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The FSF's Donald Robertson Talks About Secretive Trade Negotiations (Video)
Donald Robertson, is the Free Software Foundation (FSF) copyright administrator (and wearer of several other hats as well), so he's the FSF person to turn to when you want to discuss trade agreements, how they are negotiated, and how info on these (typically) secret) goings-on get leaked so that we can see what our negotiators are up to. And don't think, even for a second, that the TPP is the only trade agreement our government is working on, or necessarily the worst. After that, we learn how Don Robertson hooked up with the FSF and got what may be the best job in the world for an attorney who likes (and uses) GNU/Linux. (And for more, check out yesterday's interview with Mr. Robertson.)
Much like a cheap lock on your door, of course gun laws won't stop someone determined. They just make it less likely that someone who's deranged is going to have one within arm's reach when they snap.
Well, criminals don't follow laws (by definition)
Well, then I guess we should get rid of all laws since criminals won't follow them, right?
Looking down the comment section I have to admit, it seems the whole TPP reporting starts to worry someone, we sure got a LOT more astroturfing going on now than usual.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Certainly not. The users are free to write their own programs however they see fit. How is it "freedom" to get source code someone else wrote? I understand why it is convenient, but I don't see why it is a fundamental human right or anything like that.
In fact, more closed source projects might inspire more organized alternatives that would be very welcome IMHO. Most of the diversity of OSS is an illusion and the whole movement is nothing more in my eyes than a way for corporate developers to outsource some of the most tedious, reusable work to unpaid interns who live at home and never get a job offer or taken seriously as a human being.
"If I have seen farther, it is because i have stood on the shoulders of giants". Quite possibly the smartest man to ever live uttered these words. You advocate the methods of Alchemy, and seek to give it the same lofty perch as true Science.
Good-bye
Are you suffering from brain damage caused by prolonged GPL exposure?
Someone put it brilliantly on Twitter: GPL is free as in freedom. BSD/MIT/Apache is free as in labor.
The Free Software Foundation has been open from day one that their exact goal is to make proprietary software illegal. The GPL and AGPL and to a lesser extent MPL and EPL are means to that end. The other means is lobbying developers to create copyleft code and convincing everyone to only get and use open source code. Proprietary software enables snooping, embedded malware, and digital rights management.
You the individual may see BSD/MIT/Apache as "do whatever the hell I want with the code, and let others do the same". But in practice, permissive license open source software is the foundation modern technology companies are using to build their proprietary software empires.