Slashdot Mirror
Interview With Richard Stallman
An anonymous reader writes "KernelTrap has a fascinating and lengthy interview with Richard Stallman who founded the GNU Project in 1984, and the Free Software Foundation in 1985. He also originally authored a number of well known and highly used development tools, including the GNU Compiler Collection (GCC), the GNU symbolic debugger (GDB) and GNU Emacs.
The interview covers a wide range of topics, from rms's early years, to his current role in the Free Software Foundation. He discusses the current state of GNU/Hurd, the problems with non-free software, and much more."
This is a GNU/Interview. Get it right please!
Someone should teach the editors how to diagram a sentence.
I guess I better move IBM to the inconsequential list now :\
... and as usual the person who makes it his business to inform, impower, and proliferate benefitial technology will be ignored by the greedy, insane corporate monster and comments against him will be moded up by the PR sock-puppets who frequent Slashdot.
btw frell off sock-puppets. `(
Stallman will not change his beliefs because they aren't practical.
No sane person would sit down and write their own C compiler+debugger from scratch because he didn't like the licenses of the currently available compilers.
Stallman is gonzo batshit crazy, and that's why he was able to start a movement - normal people would have evaluated the difficulties and not even tried. If his movemement hadn't caught on, Stallman would still be labouring by himself, in obscurity, trying to make his vision a reality.
BTW, the market hasn't been slowly squeezing out Open Source, quite the contrary.
Funny you should mention that. I'm relatively new to /. and thus frequently feel like I must be completely missing something when I see the huge /. devotion to the open source world. But, here I am a bright, worldly, technocentric, system-building, wired guy... and I've just simply not heard good enough sermons to convert. I'm intrigued, periodically very impressed with so much of the work, but at some gut level I'm just not sensing the long-term head of steam and ecomonic viability of the approach (or is it lifestyle?).
Most interviews like this seem to take as irreducible truths that people like me are dumb as rocks... but not a single IT customer of mine (ranging from non-profits, to retailers, to municipalities, and so on) as developed the sense that they're on the wrong track, let alone done anything to go this route.
OK, do your worst (or, save me from myself, if you can!).
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
> Maybe he's ahead of his time or something, but right now, his ideas just aren't
> viable
That's not his problem. Or at least, it's not just his problem. You can't blame someone for identifying problems and coming up with solutions just because most people don't understand their worth at the moment. Current womens/black/animal rights were won through slow, unpopular and sometimes illegal methods, and people criticized those at the time too. When people can't tape programmes off the tv or listen to music they've bought on CD (or wherever) in the car is when people will start to pay more attention to some of these issues.
Why is it that the proponents of "one nation under God" are so eager to get rid of "liberty and justice for all"?
The death announcment of OS is a little premature. I work for a large biotech and we see OS as a valuable, litlle different, business model. Sure it will have a hard time with Joe Sixpack who just wants to surf pr0n, but there are already enough non-PHB bosses out there who see the benifit of OS. Just take the religion out of it and start realising that not all OSS is written by ideologic amateurs. The % of OS software written by people who get paid for it is on the rise!
10 ?"Hello World" life was simple then
Desperately trying to find RMS' fault?
Why do slashdotters hate RMS so much? I hope you realise that slashdot (and all such sites) would not have been here if it wasn't for RMS' efforts.
...here is a Gloklaw story about a patent (U.S. Patent number 6,836,883, titled "Method and system for compiling multiple languages", described as a method or "process involving the parsing and analyzing of more than one source language to produce a common language file that may then be read by the same or another front end system.") that was awarded to Microsoft. Says PJ, "The patent cites the Free Software Foundation's GCC in the prior art section." Microsoft's motivation for applying for this patent is: "The protection and licensing of intellectual property allows companies and individuals to obtain a return on investment, sustaining business and encouraging future rounds of research and investment in the IT industry."
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur.
Exactly. The best thing RMS has done [w.r.t. software] was get the ball rolling. I think he deserves all the credit in the world for that.
I don't think he deserves the credit for the current state of things. GCC is now the result of 1000s of contributors and several dozen active developers none of whom are RMS.
But does anyone know their [GCC developers] names? Hell, I couldn't even name one off the top of my head. [Mark Mitchell comes to mind but I don't think thats right]...
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
Stallman may be fanatical but you must be blind. I see companies embracing open source and thriving. And you know what. Open source was here before their was a market for it, and it will be here after if it comes to that.
Sounds like "There is no God but Allah; Mohammed is His Prophet".
I care about the idealogical bents of Richard Stallman. I am a consumer and a producer. Please don't speak in my place, especially without my permission. I shall refrain from speaking in your place, albeit I had beans yesterday...
-if at first you don't succeed, stay the heck away from paragliding.
They should have asked him about his thoughts on the recent introduction of software patents in India.
