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Proprietary Software is the Driver of Unprecedented Surveillance: Richard Stallman (factor-tech.com)
From a wide-ranging interview of Richard Stallman, president of the Free Software Foundation, programming legend and recipient of at least 15 honorary doctorates and professorships: "The reason that we are subject now to more surveillance than there was in the Soviet Union is that digital technology made it possible," he says. "And the first disaster of digital technology was proprietary software that people would install and run on their own computers, and they wouldn't know what it was doing. They can't tell what it's doing. And that is the first injustice that I began fighting in 1983: proprietary software, software that is not free, that the users don't control." Here, Stallman is keen to stress, he doesn't mean free in the sense of not costing money -- plenty of free software is paid for -- but free in the sense of freedom to control. Software, after all, instructs your computer to perform actions, and when another company has written and locked down that software, you can't know exactly what it is doing. "You might think your computer is obeying you, when really its obeying the real master first, and it only obeys you when the real master says it's ok. With every program there are two possibilities: either the user controls the program or the program controls the users," he says. "It's free software if users control it. And that's why it respects their freedom. Otherwise it's a non-free, proprietary, user subjugating program."
Given the opportunity, users will fuck up anything and everything. There is a reason we don't give users more than the bare minimum of control that they need. It's because we don't want to spend all of our time chasing our tails in circles trying to patch up everything the ruin.
He's not wrong
The Free Software Foundation requirements are so restrictive that no mainstream Linux distribution qualifies. Stallman is living in a fantasy world where he thinks billions of people are going to start learning command lines and troubleshooting their own comparability issues. This is not reality.
Open source MUST be made easy to use or else Average Joe User will never use it. In the real world, rightly or wrongly, people care about EASE OF USE more than abstract philosophical concerns about free software.
The open source movement needs more businesspeople and fewer armchair philosophers. We do not need yet another FOSS project reinventing the wheel and having 3-5 developers trying to drum up support for their spin on something that has been done 50 times already. We need to see more along the likes of RedHat and Canonical if open source is going to take over the mainstream.
He's right about a lot of software. Some of it can be trusted but not all of it and it is especially troubling considering revelations that certain major vendors have been bought off my state actors.
And then they can't be spied on and tracked via the web, because FF is free software.
Keep dreaming...
At least it would have been if the proprietary software I was using let me.
This claim is both plausible and difficult to refute. Stallman would probably get better results if he were pushing the MIT or BSD licenses instead of GPL, though.
Rather than acting terrified that the commercial software will outcompete the free software and delivering mouth-foaming rants about it for decades, how about just writing free software better than the locked-down, unjust proprietary software?
What else do you call people who go around destroying property and hurting others to push their agenda?
... to read the article T_T
Windows has the ultimate control. The Linux subsystem has no Linux kernel, nor is it open source. And either no one seems to believe it or get weirdly offended. The arguments aren't worth the karma hit to want to login.
For the average person trying to decide whether to run some new support ticketing package on IIS or LAMP is thinking "free" as in beer, not free as in "I can get in and fork this web server library to suit my purposes." Most people have no more sense of whether or not their free-as-in-hackable module or plugin or OS is watching them or recording telemetry for their own good or not. And most them don't care, either. They just want it to work.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
In the past, it certainly drove surveillance. Now it's the cloud driving surveillance (especially since Windows 10 is always tied into one.) Google tracks the pages you view, Facebook does the same plus uploads conversations on your phone to the cloud, the Google Home and Amazon Echo record constantly, etc. Surveillance might happen in closed source non-cloud-based apps, but those are a drop in the ocean at this point.
I think water is wet.
With respect to both Stallman and Slashdot, he's been leading this crusade for over three decades with little change to his message. How is an interview where he reiterates his main arguments against non-free software still news?
Now I think he's just right, and almost all the time.
Where did this barbarous thing come from? I've been seeing it more and more.
The person you're citing comes first, then the colon, then what they said. Quit doing it backwards!
Additionally, it's irrelevant if he was or not.
If his claims are true, his claims are true, without ad hominem.
Has crap functions.
Few take the time to research what they are loading, even when offered the choice will load the "Bing search bar" when installing software.
Many lean on "trusted" sources used to be Godfather of software, then became Cnet or Download dot com, then became Google or the IStore.
These entities take only the time needed to profit from offering these softwares, and only remove things that are grievous and give them bad press (when brought to their attention by others).
Laziness and Greed on both parties parts is what drives the distribution of shitty software.
Rick B.
IMHO real solution for computer security and privacy is a new kind of OS.
Imagine an OS, which is also a VM.
Imagine it is designed in a way that no code can run directly/independently of that OS on the computer.
Imagine as the OS executes instructions of any software, it also checks if all security policy rules followed or not.
For example it would not allow any software trying to make an unauthorized communication.
