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Richard Stallman: Cell Phones Are 'Stalin's Dream'
jbrodkin writes "Cell phones are 'Stalin's dream,' says free software pioneer Richard Stallman, who refuses to own one. 'Cell phones are tools of Big Brother. I'm not going to carry a tracking device that records where I go all the time, and I'm not going to carry a surveillance device that can be turned on to eavesdrop.' Even the open source Android is dangerous because devices ship with proprietary executables, Stallman says in a wide-ranging interview on the state of the free software movement. Despite some progress, Stallman is still dismayed by 'The existence and use of non-free software [which] is a social problem. It's an evil. And our aim is a world without that problem.'"
harbinger.
RMS is seen as crying wolf, but many of his weirdest predictions have come true.
Viz. The Right to Read
And we're already there with Amazon's action's regarding remote Kindle book manipulation.
Cell phones? Remember the article on government snooping while the phone's turned off? The fact that cell phones can and do track you is blindingly true, but for some reason, people don't even want to hear it.
I'm not a lawyer, but I play one on the Internet. Blog
the 'turned on to eavesdrop" is very real.
http://www.zdnet.com/news/fbi-taps-cell-phone-mic-as-eavesdropping-tool/150467
"functioned whether the phone was powered on or off." "a cellular telephone can be turned into a microphone and transmitter for the purpose of listening to conversations in the vicinity of the phone."
"remotely install a piece of software on to any handset, without the owner's knowledge, which will activate the microphone even when its owner is not making a call."
That was a few years about past cases.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
If only quality were the determining factor. It's not and rarely ever is. MS Office is a frustrating and infuriating product for my users. I have to teach them how to use it and advise them of its limitations daily. MS Office is not "the best thing" out there. In many cases, I find OO.o (and now LibreOffice) to be quite sufficient for the vast majority of tasks out there except where 100% compatibility is required and that's the catch -- only one thing is 100% compatible with MS Office... that's the exact same version and patch level of MS Office. And it's "viral" by MS's definition of the word because when one user goes to a new version, eventually they ALL have to go to a new version or else that nearly 100% compatibility gets lost.
Quality is NOT the determining factor -- in the case of MS software, it's "critical mass."
If you're going to rant about this, at least understand what the man is on about. It's not "OMG FOSS is just so better and Miscro$oft is teh evils!!!11!1ONE!!!"
His position is basically that if you don't have the source you don't have the freedom to control your own computing.
With closed source programs you are:
He considers those points (and at least one other, and possibly wider points than I have made) to be essential for a person to be free and to be in control of the device they are using. A computer is a general purpose device, shouldn't a user/owner be able (within their technical bounds) to make it do what they want?
Now, you may or may not agree with his stance (I don't agree with all of it, certainly), but for him and people like him this is not a question of utility.
Saying "where's the software" is therefore totally irrelevant to RMS and people of his views, because it becomes a moral issue. They wish to control their computing devices, they believe that it is their right to do so. Therefore they will not give money or time to those that promote a different agenda. Just like some people don't buy DRM, or Sony.
So yes, for them, being open source is enough reason. Or rather the reverse, something being closed source is enough reason to avoid it.
As I say, I do not necessarily buy into his stance, the guy has some views I don't agree with, but if you're going to rubbish him at least try to understand it instead of mindlessly bleating about how proprietary software is better. That's may be so, but it isn't the point.
You know, he may be a fanatic, but he is quite realistic with the "tracking" part. If you understand german, check out this animation (you can still watch the animation if you don't understand german and get the overall idea though).
Basically, some politicians asked for the 6 months of basic data about his phone useage ( which towers he was near to, with whom, when and for how long he was on the phone) mobile phone providers are required to keep in germany, and journalists at Die Zeit combined those with publicly available updates from his twitter and FB account and his party's website to reconstruct where he was and what he was doing in those 6 months.
They were not only able to track him, but also to build quite a detailled profile of his everyday life and personality that way
"DRM is like the Ford Pinto: it's a smooth ride, right up the point at which it explodes and ruins your day."-C.Doctorow
The FBI could have planted bugs in my apartment. They could bug my landline telephone. They could point a laser device at my window and pick up voice via the vibrations. They could be following me. They could have planted a tracking device on my car.