The subtext of your argument is that (if I'm reading you correctly), because only a small minority see freedom in software as important, free software is not viable. That minority however is important: that minority is a huge proportion of those who make technology decisions for computer companies, which is why we're seeing a situation where most servers today seem to run free software. That minority is also intelligent and educated enough to be able to support free software, to provide the infrastructure that allows it to exist. And free software, to an extent, is self-sustaining as long as someone, somewhere, believes in it. If there's only one person in the world who believes in it, that person can modify and improve the software they have. The same argument cannot be made for proprietary software which requires a large enough market to become sustainable.
In other words, the marketshare of free software is not a serious issue and never has been. Those handing their private parts and a mallet to Apple have more to fear than those handing them to RMS and ESR.
RMS has already won the war, to a certain extent. Free software is no longer a lunatic idea. The second most popular operating system is free software and is just as viable as the first.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
That's why I completely support the anti-piracy measures that companies like Microsoft favor. I just think the MS and company don't go far enough in enforcing the anti-piracy measures. I want every person in the United States to know that installing the same copy of a single user license of Windows on their PC and all their friends and families PCs is piracy. I want all of them to know that swapping music and movie files online is illegal and that there are no loopholes no matter how much they might wish there are. I want them to know that even sharing a VHS copy of a TV program broadcast for free over the air is considered to be an illegal action here in the U.S. And I want these things enforced. Once there are consequences behind these actions, I think people will realize how totally screwed they are. Then I can sit back and say, "I told you so"... :)
-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
You're right. We should wait until Netcraft confirms it.
In Soviet Rush, today's Tom Sawyer gets high on you.
If you pull all the Linux based products off the market right now, I guarentee retailers would feel it. If you forced all IT companies into costly contracts for Windows, and therefore reduced the capabilities of their servers, I guarentee they would feel it.
If you don't care about your freedoms, then you're an idiot who doesn't deserve to have them. The beauty is that if you think I'm wrong, by inference you must take Stallman's side as truth.
You talk about RMS like he has "missed" something. Do you think a guy who has been fighting this hard since 1984 hasn't had time to contemplate his goal? I think perhaps it's you who has missed something.
And on a more personal note, you're a fucking retard.
Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose.
In no particular order:
- RMS was useful at one time but he should now leave serious persons do the real work.
- RMS is too extreme
- RMS is a crackpot
- RMS is a communist
- RMS is a dirty hippy that smells bad
- GNU/Linux is childish/idotic/ego-driven
- The GPL is not free/ viral etc...
I just wish for once all the idiots who will inevitably spout their mouth would just shut up.
Richard Stallman has consistently proved he was a true visionnary. He forsaw the problems with software and copyright law 20 years ago and devised an extremely clever answer : the GPL.
Not only that but he gave us great software to work with. Some he wrote himself (GCC, GDB, Emacs), some he inspired others to write.
He warned us many times when few would listen. About the importance of protecting freedom. About the importance of tracking copyright ownership. About software patents. About the right to read. Every time he's been criticized, ridiculed or dismissed as a lunatic and every time he was right.
It is time to recognize Richard Stallman's place in history as a great modern philosopher.
So I, for one, would like to thank deeply RMS for dedicating his life to our freedom. For standing tall when no one else would.
Live long, RMS, and never give up.
Where, in my post, did I say that its all because of RMS' code? Its because of his efforts. Get a dictionary and look up the word 'effort'.
I mean I love most of the gnu software I have running on my system and god bless any contributor to that effort but - woh! - he says some of the funniest things like:
The Workplace:
JA: What if your job requires you to use non-free software?
Richard Stallman: I would quit that job. Would you participate in something anti-social just because somebody pays you to?
I mean come on. Both free and non-free software has its place in the modern world and I need to take technology to a religious level like I need a hole in my head.
He is sooo wacky.
ACK
Hmm, somebody is full of themselves.. but it doesn't seem to be RMS.
A bit of reading comprehension and critical analysis would go a long way, you know.
As is amply clear from the article, RMS doesn't see his major contribution to be code. He has coded, and he enjoys coding, but his cause is not to produce code - it is to spread the free software ideology. Now, you might agree with that ideology, or you might not, but to intentionally misread somebody's words in an attempt to characterize them as 'full of themselves' is arrogant, small-minded, and spiteful.
For what RMS considers important (the promotion of the Free Software ideology), he IS indispensable. There is no-one else that is as well-known, respected, and staunchly committed to the FS movement as Stallman is. And that's what he cares about, so he is correct when he calls himself 'indispensable'.
You might scoff at the 'respected' comment, but trust me when I say that there are a lot of people (including me), that are not in complete agreement with his philosophy, who still respect him - because he acts in good faith, has good intentions, and makes his intentions clear. RMS is the fucking ephitamy of a straight shooter. And that's a lot more than you can say about most people.
-Laxitive
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
I can already see the way these posts are heading.
Talk about a bunch of ungrateful children...
He is now and has been consistent in his views. He hasn't changed his message. The fact that his message is still relevant after 20 years should say something.
Richard Stallman, over the past 20 years, has done more than most of you put together will do in your entire lifetime and all you can do is complain and make fun of him for it.
That's ok, Jesus likes me anyway.
Public domain software existed before RMS started his FSF and GCC/GDB projects.