W/O an OS like that, each computer is like Wild West! Anyone can do anything they want!
Everyone who considers using Firefox should read its privacy policy.
Firefox collects a lot of personal information, and sends it to a variety of organizations/companies, including Google.
The privacy policy dated September 28, 2017 contains awful stuff like:
Free/Open Software is an ideal of the STEM community. It is great and I think it is better. However the entire global software user base is not of the STEM mindset. Many companies want to have a business model of selling software licenses. Some sell both licenses and support. Stallman has long preferred the idea that we as a society share information the is easy to copy. He supports a reasonable compensation related to creative works. But puts more emphasis on compensation through continued support of that creative work. He cites situations where people use non-free/open software, support ends for that software and people are then often forced to either discontinue use, increase vulnerability or loss of productivity risks, and/or purchase a new license of what is essentially the same software that has extra non-security related enhancements. For the latter argument it is made that users end up paying not just for the enhancements, but also for the original product as well as a built in support retainer in many cases.
It is my belief that the problem Mr. Stallman really wants to fix is this last business model. For every person in the world to have full control over all the information they are given is a great idea. Reality is that the Human condition of greed, or improving ones self by disadvantaging another, prevents FOSS. It, indeed then, would be enough to mandate software and information not be double charged. That either an ongoing support license for use or a support license retainer built into an original product followed by cheaper enhancements with a further retainer built in be possible. Many companies already do this. It isn't FOSS, it isn't giving the user base full control over information. That isn't possible due to greed. In the same way certain governments such as Marxist Communism really isn't possible.
But, to defend greed just a bit, a sense of bettering ones self does drive many people to do things that are not comfortable, that are above average, that give them a sense of fulfillment in their lives. For those of us that embrace FOSS we are free to continue our scientific sharing of ideas. We should be thankful that those who oppose or seek to abuse FOSS must follow the same rules that protect non-free closed software.
There is or can be built a machine that can simulate any physical object. -Church-Turing principle
is how many geeks who should know better, see nothing wrong with so-called "smart" so-called "telephones" -- which are the antithesis of what we computer hobbyists were trying to build for all those decades. The answer is to stop giving Google, Apple, Microsoft, Facebook, and such companies any of your time or money, and to stop being an enabler in the abusive relationships those companies have with your friends and co-workers.
Android is "open source" and runs on Linux but it's the worst spyware I can think of.
I award the title of "Least Printable Website of the Year" to this jewel of script-driven cancer.
Personal experience (email exchanges) have convinced me that Stallman is a nice guy, but his priorities are warped around ideas. As an idealist, I sympathize, but...
The problem is NOT the tools or even who wrote the tools. Not even the financial models underlying the tools, though one of my crazy ideas involves an alternate financial model for more democratic control over software. (Ancient joke time: Lots of detailed suggestions available upon polite (and sincere) request.)
The problem is that the decisions are made by materialists. You don't have to be super-greedy to become a dominant materialist, but you don't become super-rich unless that is one of your attributes. I actually think the extremely rich bastards have to know something about manipulating people and often know how to play games with ideals (especially to disguise their greed), but it always comes back to the insane greed. In this context "insane" means a willingness to hurt other people.
In summary:
(1) Super-rich bastards are bribing the cheapest politicians (mostly #BolshevikRepublicans these years) to rig the rules of the games to make themselves richer.
(2) It's painful enough just watching mindless morons voting to hurt themselves without watching their fear-filled leader #PresidentTweety hurt the entire nation.
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
even if all your software on your client device is free software, the issue is the software that actually runs the things that matter is on the server side, where companies and governments run it in private. That is where the most concerning of the privacy-defeating activities happen, and it is beyond the ability of the GPL to fix this problem.
if you want to talk about Surveillance, talk about how every last vendor is all about 'sync and integrate' so that you can pre-pay their infrastructure with your personal data, exposing you to all the data-mining and network analysis they want or need for their hackers or actual customers.
Stallman has been right for long enough for people to recognize the 4 gpl freedoms and to realize the debt that we owe the GNU userland. He's just not talking sense. I know he's probably fine without a phone and using just abook or emacs/bbdb, but i'm not .. and open-source is really truly completely failing me in this area by not having anything to offer that rivals outlook-integration or cloud-sync. for decades now.
Amiright? howwrongami?
Because it is faster, easier to use, and features the benefits that most (not all) Firefox users look for more readily by default.
https://www.indidea.org/gael/blog/leaving-apple-google-eelo-odyssey-introduction/
Free software (Linux) drives most mass deployments of software (as used for surveillance) because the marginal cost of the software is so small.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
I feel we need a whole new category of licences, ones that do discriminate against different types of usage.
It should not be permitted to USE free software to take away the freedom gained from free software.
Also, there should be a licence that doesn't permit distribution alongside proprietary software, linking or no, but thats a different story.
