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Free Software Foundation: Dating Is a Free Software Issue (fsf.org)
"I've been making the argument that everything is a free software issue for a few months now," writes the campaigns manager for the Free Software Foundation, in a new essay sharing thoughts on "the issues proprietary technology poses in dating and maintaining romantic relationships":
Many dating Web sites run proprietary JavaScript... Proprietary JavaScript is a trap that impacts your ability to run a free system, and not only does it sneak proprietary software onto your machine, but it also poses a security risk. Any piece of software can be malicious, but proprietary JavaScript goes the extra mile. Much of the JavaScript you encounter runs automatically when you load a Web site, which enables it to attack you without you even noticing.
Proprietary JavaScript doesn't have to be the only way to use Web sites. LibreJS is an initiative which blocks "nonfree nontrivial" JavaScript while allowing JavaScript that is either free or trivial. Many dating apps are also proprietary, available only at the Apple App and Google Play stores, both of which currently require the use of proprietary software.
The essay also warns about the proprietry software used for restaurant reservations, ride-sharing apps, and chat applications. (Not to mention the non-free software behind gift shopping on Amazon.) And even if you decide on a romantic evening at home, "you might find yourself tempted by freedom-disrespecting, DRM-supporting streaming services like Hulu and Netflix...."
"These are all proprietary tools, and the act of using them restricts our freedoms. When the ways we connect with one another are proprietary, we're trusting our secrets, intimacies, and relationships to technology we cannot trust."
Proprietary JavaScript doesn't have to be the only way to use Web sites. LibreJS is an initiative which blocks "nonfree nontrivial" JavaScript while allowing JavaScript that is either free or trivial. Many dating apps are also proprietary, available only at the Apple App and Google Play stores, both of which currently require the use of proprietary software.
The essay also warns about the proprietry software used for restaurant reservations, ride-sharing apps, and chat applications. (Not to mention the non-free software behind gift shopping on Amazon.) And even if you decide on a romantic evening at home, "you might find yourself tempted by freedom-disrespecting, DRM-supporting streaming services like Hulu and Netflix...."
"These are all proprietary tools, and the act of using them restricts our freedoms. When the ways we connect with one another are proprietary, we're trusting our secrets, intimacies, and relationships to technology we cannot trust."
Oh, sorry, it was you... Well in this case not only it isn't funny but it's somewhere from pathetic to dangerous. We can make fun of RMS but it's the world that's sick.
What a shitty bowl of word soup.
Could we block this using host files?
"Many dating Web sites run proprietary JavaScript..."
No shit, Sherlock. Why not just say "Many web sites run proprietary JavaScript..."? Why call out dating sites?
Practically every goddamn site I visit runs JS and sometimes they run fucking gobs of it to the point where my browser pops up warnings about scripts slowing down the system. Why are dating sites any different? Why not say car sales sites or blogs or Amazon? What's so special about dating sites?
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
Apple started from the idea that users should be free to follow their dreams and the nature of the wallled garden is merely to safely free users to do so and any idiotic app you can think has been welcomed with open arms. If you contrast it to google, where the open part is really for google and users are exposed to all manner of questionable apps and only google revenue is used to accept or deny something, you can see there ought to be a clear differentiation in the minds of consumers between the two but perhaps not. I think of Apple review like Dee Snyder in the Twisted Sister video where he spots the fake fan in the audience and rips his blond wig off to cheers and jeers.
I am not a full time programmer so examining the code is irrelevant to me. Therefore you are asking me to trust the ones who wrote it because it is free. I cannot evaluate your honesty whether you wrote free software or proprietary software. So there is no difference, except some other person examined the code and said it was good. Am I to trust them also? How would I know that they are not corrupted. Who watches the watchers?
I might be willing to extend trust to a regulatory body that has lawful powers to punish rule breakers who misuse data, violate privacy, or purposefully wrote software designed to do that. It may be the least worst solution. But self regulation by writers of free software is not a model I can trust as a user. You are all suspect.
The LibreJS site says, "The program GNU LibreJS detects nonfree JavaScript in pages you visit and blocks it, preventing it from running and thus saving you from giving up your freedom."
Yes, and it'll also prevent you from using the site in most cases. That's kind of the opposite of "freedom".
I don't see a practical solution to this issue.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
or maybe he's just a little butthurt nobody swipes right.
. . .it's hard to find a date.
I support free software and see the obvious benefits of its existence, but these guys who try to excise all proprietary software are living in a dreamland. My wife thinks I'm weird enough for abstaining from social media. When free software is convenient and useful, I use it.