But GCC is probably the biggest reason that free software runs on just about anything now. Before GCC became widespread, porting software used to be a major bitch. GCC changed that, mainly because it was one of the first ANSI C implementations that worked well.
(S(SKK)(SKK))(S(SKK)(SKK))
"Free Software" vs. "Open Source":
"...for our readers that may therefore be confused themselves, can you explain the differences, and why it is important to get it right?"
Richard Stallman: "...In the free software movement, our goal is to be free to share and cooperate. We say that non-free software is antisocial because it tramples the users' freedom, and we develop free software to escape from that..."
I found this to be the vaguest answer possible to the question. As someone who is not on the front lines of "Open Source vs Free Software", his response does nothing to clarify his position and only adds to the confusion for me. Are we talking licenses? How is non-free software anti-social? Does it not play well with others? Does it run with scissors? Sit in a dark room listening to emo music all day?
After reading the entire interview, I'm sort of sick of seeing him respond with the word "freedom" without really clarifying.
shame on us / for all we have done / and all we ever were / just zeroes and ones
I totally disagree, the mad poster. You say that people don't care about open source and the ideology behind it. Wrong. However, you are entitled to your own opionon. Just be careful when you decide to speak for "everybody" soley because "everybody" does not share you views on open source and if it's idea's are viable or not. For my self, I don't won't to be bonded by intellectual software. I want to be free. I want to use software and be productive without worrying about copyright laws and such. But for those who just don't care about that, I would understand how Stallman's movement may seem useless and "ahead of his time" as you put it.
And, he doesn't even understand himself. Here he is, trying to legislate what we call Linux ("That's GNU-slash-Linux"), as if he owned it. One of the things you have to give up, if you develop open-source (or free, or whatever) software, is the right to be credited as you'd wish. Someone may grab your code, rename & repackage it, strip many of your identifying marks from it, & sell it for a million dollars. That is precisely the freedom I thank Stallman for inspiring us to achieve, & it's exactly what Stallman, now that he's been eclipsed, wants to take away from us.
That said (or ranted), us Slashtrolls' reaction to this is too predictable. Why is the OSS community, on the whole, so antipathetic toward RMS? Is it because he's become such a dogmatic preacher? Is it that he's always been so, but now that we're nearly on top, we'd rather not be reminded of our moral obligations? Is it that we only respect the one with the latest Freshmeat entry?
If they were able to capture enough of the value of what they write to pay for the legal defense of their rights they'd probably write a lot less free software.
This gets to a fundamental problem with the incentives created by taxing things other than asset value:
Possession is rewarded over creation.
Think about it: Once you possess something, you basically have no tax burden. You enjoy the benefits of young men dutifully going out to die in wars, the entire legal edifice describing and protecting your rights and without you having to pay a cent. You can just soak the public for these benefits.
Taxing everything but possession (income, capital gains, sales, value added, etc) is just a way to tax the creative process.
Naturally, creators who are trying to get a leg up on the situation end up selling their creations cheap to those whose possession is subsidized by the tax payments of the creators.
Well, there is one exception to this rule of no taxation of possession -- and that is the patent maintanence fee. Patents are the only assets that the government taxes. This is an incredibly regressive tax hitting hardest those who are earliest to support the realization of a new technology's value -- forcing them to sell their rights ("assign") cheap to someone who has been sitting around enjying the government's protection.
It all adds up to a very nasty way of sucking capital out of the hands of creators and giving over to the hands of possessors.
So the creators, unable to change the tax laws to tax assets rather than creative processes (becuse they can't buy the Ways and Means Committee) become socialists.
This is directly related to the issue of outsourcing since if programmers who had created the value of the information industry had been allowed to retain the value they created, they wouldn't need jobs. The corporations would be paying them royalties or be paying companies owned by the programmers for the rights to their software instead of just throwing creators out on the street after extracting their youth and creativity.
A system that would work would elimnate all existing taxes (although not necessarily tariffs) and just tax net assets at a rate equal to the interest rate on the national debt -- exempting from taxation the same assets that are exempted by personal bankruptcy protection: home and tools of the trade.
Seastead this.
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." - George Bernard Shaw
Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
What he failed to note, however, is that people don't care about doing what's right. The vast majority of the public doesn't even care about losing some freedom (such as the FCC broadcast flag issue he mentions). What the public cares about is discomfort.
As long as a loss of freedom, even a "big" freedom, does not manifest itself in the form of present discomfort, a person has no motivation to change. Folks like Stallman who feel a present discomfort due to future possibilities are a rare breed, and while there is a danger in worrying too much about possibilities there is value in thinking about the future.
However, since most people only care about the discomfort they feel "now", it will be hard to get political change. We will probably see some soon as there are a lot of people feeling "now" discomfort due to the international trade policies (you cannot blame capitalism for sending jobs to lower-cost providers, even if the companies that do it abuse the power, because that is what capitalism is designed to do. Capitalism is working just fine!).
I'm also not quite sure what Stallman thinks people will do for food if people quit their jobs over non-free software. And you have to ask the question, if people "donate" money to you for writing non-free software (i.e., they pay you for your services as a programmer rather than for the right to use and control the software), is it really non-free?