All of those except the landline require actions in the physical world, where resources are limited and distances are real. Those natural limitations will prevent large-scale invisible abuse. You can do it on a limited scale, or you can do it big scale but then the country turns visibly into a police state.
Bugging your landline or your phone, or reading your GPS coordinates remotely requires a computer and being the FBI so you can tell the telco to go and do it. Running it on 1000 people is only marginally more troublesome than running it on 100 people. And that's a very important difference.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
No. Because there is no reason for the FBI to have any interest in me
You are probably less relevant than RMS. But there are many powerful interests which would have interest in tracking and eavesdropping on him, so his argument is sound.
But your point of view leads to the more worrying conclusion that, because most people lack the talent or the courage to take a stand, it shouldn't matter that those who do make a difference may be prevented from doing so. Essentially, you're scared of freedom and you resent those who want to enjoy it.
Anyway, as a matter of routine I take out my cellphone battery when I don't need to use it. It probably cumulatively wastes an hour a year of quick hand movement, which is less than I waste in a couple of weeks on.. err.. masturbating? I know I'm less relevant than RMS, but being the activist type (in the sense of organisation and publication) I'm probably slightly more interesting than the average lady or gent. I know for certain by questions I've been asked at US immigration that at least someone's paying attention to what I'm doing.
You have the right to be boring. I shall celebrate my freedom not to be.
It's more than feasible to do on everyone, in fact the latest "straight out of 1984" directive from EU demand they store positions on all phone communication - which for smart phones is roughly 100% of the time - for 6-24 months.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Stallman's answer to that would be "It's doesn't matter". He has regularly and without the least sense of irony said that he would always rather use "worse" Free Software than "better" closed software. This is fine in my opinion, it's his computer and he can put whatever he likes on it. The telling bit is here: "The existence and use of non-free software [which] is a social problem. It's an evil. And our aim is a world without that problem." As soon as one side of the debate has labeled the other side "evil", the entire concept of "debate" is becoming worthless. This is the problem with Stallman as an advocate. He's got no shades of gray. Fanatics make terrible representatives for a cause, because in a world with billions of people, the chance to get even part of what you want, without some sorts of compromise, is non-existent.
Some would argue "Well that's silly, obviously he's gotten some of what he wants look how popular certain free software projects are." I'd argue that this has happened largely in spite of Stallman, not becasue of him. It's only since guys like Eric Raymond started the more compromise oriented "Open Source" philosophy (strange to think of ESR as a compromiser, but by comparison he is), and guys like Torvalds have written popular FOSS software in a non-political way; that FOSS has started getting traction.
As as side note, Stallman could care less about the lack of a VS equivalent; or whether or not Eclipse is worse, comparable, or better than VS. If you ever read him describe how he uses a computer, it more or less froze in the 1970s. He uses almost exclusively text and terminal based tools. Last I heard he doesn't even use the internet beyond FTP (for posting the stuff he writes), mail, and USENET; and he get the mail and USENET from a periodic UUCP connection.
I don't need a million points of light, just two points of multi-mode fiber and a 10 Gig-E router.
I went to a talk by Richard Stallman in London last week where he discussed this issue and others. Whilst you are free to disagree with him, I think it is short-sighted to disregard his arguments as "shit", since they are perfectly rational. As he said in his talk - it is too late to worry about surveillance after your government has gone bad: now is the time to do something about it... assuming you think you are currently free.
rt
But Stalin would also have loved computers. They are the perfect tool of big brother. I mean really folks here is a news flash for everybody. Technology can be used for good or for evil.
Jet aircraft can fly people to hospitals where they can get treatment or carry bombs.
The printing press can be used for the Bible, Penthouse, Mien Kampf, and text books. I will let you all argue over which is and is not evil.
And a cell phone can be used to call for help when you car is stranded or if you are hurt.
And the internet can be used to view websites like Godhatesfags, slashdot, whitehouse.gov and REI.com. Again you can pick which of those is evil and which is good.
Welcome to the real world. Many things can be used for good and evil. That is just the way of the universe.