The ironic part is that, as much as guys like Stallman rant and rave about freedom, the lifestyle they promote is extremely limiting. No wonder those nerds can't get dates. A free software dating app wouldn't change things.
"From the depths of my skeptical and rationalist soul, I ask the Lord to protect me from California touchie-feeliedom."
Had to check my calendar that it isn't already an election year.
"When all you have is a hammer"... Well, you know the drill.
I used to think "incel" was a made-up controversy of mainstream outlets picking up on some bizarre, niche forum of a very wide, global internet, but that this essay get made makes we reconsider that conclusion.
Free Software is important, and promoting its use in the fundamental components of software architecture and systems design is important, as is having its principles applied to critical aspects of modern communication -- arguably now including social network systems.
Dating sites are not a critical aspect of modern communications. This essay comes across as someone who thinks the reason they don't get hits on Tinder is because there's a binary blob somewhere, when chances are higher it's because the blob is you.
FSF has more important things to work on and much lower hanging fruit than this.
Hire a Linux system administrator, systems engineer,
Dating is a social activity with the end goal being to get some.
Software is the thing running on a computer that makes it useful (more or less).
Whatever weed you were smoking when writing this meta-article, please don't offer any of that to me.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
>we're trusting our secrets, intimacies, and relationships to technology we cannot trust.
This is about the silliest thing I've read today and the day is still young.
Just looking at the Linux Foundation membership page...
ATT, Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Amazon, Tencent, Experian, Verizon, Yahoo, etc. are all companies that use Linux, and yet have been exposed in privacy invading datamining of their customers' personal information.
Of course, these are only companies that joined the Linux Foundation. There are plenty of other non-listed sites who use Linux like Twitter, who, it was recently revealed, does not actually delete DM's, but stores the personal communications indefinitely even though the company promised it does.
And let's not forget that the OS of choice for the in many sectors of the US military and intelligence agencies like the NSA and it various contractors is Red Hat Enterprise Linux (revealed by the Snowden leaks, government bids and requisitions contracts, and job listings).
Does the fact that FOSS software is being used by these government and corporate entities make you feel safer with regards to your privacy? Does it make you more likely to trust them? If so, well...ignorance is bliss, I guess.
I don't think someone who is so worried about some non-free JS running inside their browser is likely to be all that popular in the dating scene. Or too many other scenes of life where you realize just how trivial an issue this is.
On the other hand this is probably a great excuse for why these people don't date.
I mean, who wants a significant other telling us what to do? Live free or die, right? /s
All relationships are built on trust. The medium used to communicate is the least of your worries if you can't do that.
Get over yourself.
Years ago they used to be a program called Paint Shop, it used to be shareware and it was very popular in the U.K., it is now a commercial product called "Corel PaintShop Pro." And the download and installation is all Java-based and Java-based installations can do absolutely anything to a computer system or a computer network if somebody on that network gives it the right to install on one of the computers. JavaScript installs are usually banned on a network.
I purchased this commercial product called Corel PaintShop Pro, and I could not install it on the computer because I had to enable JavaScript installation to download and install the program. It could see the database which is on a different computer and it is part of LibreOffice.
I did what even the idiots are taught not to do I put the security level down on Windows 7 pro and allowed the program to run on a network even though it was the only Windows system on that network. The program run amok it put a third party spyware program on my computer called "PSIService.exe" = ProtexisLicensing this program runs in the background and collects licensing data and always runs when you switch on that Windows computer and always connects to a remote host Protexis.
PSIService.exe created thousands of entries in the Linux SMB firewall guard "Downloaded timestamp 10 bytes" all day long and through the night and to the next day. It made me feel a little bit sick believing that somebody had got into the database which has other people's information on it.
The Java installation could see the network when a normal installation would not be able to see the other computers on the network.
I ended up purchasing a Russian program which scans SMB and took Windows off of the network believing somebody had got into SMB.
These windows programs should tell you what they are about to do before they do it.
So will "Piratebay and Chill" become the new PC term for sex on the couch?
or
Find Slutty Friends?
"These are all proprietary tools, and the act of using them restricts our freedoms. When the ways we connect with one another are proprietary, we're trusting our secrets, intimacies, and relationships to technology we cannot trust."
So all proprietary software is evil?
What if, it took a lot of time/labor/cost to develop any (web/desktop/server/smartphone) software & giving it away free means a huge financial loss!?