Anyway, those are just a few thoughts. In summary, I don't think any of Stallman's "solutions" are real solutions as they merely mitigate the symptoms; they don't eliminate the cause, which is basic human selfishness.
"There are a dozen opinions on a matter until you know the truth. Then there is only one." - CS Lewis (paraprhase)
You have a very simplistic way of viewing the world.
If a large corporation offers to move one of its factories to a country with a GDP less than that of, say, Nevada, in return for some tax breaks, do you think the government of that country will say no?
After a couple of years, if that corporation says that wages are climbing too quickly and it may have to leave if it isn't stopped, do you think the government will sit by and do nothing? Or do you think they might move ahead with measures to reduce further wage increases?
If you're saying that that's what the people in that country have to put up with in order to be given a better standard of living at some point in the future, that's bullshit. Corporations these days play countries off against each other to ensure that they get the best deal they can, and they ensure that this state of affairs won't change by locking in countries to free-trade agreements, which are enforced for them by larger, wealthier countries.
The world ain't black and white, and smartass soundbites like "protectionism only prolongs the poverty" don't help people living on an annual wage lower than your weekly junk-food budget.
Amongst the flames & trolls there were some detailed & reasonably thoughtful responses (including from someone who's got as 'Foe' - hi spectecjr:) - & the only argument I heard that stood up as not obvious Straw men, irrelevant, or based on a misunderstanding, was that some developers do not consider the four freedoms described by the GNU philosophy page to be fundamental freedoms.
The best counter-argument to that that I can think of is that it is only a matter of degree; the freedom to study, redistribute (etc) software is less important than the freedom not to be beaten to death by government clowns, say, but that does not mean that the software freedoms are not, in themselves, important.
I have a bad feeling I'm getting into areas dealt with my philosophy-101; can anyone else (a) advance sensible reasons why intelligent, informed people might produce non-Free s/w, and (b) refutations of those reasons.
Please, no confusion with 'Open source' development advantages or disadvantages - I'm specifically interested in the purely MORAL arguments made by RMS.
Arguments such as 'my family has to eat', 'how would programs like Photoshop be developed if it was Free?', "I am free to distribute software I write under any license I like", etc etc, are missing the point. I'd hate to find myself deciding that the reason is that proprietary developers consciously dismiss the moral / ethical issues as uninteresting or irrelevant. I know there are a lot of people here working on proprietary as well as Free s/w and you can't all be trolls :)
"None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free." -- Goethe
You think of RMS as a hippie. One could disagree, about that, but one shouldn't forget hippies are people too. Friendly, freedom loving people with no intent to hurt anyone.
I really don't see any reason for you to spit dirt at RMS.
As I wrote in the comment to another KernelTrap story, using the term "GNU/Linux" (referring to the GCC and glibc essential role in the system) is totally misleading.
Both GCC and glibc are in the current state despite the RMS and FSF efforts. For GCC, remember the situation from the 2.8 times, when an independent team (egcs) had to fork GCC, because the FSF-managed development of GCC was dead. In the same way remember years of work that H.J.Lu invested in Linux libc, because GNU libc was unmaintained and unusable. And of course the work of Ulrich Drepper, who took GNU libc2 and developed it into a form usable in Linux-based system. Ulrich considers none of his work on glibc to be a part of a GNU project (details here, see the bottom part of the text). And it looks like even the present situation in the GCC development is the same (anonymous comment at KernelTrap).
So I can say run GCC/glibc/perl/X.org/TeX/etc/Linux system, but it has nothing special to do with GNU and FSF, and I just prefer the short name "Linux" (named after a single biggest, always-running, and essential component of the system).
-Yenya
--
While Linux is larger than Emacs, at least Linux has the excuse that it has to be. --Linus
Well, a previous Slashdot article linked to this:
_ lifecycle.htm
http://www.moonviewscientific.com/essays/software
It's pretty good, and it explains why OSS outcompetes and outperforms commercial software in the long run. Proprietary, commercial, software will always be around for niche markets or emerging market though.
The OSS development model works because instead of tapping the finite resources of individual companies, it taps the nearly infinite resources of human creativity through the internet. The only thing that could suck the steam out of the OSS movement is if the internet broke down (unlikely) or if humans stopped being creative (haha).
As for economic viability, I know this sounds crazy, but a lot of people do things just for fun, for recognition, for pride, for the love of their work or simply just because the problem was there. Money isn't the only thing that can make people produce excellent software.
He really comes across as duplicitous when he says over and over how he is "fighting for freedom" and then says the following:
... I do not think it means what you think it means.
JA: What about the programmers...
Richard Stallman: What about them? The programmers writing non-free software? They are doing something antisocial. They should get some other job.
JA: Such as?
Richard Stallman: There are thousands of different jobs people can have in society without developing non-free software. You can even be a programmer. Most paid programmers are developing custom software--only a small fraction are developing non-free software. The small fraction of proprietary software jobs are not hard to avoid.
