For the person who asked, I don't know the origin, but it's copyright Sam Ogden/Photo Researchers Inc. and can not be used without permission (unlike the text of the book, which uses the GNU Free Documentation Licence). The image is actually a rather ordinary-looking on the front of the book.
:-)
In some pics he looks like the quintessential fat, hairy, ugly old slob; in others like a messiah or a jolly Santa Claus. My favourites (that fall in the latter category) are the one on the back cover of the Revolution OS DVD (which also makes up the cover art on the second disc) and this one taken in Croatia in 2000. He really stands out in a line-up
Imagine what he'll look like when his hair goes grey.
What makes me laugh out loud is the faulty assumption that Linus could not have accomplished the job independently, due to his inexperience.
I once wrote a paper in a College English course that my professor put on the rounds with the other department teachers, as an example of some outstanding work by his students. Several of the professors leveled accusations of plagiarism against me, due to my 'inexperience' I could not have possibly created such work.
These people did not take into account that I was 28 years old at the time (I am 40 now), had been writing my whole life in and out of structured courses, and had ample time to develop my own abilities for critical thinking and composition. I ended up having to persuade them I did not plagiarise the work.
It is interesting to me that in a professional setting no one's word has weight unless 'Doctor' precedes their name, and the burden of proof does not lay with the accusers.
Lodragan Draoidh
The more you explain it, the more I don't understand it. - Mark Twain
The operating system has the kernel and the userland utilities. Any operating systems course will explain the OS is
1) Kernel
2) Resource allocator
3) an interface to the hardware via utilities and programs
among many other things. To say that the kernel is separate from the operating systems is just wrong.
That's not Stallman!
Look the the picture, He's not that clean, young, or good looking, and he never has he been so well lit
And surely it's not the articles author, Lisa Stapleton, unless she's in traing for the olympics and been taking those performance enhancers...
RG
Sounds like a big fighting title match...
I can see it now..
*Brown throws a punch, and his fist gets entangled in stallman's beard, stallman corrects him on everything and uses logic on him for 45 minutes as he tried to get his hand free, finally gets it out, tries to commit suicide after all the ramblings, but then is told he needs to correct his noose, the guy wigs out, goes after stallman again, and stallman bodyslams brown,taking out brown in an instant.
the winner is Stallman!*
It takes a lot of time, in a lot of libel cases the outcome depends on who runs out of money first, and the laws vary widely in different locations. All of these poeple have better things to do that they will enjoy more, and it hardly matters if this guy sells a million books - celebrity scandal trash books have simply found new subject matter.
> Minix/Unix rip-off
Well, certainaly Linux IS a Unix rip-off, at
least conceptually. No question about that.
Don't underestimate these people. Their interpretation of the facts may differ (they may see this as a minor and irrelevant point point and therefore not worth mentioning), but they know the facts. Just like Microsoft knows exactly what they are doing in the market.
There is another ridiculous thing about Ken Brown's assertions against Torvald, which hasn't even been mentioned yet: most good, hard-core computer science majors in this country -- even undergraduate -- include upper-level courses for writing operating systems. I didn't major in CS (when I was undergrad more than a decade ago), but had many friends who did. In a single semester they wrote simple x86 operating systems, complete with file systems, command line interpreters, etc. Most of them used C, though the brave ones used assembly.
So if undergraduate students working on class projects, while still taking other classes and doing other classwork, can develop the basics of an operating system over a single semester (roughly three months)... why is it so bizarre to think that Torvalds could something better or more sophisticated in six months? This is a rhetorical question for Slashdot readers, but may be useful in combating FUD in the workplace (if Samizdat ever sees the light of day).
At the very least, IT people who took good CS courses in college should know this already.
$nice = $webHosting + $domainNames + $sslCerts