Oh and China is pushing Linux!
EVIL!!!!!!!
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
a lot of you in other countries havent gone through this, but in turkey, everyone knows that they are being listened. the government refuses that they are listening to everyone's cell phones, however, always anything that is detrimental to the interests of the current government 'leaks' to pro-government newspapers from unknown sources. ironically, neither police or secret service unable to 'find' who does this. it keeps on going and going. even the judges' phones are being wiretapped, without authority. some judges started to buy jammers. despite ALL of these are in mainstream media, and everyone discusses, situation still hasnt changed. wiretapping goes on, noone is able to 'find' who is doing it. even ordinary people started to pay attention to what they are telling over the phone to each other. it was officially stated that over 60,000 people were being wiretapped at a given moment, but, naturally these are only those who went through 'due process'. everyone knows much more is being covered.
it is probably happening in usa, u.k. etc too. but, the difference is, the governments there are not so clumsy as to go on using everything they find out by leaking it to their supporter media. they are probably using those much more wisely. how do i know ? well, the entire listening equipment and infrastructure here in turkey was bought and installed by american corporations.
Read radical news here
This is the problem with Stallman as an advocate. He's got no shades of gray. Fanatics make terrible representatives for a cause, because in a world with billions of people, the chance to get even part of what you want, without some sorts of compromise, is non-existent.
I think hardliners (to pick a word without the connotations of "fanatic" or "extremist") are quite useful in achieving a compromise.
I spent my youth disagreeing with hard-line Welsh nationalists, but I've come to realise that without their extreme demands (which they have not achieved), the Welsh language would have been killed by London-led government policy. I think the moderate situation we have now is about right, but it wouldn't have come about without the hardliners demanding something stronger.
Likewise, I'm glad of hard-line anti-war campaigners. I know there are situations on the global stage where the last resort of armed conflict becomes appropriate -- but I want peaceful resolution to be pursued wherever possible, so I'm grateful that there's a lobby demanding there be no war under any circumstances.
So what's your point? You can't complain about something that's wrong, if you don't complain about everything that's wrong?
Stallman himself has said that there are more important issues than free software, but, since he's a software guy, he talks about software.
The whole "How can you talk about A, when there's B in the world?" is just cheap rhetoric.
And just as a FYI, here's Stallman on hardware: http://www.linuxtoday.com/news_story.php3?ltsn=1999-06-22-005-05-NW-LF
The first three posters in this thread have brand new, nearly consecutive uids and are sitting around agreeing with one another about proprietary software and MS. Just saying.
Well, I can't speak for anyone else, but getting totally fucked over by allowing myself to become dependent on orphanware, is how I became an "OSS geek." Proprietary executables have serious practical real-world disadvantages.
Free software isn't a religion; it's a rational strategic reaction. My Amiga went years without an OS update. OS/2 too. My current work machine can't run a lot of software because it has an obsolete version of Mac OS X and there is no upgrade for this hardware.
The proprietary compilers for the proprietary language that my former employer used (Clipper and Visual Objects) sucked and weren't getting maintained, and there wasn't anything to do about it except throw away thousands of lines of code that our products depended on. (Our solution was: go out of business. Problem solved.)
Then I look at all the computers I now own, and am grateful that every single one of them can and does get maintenance, because they run Free Software. The only way these computers will ever become obsolete, will be if I decide they're too old/slow/powerhungry. (It's surprisingly how many peoples' computers become obsolete for reasons other than those things.) The only weakness is that some of them have Nvidia hardware and I run the proprietary drivers, so some day I will upgrade a kernel, and the driver will no longer exist because Nvidia will decide, "fuck you, user." Fortunately, this day hasn't come yet for those machines -- and it won't come for any of my newer hardware, ever. (Why? Because I preemptively prevented it, by thinking about it before stupidly buying things which require proprietary drivers.)
If you use proprietary software, you get fucked, and that is the common case, not the rare case. It happens to most users at one time or another. Some of them realize what caused their problems and become "OSS geeks," and some of them don't get it, and repeat the mistake again and again and again, never ever learning how they set themselves up to become dependent on third parties.