So if one freely decides to write a program and not divulge the code, then that person is antisocial? Hey - I don't accuse Colonel Sanders of being antisocial just because he keeps his 11 secret herbs and spices a "secret". And I don't accuse Bill Gates of being antisocial because he refuses to divulge the code to Microsoft Bob. He may be a numbnut, but whom am I to accuse someone of being "antisocial".
This word "freedom"
They call me the working man. I guess that's what I am.
Is of course the GNU/Darwin. Somehow it is what GNU always wanted to have - a GNU running on a microkernel (at least sort of). (I admit, I don't know what licence applies to Darwin).
You can defy gravity... for a short time
If your interest is more on creative media and copyright then we hosted a talk with Richard Stallman, the gist of which is here:m an0504.htm
http://www.plugincinema.com/plugin/articles/stall
My Personal Blog on Games and Technology and More
"That was always the biggest complaint I heard about RMS: his insistence that Linux be called GNU/Linux"
He doesn't insist on that at all! He asks that the GNU system that uses Linux as a kernel be referred to as GNU/Linux, for the reasons he gives in the article. Linux should be called Linux all day long when the topic of conversation is Linux (ie. the Kernel).
Are people deliberately being ignorant on this matter or is there a problem with their hearing or reading skills? I can't imagine the issue being explained more clearly than in the interview.
There is trade and then there is trade. In one case you have a bunch of totally psychopatic and anti-social artificial personalities called corporations seeking to abuse differences in income between countries to make less then 1% if US population even richer and on the other hand you have attempts to control the flow of goods and services in order to ensure that the local populations' standard of living actually goes up as trade increases and the standard of living of the country to which the goods are exported does not decrease as a result.
Yes I do buy into the Naomi Klein "BS" as well as many other people who thought these sort of things do. It is the prophets of Ayn Randish unrestricted capitalism that is creating such economic wonderlands as Iraq who are in the wrong on this one.
And what a kernel. Personally I doubt it boils down to monolithic vs micro kernels or other architecture decisions. I reckon simply that Linux was seen as a dynamic development process driven by practical requirements rather than politics. An example of this is Linus' decision to use non-GPL SCM tools for developing the kernel, simply because they were better than the free alternatives.
Frankly nothing about HURD supports any notion that Linux is ultimately doomed. It's a hobbiests OS that feels like Linux ten years ago but without any clear purpose. I can't see any possible benefit for using it, except for someone who wants to play with a GPL'd Mach kernel. All other cited reasons such as the supposed stability benefits have long since been disproven.
Interesting how one must choose to license their program under the GNU GPL and one must choose to distribute GPL-covered programs, yet "the GPL forces [RMS']" view of free software on others.
There's no force involved. If you don't like the GPL, don't choose to distribute programs licensed under it. There are entire free software operating systems written by people who are working hard to rewrite GPL-covered programs because they don't like the strong copyleft implemented in the GPL.
Quite to the contrary of what you're saying, the reason the BSD licenses qualify as free software licenses is because they grant the licensee the freedoms free software talks about.
Digital Citizen
"Legislate" is the wrong term. It's best desribed as "asking." He's asking you to call it GNU/Linux. That's all. You don't have to do it, you don't have to listen. But he's asking you.
He doesn't want to take it away from you. He never says that, and he says quite the opposite.
From his site:
"Why not sue people who call the whole system "Linux"?
There are no legal grounds to sue them, but since we believe in freedom of speech, we wouldn't want to do that anyway. We ask people to call the system "GNU/Linux" because that is the right thing to do.
Shouldn't you put something in the GNU GPL to require people to call the system "GNU"?
The purpose of the GNU GPL is to protect the users' freedom from those who would make proprietary versions of free software. While it is true that those who call the system "Linux" often do things that limit the users' freedom, such as bundling non-free software with the GNU/Linux system or even developing non-free software for such use, the mere act of calling the system "Linux" does not, in itself, deny users their freedom. It seems improper to make the GPL restrict what name people can use for the system."
Could that be any clearer?
Well, this is linked to from the project front page, plus there's the MAINTAINERS file in the top of the source tree (although that lists the active maintainers and their responsibilities, not everybody-at-any-time-ever). Yah, Mark's one of them.
GCC isn't like the Linux kernel, where the development teams are formed around cults of personalities, and /.ers eagerly congregate to hear the heated flame wars between their favorites. :-) The GCC people are way milder, way less vitriolic, and as a result, don't make the tabloid news.
The inflammatory statements made on LKML concern stuff like DRM and proprietary drivers and things about which more Linux users actually care (or even understand). Inflammatory statements on the GCC list are of the kind which only arouse the ire of other compiler geeks. We can almost get into fistfights at the annual summit over whether a combined CSE and DCE pass should be done even when optimization is off ("the Laffer curve argues for-" "bah, users shouldn't notice!"), but nobody on /. will care. *grin*
You cannot apply a technological solution to a sociological problem. (Edwards' Law)
It's an interesting paradox that to make free software the universal norm, you would have to take away people's freedom to make non-free software. Either way, freedom can't be total.
