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RMS: 'Is Android Really Free Software?'
An anonymous reader points out an article by Richard Stallman in The Guardian which questions whether Android should be described as 'free' or 'open.' Quoting:
"Google has complied with the requirements of the GNU General Public License for Linux, but the Apache license on the rest of Android does not require source release. Google has said it will never publish the source code of Android 3.0 (aside from Linux), even though executables have been released to the public. Android 3.1 source code is also being withheld. Thus, Android 3, apart from Linux, is non-free software, pure and simple. ... Android is a major step towards an ethical, user-controlled, free-software portable phone, but there is a long way to go. Hackers are working on Replicant, but it's a big job to support a new phone model, and there remains the problem of the firmware. Even though the Android phones of today are considerably less bad than Apple or Windows smartphones, they cannot be said to respect your freedom."
Marketing: The art of making something seem better than it really is. And sadly, most people fall for it, which is why they keep using that approach.
Isn't a developer free to license something however they want, within the constraints of the licenses of whatever is being used? If Google suddenly said they weren't ever publishing source again, I'd be pretty peeved, but they had reasonable, non-evil reasons for not releasing 3.x, and have committed to releasing Ice Cream Sandwich. I'd like to see 3.x released, but as long as it's a non-regular occurrence, it doesn't bother me any - but i'm not quite as idealistic as RDS - if that were possible.
Of course it's not. Not only is it not free in the RMS sense of the world, withholding source is not the openness Google always claimed it was promoting. Android exists solely to get people onto Google services for purposes of web advertising. The only reason it got so much support from techies is because it runs on Linux, and Google's PR department convinced them that it represented the usual unrealistic OSS fantasies about free ecosystems. Most users don't even care about such things. Apple is still the #1 smartphone vendor, and iOS the #1 mobile operating system counting iPads, iPhones, and iPods.
Remember, Google's main business is a closed, proprietary product--the search engine. Web traffic is regulated by a closed product run by an advertising megacorp. They are not some benevolent cheerleader of openness. They won't even implement Do Not Track in Chrome because it would interfere with their ad business.
Because Google has been promoting its supposed openness for years now, so it's kind of a big deal when one of the founders of the movement calls them out.
Then Google can't keep pretending it's an "open platform."
Small correction for you - The world doesn't even care that it's open.
WHY are they less bad? For whom?
Because Android respects at least freedom 0 with respect to user applications: "The freedom to run the program, for any purpose."
What does this mean? Phones running Android are less bad than phones running iOS or Windows Phone 7 for people who use applications distributed as free software because Android has the "Unknown sources" checkbox.* This lets the user obtain free applications from anywhere and hire anybody to improve them without having to seek the OS maker's permission to run them.
*Yes, even AT&T lately; citation available.
You don't really get to submit to Android like you do other open source software programs. There is a NIH (not invented here) attitude. It is "open sauce". Add your favorite sauce on top of it after it is done, but that is truly about it,.
That's only true if you define "world" to be people who want it open.
If you want to define the "world" as every potential user of Android, the vast majority DON'T CARE if it's open. They care that it works, that's all.
People who rigidly cling to the notion that any software which hasn't been provided in a ideologically pure enough way is a Great Evil ... well, those people are as rabid and narrow minded as any other fanatic.
It's sad you got a Troll mod for pointing out that not everyone cares what RMS has to say. Because, an awful lot of us tuned him out years ago. Sure, he's a smart guy who has been an advocate for free software ... but his completely inflexible view that all software must live up to his notion, well, I just can't agree with him.
To me, he's that crazy guy on the corner with a "The End is Nigh" sign. Most of the times when I hear what he has to say, I disagree with him and then tune him out.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
> so it's kind of a big deal when one of the founders of the
> movement calls them out.
Not really.
RMS has called out damn near everyone with anything to do with free/open source software. I think it's almost at the point now where most projects/organizations should take it as a badge of honour when they've gotten large and important enough that RMS considers it a problem if they aren't 100% compliant with his concept of freedom.
Log in or piss off.
Without Stallmanites sticking to their convictions, there would be little or no Open or Free software, THAT'S FUCKING WHY.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
It's sometimes difficult to not think like then when you're confronted with someone who has a rigid, ideological position, whose starting point in all discussions is that they're right and you're wrong, and there is no room for any give.
RMS and some people who agree with him are sufficiently fixed in their ideology that it's hard not to end up saying "rabid Stallmanites".
You might as well try to convince someone their religion is wrong as try to convince RMS that not all software needs to be open. He and others are pretty inflexible on this position.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Yes, but unlike Martin Luther King and civil rights, I'm in favor of software not always being something which needs to be open.
Sure, RMS believes in it ... that's fine. But not everybody agrees with him. At a certain point, his opinion becomes him telling other people what they're free to do.
If he holds a rigid "either/or" position on if, for example, software that I write needs to be open or not ... well, he can go to hell because he doesn't get a vote on what it I do with code I write.
If all you're doing is trying to tell me that I'm committing some form of sin because I write proprietary software, you're a rabid zealot, and I will treat you as such.
Which, is what a lot of people do with RMS ... they just tune him out as someone who has a very loud opinion, but that it's none of his damned business.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
I don't get what you're getting at.
Whether you agree or not with his position doesn't have anything to do with what I'm saying.
My point is that during MLK's time there were plenty people around who didn't agree with him. But if he just had shut up and decided to compromise he wouldn't have got anywhere.
The same way, it makes no sense for Stallman to shut up, because then he wouldn't be saying anything at all. Your agreement or disagreement is entirely irrelevant, if Stallman really wants to get something done, he's got to keep saying what he does, whether you like it or not.
Sure he does. He for instance can choose not to buy proprietary software if he wishes, and that's effectively a vote because there's no point in writing any if nobody buys it. If he manages to convince enough people that he's got a point that's your vote right there.
You do the same thing every time you decide to buy or not to buy a music CD, that sort of thing is effectively a vote on whether the next album get made.
I'm not saying anything about my own opinion on the matter actually. And I don't really care if you think I'm a zealot or not, that's your own business.