Slashdot Mirror
Should Developers Switch to GPLv3?
Isaac IANAL asks: "Victor Loh of ExtremeTech writes about the General Public License version 3's clause, which requires releasing digital signature keys — in other words, the software should be able to retain interoperability when modified. The article raises an objection, citing Linus Torvalds, that the so-called TiVoisation clause would inhibit open-source adoption in embedded devices among entities such as governments, health care providers, and finance firms. The issue has been discussed on Slashdot many times before. If you're a developer for a platform that needs to run signed code, could you use software under the GPLv3, or does the GPLv3 (at its current, unreleased state) truly inhibit your control as a developer over your device?"
The bottom line is that the FSF honestly never should have been involved with Linux to begin with, IMHO. Stallman never would have become more than a historical footnote if it hadn't...He has been riding Linus's coat tails, and (which is even more galling) trying to claim that it is actually the other way around.
A lot of people have criticised Linus for the amount he has said about this...in my own mind, he hasn't gone nearly far enough. IMHO he needs to publically confront Stallman, and then move the kernel to an entirely new license that he himself is the author of.
The FSF and Stallman's radicalism are one of the main things that still alienate people from Linux. There very badly needs to be a parting of ways. Let the FSF and whoever else wants it continue developing the Hurd...The degree of rapidity with which Stallman would re-submerge back into total irrelevance after such an event would in itself be a powerful testament to his true level of significance.
To any of Stallman's supporters reading this who feel an urge to attempt to reprimand me as you have done in the past, let me simply say that I believe (and will continue to believe, your protests notwithstanding) that the only genuine reason why you are ideologically supportive of him is because you find it easier and more convenient to simply co-opt someone else's philosophy rather than using your own brains. Those of us who *aren't* afraid of engaging in genuine mental effort continue to see Stallman as we have always seen him...A fraud, and an individual far less enlightened than he has been able to lead more impressionable souls to believe.
Because of all of this, Linux does not need Stallman.
It does not need his false claims of credit for things that do not belong to him.
It does not need the division and conflict that he causes. (Which alienates newcomers primarily because the very issues Stallman creates conflict about are things about which they themselves do not care about at all)
It does not need the stigma of being associated with an uncompromising, radical, neo-Bolshevik extremist.
I have tried here over a period of years to continue to write what I believe to be the truth about this man, despite the best efforts of his followers to reprimand me, to shame me, and to do the same to others like me who have dared to express their opinions. You can lecture me, you can tell me how ignorant and foolish you think I am, but I know that I will continue to be vindicated. At nearly every speech and interview he gives, Stallman continues to dig his own grave...he continues to say things which portray him ever more as a radical, and ever more as someone who is genuinely deserving of the marginalisation that must inevitably come to him.
It is time for Richard Stallman to go.