So.. it has come to this
Stallman constantly talks about the freedom of users. What about the freedom of programmers? By this I mean the freedom to decide whether to publish your source or not, to charge money for your work or not. That concept never enters his lexicon. Yes, he has made huge contributions to computing over the years. No, he is not always right.
charging money for software to cover costs and run a business. Everyone is free to buy it or not. I worked for 12 years on a software package that assists and optimizes the manufacture of printed circuit boards. It has become very difficult to produce PCBs without this type of software. It would never have been developed as free software. Custom "one-off" solutions would force hardware manufacturers out of their expertise. Without charging for software I'm guessing there would be alot fewer choice we'd be able to make.
Summary of this entire thread: The Richard Stallman "I Love Me" Thread.
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
I do not deny big RMS and FSF contributions to GCC, glibc, and of course the GPL. Yes, they get (part of) the ball rolling. But this does not justify their requests to use the term "GNU/Linux". DEC's (and X Consortium) contribution was of the same magnitude, because without the good graphical interface Linux (and any of *BSDs) would be nowhere near the current state. Yet they do not demand the term "xc/Linux" should be used.
If they recognize the changes as good and accept them back into their code base, that is their right, and that is how free software projects work.
In fact this is precisely the way Open source projects work. I.e. judging the code by its quality instead of some "political" reasons.
Do not get me wrong - I consider freedoms I have from using (and writing) the GPL-licensed code to be very valuable. Let me repeat that: I agree that without RMS (and FSF) we would be nowhere near the current state. But this is about as true for RMS/FSF/GNU as is for Linus Torvalds, Alan Cox et al./Linux, Jim Gettys et al./DEC/X Consortium, */Apache project, and many others (Ken Thompson and Dennis Ritchie did not contribute much of the code for my system, but they created an excellent API and design; the same for Internet protocol authors, and so on). But nobody except RMS does request that I use the term their project name/Linux. And, unfortunately, the present FSF efforts with respect to GCC and glibc looks less than nice to me.
Currently I can switch the kernel I use for something else (*BSD, may be even HURD) the same way as I can switch my glibc (to dietlibc, for example), and GCC (to Intel CC or lcc). I use Linux, GCC, glibc, Perl, xorg/X11, etc., because they best fit my needs. GNU project is nothing special in this.
-Yenya
--
While Linux is larger than Emacs, at least Linux has the excuse that it has to be. --Linus
Yeah. That's the point of freedom. You don't get to make decisions for somebody else.
Enforcement of high labor standards in rich countries is a good thing. It imposes higher costs on employers, prompting them to move jobs that become unsustainable under such a regime to more permissive regulatory environments. This increases the demand for labour in these economies and as a result decreases the substitutional value of labor standards in this new regulatory environment, prompting improved conditions of work.
The point being that when you say:
you are largely correct. But unrestricted trade and enforcement of labor standards are not mutually exclusive and the notion that they have to be is fallacy on the part of Ms Klein, a lot of corporations that threaten to outsource jobs if they are not given a free reign of labor standards, and in this case, you.
When a true genius appears in this world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are all in confederacy against him. - Jonathan Swift
If you have the time of inclination, check out the novel Confederacy of Dunces.
The "free" argument needs some clarification. I think it's too easy to read these sorts of interviews and come away thinking that "free" means:
1)Source Code
2)The right to do ANYTHING you want with said code
I get the feeling that it's more that the code should be provided, and you can do whatever you like with said code on your own machine, but the original author has the right to limit other rights like distribution or sale. I say this because it simply makes sense to me. To say that if you're going to write a program that is meant to be distributed, you should be required to provide all code and give up all rights of ownership over said code seems to discourage serious development of anything overly complex in anything close to a timely fashion.
Freedom is all well and good, but who would have preferred we never had proprietary software to begin with? How far behind current standards would we be if companies like Apple and Microsoft had not pushed the GUI as they did? Where would modern word processing be if it weren't for WordPerfect and Office? Most free software out there now is working to emulate non-free equivalents. Does the FS/OS community have the vision to pioneer technology instead of immitate?
It's too easy to say "Apple bad! Microsoft immoral! They no give code free!" Dislike the giants all you want, but they accomplished in a few years what has taken us geeks decades to do in our free communities.
There is a place for Free as well as Non-Free software. To say one is inherently superior to another is simply ridiculous. To say one is immoral by it's nature makes you sound like a self-important maniac.
Since when should geniuses only work on that area in which they express their genius abilities? Also, RMS is upfront about what free software won't do. After explaining the way in which businesses turn the Phillipine 2-year exemption from labor into a perpetual exemption by closing up shop and establishing a new business every 2 years, RMS is asked: (emphasis mine)
It sounds to me like he realizes the limitations of free software and is quick to answer as such. If you listen to his speeches, you'll also hear him respond that if he knew a way to help get corporate money out of political campaigns, he would work on that and nothing would make him more proud. This too is not a problem free software can solve alone, perhaps playing a minor role in making such a thing happen, but it is critical that we work on this when we consider the amount of power that comes with campaign donations and how much more money multinational corporations have to put into campaigns than most ordinary people.
