RMS Calls to Liberate Cyberspace

Henri Poole writes "In an interview with Groklaw's Sean Daly at GPLv3 Conference in Barcelona, RMS talks with passion about the dangers of DRM. From the article: 'the point is, we shouldn't be passive victims! We should decide that it will not happen! And the way we decide that is by activism. We have to do everything possible to make sure that those products are rejected, that they fail, that they give bad reputations to whoever makes them.' He closed the interview with a far reaching goal for the Free Software Movement: 'the goal is to liberate everyone in cyberspace.'"

Comments

Re:The people who criticise Richard Stallman...

[dbIII]

The people who criticise Richard Stallman are those who are afraid of his message.

That "you're for us or against us" view is a little simplisitic isn't it? We don't need some hero to follow blindly, we need people with good ideas (like RMS) and follow those ideas after some thought. I for one think the GPL is a very good idea BUT don't let people onto computers I am responsible for unless they type a password or some other method of authentication - and I don't take kindly to random unidentified strangers wandering about my workplace - thus I don't agree with RMS on every issue.

The GPL is something I like after looking at it. Forcing a draft GPLv3 via the backdoor into linux is one thing I don't like - wait until it's finished and then see if people like it. Renaming linux distributions as LiGnuX then gnu/linux after the first idea was rejeceted as being irrelevant and a stupid name I disagree with - but obviously others don't. There is a gnu/linux out there - it is "Debian Gnu/Linux" because the people who went to the effort of putting together a distribution liked the name for whatever reason. RMS has a lot to do with the GPL, did major work on gcc and laid the foundations for the emacs editor to be written (and had some significant influence on it later) plus many of the gnu tools - but he is not involved in linux. The renaming has led many people to think it is a gnu project - so I feel free to criticize Mr Stallman without belonging to any of the three catagories listed above. There is a point where it just looks like MIT staff room politics overflowed into the open software arena and the credit for "other bugger's efforts" comes into play.

Re:BINGO.

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

"What is important though is now when I buy my next computer I will be able to get her to agree to have linux as the only OS on the computer and she is now in a possition to understand why it is better."

The problem is Linux is not better. Its far from better. It doesnt have what windows has, which is the same software, or equal/better software.

Linux is not for everyone and it wont be by the time Vista is on sale.

Will Linux have full HD DVD resolution support like Vista?

Linux just is not ready, or i would be using it!

I need a range of apps most are windows based, some do have linux ports such as Softimage XSI, Alias Maya, Houdini, Renderman...

Linux is a great start, but its not for grandma or grandpa. It's difficult, its odd, its complicated, and lacks refinement in many ways.

Is there a Skype for linux?

Word? (Open Office is a let down)

The reason i ask about skype is because people arent going to easily jump to linux without knowing that their app is already there.

I'm sure there are other VOIP like software for linux but i dont know them, so why would i even think of leaving windows? Its far easier to change OS when you can reasonably expect something out of it.

Right now you can not expect 96% of your windows apps to be there...

You cant break an addict like that :)

Linux is not ready... if it was, i would be using. I ran BBS back in the day with DESQVIEW and QEMM, Norton Commander, Teleguard bbs software, Renegade, PCboard, wildcat, you name it... i'm a computer user...

I could run Linux if i wanted, but its not for me yet. Heck i run GAiM on windows :) I'd run linux beleive me... I just wish it was ready.

It's not ready enough for this war. Yet.

Linux is playing catchup in many areas... but its so far behind in the application area.

Figure this... Linux has Firefox, Thunderbird, GAiM all apps I and many others run on windows now. Thats not bad. Thats a great start for the OSS world.

However... Those are networking programs... and we all know Linux excells at this area.

Its everything else that Linux fails at. It's not ready. Until the Adobe's of the world come knocking...

Look at the windows manager UI in linux... MS is going full 3d accelerated. I know linux has a project to do a similar thing but its far from ready. Vista and MacOS will use this approach to UI... Linux... who i thought is the hackers dream OS, would have done this FIRST....

So do we have to wait now, while linux catches up to VISTA ? How about Flash support?

Linux has so much to catchup on. IF you're a computer user you need to be productive with your computer. Linux excells in some fields but as a general use desktop os for a wide range of applications, it fails miserably.

I dont want to use Windows. I would rather use MacOS... but i would also rather use an OSS alternative to both.... its a shame none exists ...

YET.