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After 30 Years of the Free Software Foundation, Where Do We Stand?

Posted by samzenpus on from the what's-changed? dept.

An anonymous reader writes with this interview with John Sullivan, Executive Director of The Free Software Foundation. "There is a growing concern about government surveillance. At the same time, those of us who live and breathe technology do so because it provides us with a service and freedom to share our lives with others. There is a tacit assumption that once we leave the store, the device we have in our pocket, backpack, or desk is ours. We buy a computer, a tablet, a smartphone, and we use applications and apps without even thinking about who really owns the tools and whether we truly own any of it. You purchase a device, yet you are not free to modify it or the software on it in any way. It begs the question of who really owns the device and the software?"

13 of 201 comments (clear)

  1. It doesn't 'beg' the question... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    ...it raises the question.

    1. Re:It doesn't 'beg' the question... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Thank you. Fixing that idiom error is a rough toad to hoe. Most people just ankle the line because they're so well heeled.

    2. Re:It doesn't 'beg' the question... by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The phrase is non-intuitive and confusing to me. While the common incorrect usage is quite intuitive.

      The solution is to never use the phrase in your own writing or speaking. If you use it correctly, most people will be confused. If you use it incorrectly (as most people do) you will look uneducated, and may be attacked by pedants. So just avoid it entirely. Instead, use either "raises the question", "circular argument", or "assuming the conclusion".

  2. That's because by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    We buy a computer, a tablet, a smartphone, and we use applications and apps without even thinking about who really owns the tools and whether we truly own any of it.

    That's because only a vanishingly small percentage of the population really cares about hacking on their devices. I know this is heresy here on Slashdot, but it's true. 99+% of the population simply don't give a shit whether or not they can build their own applications for the device.

    Why?

    Because 99+% of the population does not have the necessary time, skill, and interest to do so. It's not that people are dumb - it's that they just don't care about replacing the existing software that lets them do all the things they want to do with their devices.

    1. Re:That's because by Em+Adespoton · · Score: 5, Insightful

      And yet, the majority of iPhones in Asia are jailbroken. Why? Because they care about replacing the existing software because it doesn't let them do all the things they want?

    2. Re:That's because by TWX · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Even for those of us that do have an inclination for digging into the working parts of our devices, times come where we just want the darned thing to work.

      I've been using Linux since the 2.0.0 kernel debuted in 1996. I have not rooted my phone, because unlike the Linux boxes that I've set up as my workstations, I need my phone to work 100% of the time. If I break my computer it's not a big deal, I have both other hobbies that don't use computers, and I have other computers themselves. By contrast I have one phone, and based on both the costs for subscribing multiple handsets and the cost of those handsets themselves (and their penchant for only being replaced when they're actually physically broken in my case) I do not have a spare phone to revert to should I break the current one.

      I'm a geek that figures out how just about everything works, but I don't necessarily feel a need to take everything apart simply because I know how it works.

      --
      Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
    3. Re:That's because by farble1670 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      And yet, the majority of iPhones in Asia are jailbroken. Why?

      so they can installed pirated apps.

    4. Re:That's because by farble1670 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      let's not get all high and mighty about freedom and privacy. it's about installing pirated software. call a spade a spade, that's all i'm saying.

    5. Re:That's because by Trogre · · Score: 4, Insightful

      That might have been true a couple of years ago, but now that it's common knowledge that your device is probably spying on you, people are suddenly interested in how to make their devices NOT spy on them.

      --
      "Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
  3. 3rd AC comment is golden by rmdingler · · Score: 4, Insightful
    We talk about the backdoor installations the government's pet TLAs request in exported electronics.

    We assume the information gatherers track us at every chance, often with our tacit permission.

    No longer bordering on tinhattery, there exists the very real possibility everything you purchase in the electronics section might report your doings for fun and profit. If you can break the phone, why wouldn't you?

    --
    Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.

    Ernest Hemingway

  4. "Ownership" isn't about hacking your device by ciaran2014 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    > only a vanishingly small percentage of the population really cares about hacking on their devices.

    I don't hack the software on my laptop, but it's all free software and I know it's written by people who aren't trying to spy on me or to give me inconveniences so that I'll buy some premium version.

    If you have Window, then MS has owned your PC.

    If you have free software, then you "own" it.

    --
    Help build the anti-software-patent wiki
  5. You are more Free than they let on by SuperKendall · · Score: 4, Informative

    Out of the box, the devices are not "Free" in the sense you can modify them directly.

    But you ARE legally able to Free any device. Jailbreaking was explicitly declared legal to do, and indeed plenty of people do so.

    As long as you are legally able to Free a device, I think we are OK - I don't see the need to force a device to be inherently insecure for millions so thousands of people can expend no effort to modify how a device works.

    I still donate to the FSF (and begrudgingly the EFF) every year because I think it's good someone is keeping an eye on all this and striving to make things that are wholly Free. But I just don't see where it's realistic or even a good idea to hold every product to that standard.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  6. Failure by bug1 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    We where onto a good thing, but we failed to adapt.

    We failed to adapt to the commercial attacks that make closed source software the gatekeeper to software freedom.

    We lost the mobile space, Android is full of crap software running on a Free kernel that hardly anyone can use freely.

    Free software is free beer that corporations on-sell minus the libre.