Digital Citizen
I do not deny big RMS and FSF contributions to GCC, glibc, and of course the GPL. Yes, they get (part of) the ball rolling. But this does not justify their requests to use the term "GNU/Linux". DEC's (and X Consortium) contribution was of the same magnitude, because without the good graphical interface Linux (and any of *BSDs) would be nowhere near the current state. Yet they do not demand the term "xc/Linux" should be used.
But I would still be happily using the free software I have, and who knows what technical advancements would have replaced them. I used and valued DEC software long before there was a GUI, and the GUI isn't the indispensible piece for me that you seem to think it is, even assuming nothing else would have taken it's place. Believe me, DEC's GUIs were never worth writing home about. I do not run a GUI on my most important systems today, which is freedom that free software gives me with no contribution from DEC. DEC wrote all kinds of wonderful compilers as well as operating systems but were never philanthropic enough to allow me to use them freely. The UI was not much of an intentional contribution which you would understand if you ever licensed software from them, including their DEC adaptations of the UI.
DEC's contribution was at most a technical contribution to a narrow part of the system. I do not find this comparable to the FSF contribution.
Linus already gets all the credit, some of which he deserves for the kernel. Alan Cox contributes under his Linux kernel banner. Linus does not seem to value freedom and GPL (based upon past actions) to the extent it is merited. And what does the Apache Foundation have to do at all with Linux distributions or free software?
While the Linux kernel may be substitutable, I have never found the GPL, GNU utilities and other things as substitutable.
Linus seems to believe that the technology is more important than the freedom (as he has clearly expressed WRT bitkeeper and on many other occasions), which is part of why they tend to undervalue the GNU contribution. I suspect Linus is coming to value it a bit more with the SCO nonsense.
That is why I respect the idea that being forced to use non-free software where reasonable alternatives exist could easily be reason enough to change jobs.
It's a shame that Stallman seems to be mostly interested in bashing the Open Source movement.
1. Open Source is more like Microsoft than GNU:
"The open source movement promotes what they consider a technically superior development model that usually gives technically superior results. The values they cite are the same ones Microsoft appeals to: narrowly practical values."
2. Linus Torvalds is a corrupting influence:
"People know that Linus Torvalds wrote his program Linux to have fun. And people know that Linus Torvalds did not say that it's wrong to stop users for sharing and changing the software they use. If they think that our system was started by him and primarily owes existence to him, they will tend to follow his philosophy, and that weakens our community."
So if one freely decides to write a program and not divulge the code, then that person is antisocial? Hey - I don't accuse Colonel Sanders of being antisocial just because he keeps his 11 secret herbs and spices a "secret". And I don't accuse Bill Gates of being antisocial because he refuses to divulge the code to Microsoft Bob. He may be a numbnut, but whom am I to accuse someone of being "antisocial".
When Stallman says "social", he is going to the root of the term - talking about society.
How is it NOT harmful to society to have any one thing controlled by one person alone? How is it not harmful to have myriads of documents that are in a format no-one but Microsoft can REALLY read. How is it not harmful to have many video files that one company can control weither you see or not? How is it not harmful that you have an OS that millions of people use every day and yet are not able to modify in such a way that it is secure or built to thier satisfaction?
So anti-social, in terms of being bad for society - yes Bill Gates is Anti-Social. Just as are car companies that try to make sure you cannot repair or modify a car away from a dealer.
If you like, think of this in terms of dependancy. You are reliant on Microsoft for care and feeding of your OS, if Microsoft every went south or in a direction you did not like you are reliant on thier good graces to get a job done you could do before. But a healthier mode of existance is a compartmentalized one, an encapsulation if you will of the tools that you use that isolates your dependance from the tool makers. A socket wrench I bought 20 years ago still works to turn a bolt, but really no software I BOUGHT twenty years ago is still viable - the only software I used fifteen years ago or so that I still use today is Free Software. There is a message in that truth.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
just because we are competing with proprietary software on issues of technical merit doesn't mean we think people should choose the program for source control based on technical qualities alone. That would mean assigning zero value to freedom itself. If you value freedom, you will resist the temptation to use a program that takes away your freedom, whatever technical advantages it may have.
Proprietary software is unethical, because it denies the user the basic freedom to control her own computer and to cooperate. It may also be of low quality or insecure, but that's a secondary issue. I will reject it even if it is the best quality in the world, simply because I value my freedom too much to give it up for that.
That is in addition to the constant insistance on not useing binary drivers for hardware, which is also again in that article. The only freedom that I'm interested in is the freedom to choose what works. I don't need to see the source, it is useless to me. If it doesn't work or it only partially does what I need it to, it might as well not exist.
"I use a Mac because I'm just better than you are."
"My freedom is not in jeopardy because I elected to use MacOS X on an Apple G5 (my wallet was but not not my freedom)."
I'm sorry but you are wrong here, you are at Apple mercy. If they choose to drop the support for the OS, to stop the development, or to include a backdoor in their OS you have no say in that matter.