In the bigger picture the free and open software movement is rotting, any system can be gamed, and thats what has happened, we havent evolved and we need to.
Its probably too late.
BREAKING NEWS: Richard Stallman now favors vi over emacs.
Film at 11.
In other news, I'm definitely lying. Sorry about that. Please continue.
No amount of open source non-proprietary software will save you from neo-stasi surveillance as long as there are layers upon layers of closed source proprietary hardware forming the foundation of that software.
You usually got the source code, even if you bought the software. You didn't get the right to redistribute it, but you could read it and, for your personal or in-company use, modify it. That started to change when machine language blobs became the standard method of distribution. There was good reason for that method: people wanted to perform a task, not do programming. But Stallman is right: that was not a good way to do things, really.
How many of us actually get the source code any more, even if we can? Most of the time (raising hand: guilty) we look for the pre-built .exe package because we want to use the software, not write it. So Stallman is right in principle, but it's hard to write letters with just principles, though the letters should be principled ... and the principal purpose of writing software is to have it used for some purpose, which may not be limited to writing more software, right? /tang_toungled
... keeping the population under control and the corrupt in power is the reason for surveillance, surveillance is not some new thing. That was the elites entire agenda since forever.
In his 1970 book Between Two Ages: America's Role in the Technetronic Era, Brzezinski wrote the following.
"The technetronic era involves the gradual appearance of a more controlled society. Such a society would be dominated by an elite, unrestrained by traditional values. Soon it will be possible to assert almost continuous surveillance over every citizen and maintain up-to-date complete files containing even the most
personal information about the citizen. These files will be subject to instantaneous retrieval by the authorities."
Between two ages
The grand chessboard
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
But Richard Stallman is just nauseating. He's the Michael Moore of Open Source Software - so radically left as to be obnoxious and turn people away.
> And the first disaster of digital technology was proprietary software that people would install and run on their own computers, and they wouldn't know what it was doing. They can't tell what it's doing.
Richard, you dick-breath, the problem isn't whether the software is "proprietary" or open-source or whatever you want. *You* might look at source code when it's available, but don't delude yourself thinking the average Joe would. Having all software open source wouldn't change a damned thing in that respect.
I bought a surround surroundbar from Vizio for my TV. It has an app to allow you to control it from your phone or tablet. It wanted permission to report it's location with the explanation that it would help it to find "wireless networks". Why a glorified remote control would need to find networks is a problem, but reporting home about where I'm at is out of the question. I just refused to install it and used the remote.
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
while poking his nose, rubbing his hair and scratching between his legs?
Android is the perfect example. It tells users what permissions apps require, and that doesn't matter one bit to most people. Most people don't want control, they want convenience. 99.99% of people (probably more) use apps which request permissions to pretty much their entire phone: location, accounts, phone book, etc. Apps like WhatsApp or Facebook, and many where the permissions aren't even warranted (such as many games). 'Free' software, the way Richard Stallman thinks about it, does nothing to help. There have been many cases of malicious code being put into open source software, or specific distributions of it, and that's precisely because this code is open, because those who create it have no vested interest in protecting it, and because it's 'free as beer' and people love stuff that's free as beer, and don't look too closely into what it might do.
For example, if you replace the phrase "Proprietary Software" with "Money", then I think he might be right.
Why did surveillance ever exist? Two reasons, insurance companies give you better rates; police can capture fine-able offenses
Well... all mass surveilance systems,... literally ALL OF THEM. Are build MOSTLY with GPL licensed software. All internet centralisation (Google, Facebook,...) are BUILD using GPL licensed software.
So... you might want to look at yourself Mr. Stallman.
Because you have the power to change something for the GPLv4.
You can turn it into the 'Good Public License', or wine about your own contributed problems forever!
I'm sure you're intelligent enough to figure something out, you did that twice already!
Stall man is a smelly fat fuck. He should stick to writing software.
You made the common mistake of saying "all software can't be free", when you meant to say "not all software can be free" or "it is not the case that all software can be free".
Maybe he was just misquoted?
"Trump!!", the new Godwin.
Ad hominem is ad hominem. He. is. right.
One thing's for sure about Stallman, he continues to flog the dead horse long after it has not only died but decomposed. He is the living embodiment of "To a man with a hammer" syndrome. Is Stallman's theory that every end-user should review the source code of every bit of code they have on their computer prior to executing it? Because other than that I don't see how his fantasy that we only run code whose operations we understand could be achieved. To call that fantasy unrealistic would be a major understatement. But that doesn't stop RMS from continuing to spout his bullshit.
MANMAN is proprietary, been around since the 1970s and runs on FORTRAN.
All it does is make drive MRP, I don't think it does any surveillance. Except maybe lot and serial number tracking. And that's an add-on module.
Tracy Johnson
Old fashioned text games hosted below:
http://empire.openmpe.com/
BT