"Stallman presumes that his intelligence and knowledge give him the right to not respect the boundaries of others."
I'm sorry but I can't see where he steps over the boundaries of others, but I clearly see where you do exactly that when you imply that he suffers from Asperger's Syndrome.
"It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities." -- Prof. Dumbledore
First, there is the good old "free as in freedom (libre)" vs. "free as in beer". I think most slashdotters get that distinction.
Here's the thing, though. There can't be unlimited freedom (libre). If I were free to do anything I feel like, that impinges on your freedoms. My desired right to punch you in the face impinges on your right to personal security. These freedoms cannot coexist.
Upshot: which freedoms do you fight for, which do you value? Which has priority, which is right? Should people and/or corporations be free to earn an exclusive revenue stream from a creative or useful work that fits in the "IP" category? Or should there be, rather, unrestricted freedom to copy said works? Should a corporation/person be free to distribute a program as binary only, or must the public be free to view the source code?
I'm not trying to be redundant (as this may seem obvious to some), and I'm not trying to get everyone to repeat themselves in reply to my post. I'm just stating what I see to be an underlying theme in the discussion, which I think sometimes gets murky when people on multiple sides of the issue all argue for "freedom".
R. Stallman gets enough money and fame, alright. What about the thousands of the silent hard-working geeks toiling away for nothing? Toiling away for the "businessmen" network more easily, and "yuppies" make more money, and "party animals" to have a better sex life? The geeks gave it all away, and got nothing back. When I try to buy an apartment, nobody cares how much software I gave away. When I buy a car, nobody cares how much software I gave away. This "freedom" stuff has been going on for a while, and everyone benefitted, except for us. Take a look at The Rat and the Butterfly.
Yes, but OTOH, if Apple wants to improve that software, then they are working for me for free also. Just see what's happening with KHTML/Safari.
It's not slavery if you get to keep (and share) the fruits of your labor.
I believe that one of the reasons that Open Source is winning the terminology war with FSF is because it actually supports more freedom, while pointing out the real benefits of this model.
I can't believe can programmer he doesn't get the fact that gnu linux spell like NEW Linux and every one I know who heard that has always answered : what ? there's a new linux ?,
He not pronounce the GNU "NU", it is be pronounced "GUH-NU". The G-letter be's not silent so. Feel bad, don't. Even the people speak the English got wrong this one often.
To ensure perfect aim, shoot first and call whatever you hit the target
What you have described is accurate, except for one thing: this is not "free trade", nor is it capitalism. Unfortunately, such terms have been co-opted to mean things very different from their original definitions.
The "free trade" agreements we hear about today are really sets of regulations that countries agree to impose. But regulated trade is the opposite of free trade. This is our modern doublespeak.
To take your example: the corporation in question only succeeds in lowering wages through government. But if the economy was truly free, the government wouldn't be getting involved, and certainly wouldn't be dictating wages.
Capitalism = market economy, laissez faire
Fascism = government/business partnership
Now I ask: what part of our economy isn't up to its eyeballs in government involvement? So which system do we have? Apply the same reasoning to international affairs, and what we have is mercantilism, not free trade.
"The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern. Every class is unfit to govern." - Lord Acton
It is only a passing observation but it seems that the rhetoric (obsessive usage of the word "freedom") is strikingly like the current US white house. I am not trolling here, I am only observing how an effective speaker like Stallman has to adapt to the climate in order to "sell" his ideas.
they don't insist that we say TEE SEE PEE SLASH EYE PEE
Hey, I did Linux in the 90s too. My computer teacher saw that I wasn't like the other kids, so he let me play with old hardware instead of following the regular program. I installed Slackware on it and learned tons. I don't see how this has anything to do with your geek credentials, though.
I'm just saying RMS seems to be this very opinionated guy. He seems obsessed and overdramatisizes everything. I'm not the only one who thinks he's harming more than he's helping with his attitude.
Why does it have to be so that every time there is a disagreement, ever so civilized, on Slashdot, somebody has to shout "idiot"? Isn't it possible to be factual? This is the sort of thing that makes me read Slashdot comments more for the sake of contemptuous entertainment than true insight.
Did I claim that installing Slackware on derelict hardware makes for "geek cred"? Did I claim to be a "geek?" I am not a "geek." Following instructions like a good little trained ape and installing Slackware doesn't classify for any credentials. What did you do when /your/ kernel didn't recognise the hard-drive? I know what I did, I hacked it so it would.
Yes, Richard M. Stallman is a very opinionated guy. Thats just how visionaries are. As a visionary he is very good, unlike the dorques who keep proclaiming "200X will teh year of the Lo0nix." And unlike the soap-box material over at Wired, he made his mark on the world. He created the FSF, the GPL and a ton of software you likely use. Please tell me, ThJ, what contributions have you made so far that give you +v to claim Stallman as "obsessed" "overdramatic" and "harming more than helping?" Harming? Don't make me laugh. He created that which you claim he is harming. Of course you're not the only one who thinks that RMS doesn't belong. A thousand years ago you wouldn't be the only one thinking the world was flat too.