(Actually, my guess is, anti-government anarchists behind this new idea about trying to force all website scripts open-source!
So that no private companies & in turn government cannot do anything to catch criminals using the internet!)
Free software is a dating issue.
FTFY
and not only does it sneak proprietary software onto your machine
Is this like a vegan who found out that mayonnaise is made with eggs?
but it also poses a security risk
Why? I mean you said it yourself: "Any piece of software can be malicious". If they published the source code to your apparent demise will that have made you more secure? Are you under the impression there's a magical fairy out there auditing everything open source and that you are magically safe as a result?
Much of the JavaScript you encounter runs automatically when you load a Web site, which enables it to attack you without you even noticing.
Any code you run on your computer enables it to attack you without even noticing.
There's a lot to be said for open source, but really this retarded hyperbole gives Open Source advocates a bad name.
I've countless times tried to register with the major dating sites. Either the registration is flat-out rejected with a bullshit fake error message (POF), or I'm put in a bubble where nobody sees any of the messages I send until the account is suddenly gone (OkCupid).
And that doesn't even get into the "phone verification" madness that cannot be bypassed anymore since they block all "virtual" phone numbers, and the services that used provide those don't even accept Bitcoin anymore.
And he goes on about JavaScript? Fucking retard.
Richard Stallman isn't listed as the author of the "Dating is a free software issues" essay, Molly de Blanc is.
People used to "rant and rave" about how one was "living in a dreamland" to think that they could run a computer with a completely free OS. Fortunately people who fought for software freedom didn't take those criticisms seriously and now we have multiple completely free OSes. It seems that what was readily declared to be fantastic is becoming real thanks to those who push past the objectors and the namecallers. What matters is the substance of what we fight for—lazy convenience accepting whatever someone else wants to do to our computers, or demanding control over our computers and making it possible to do various jobs while retaining our software freedom.
Digital Citizen
Javascript runs in the browser and the browser prohibits certain activities.
Javascript is just a language, it's not like you visit a website and it runs a NodeJS process as root. The javascript that's ran in the browser doesn't even have user level access, it operates within a container inside the browser.
Can Machine Learning classify "human-readable javascript code" vs "non-human-readabable javascript code but machine-readable"?
By example, to test several JavaScript frameworks.
How can a SW engineer actually test the code, given they will never date in the first place?
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
Molly has trust issues, that's why she's single.
> The essay also warns about the proprietry software
Way to go, nig-nog's!
Some sort of code for a site that can:
Allow a users to create an account, accepting an email and encrypted password. Keeping all that encrypted.
To ensure the CoC was displayed and some way having the CoC accepted.
To accept an image uploaded for the user computer. To size, rotate and crop.
To allow the user to see their account and enter data about their interests eg if they like Ada, Lisp, Assembler, C, Python, Forth, html, LabVIEW?
To then search for users with the same interests.
Chat rooms under a list of interests?
To send an encrypted message to people with the same interests.
To support text, mic and webcam chat? Fully encrypted.
What computer power, OS and code would be needed to do all that?
Code that works well with slow networks global and that can support different OS, web browsers?
Thats great crypto, images, text, accounts, video, voice, chat, a database of interests, searching.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Sure, FOSS has wide adoption in server OSes and developer tools but when you get away from things that nerdlingers like us use, the rest of the world doesn't give a crap. They do want ease of use and reliability. I'm sorry but Git is NOT easy to use and I say this as a developer with 25 years' experience building developer tools (including a version control system). Libre office hasn't replaced MS office (Google docs might but it's not open source). Gimp hasn't supplanted Photoshop, and normal people's grandmas aren't running Linux (though I'm sure some of you have convinced yours to by setting it up for them and providing massive amounts of instruction).
These ideals are admirable, but in the real world companies and individuals expect to be monetarily rewarded for their efforts and there's not too many companies willing to hand over their investment to anyone else.
You also don't demand to examine the ECU software for any code designed to kill you on purpose while driving.
Floor mat recall my a$$.
https://www.edn.com/design/automotive/4423428/Toyota-s-killer-firmware--Bad-design-and-its-consequences
Recursive code filled the memory and caused unintended acceleration.
The other caused downshifts in RAV4s at highway speeds.
https://www.reuters.com/article/toyota-rav4/update-2-toyota-to-fix-over-735000-cars-outside-recall-idUSN1412640020100714
Open Source or Proprietary Software is really more secure?
Consider that, anybody in the world can modify any open source software! ...
Consider that, any good programmer can intentionally create extremely hard to catch bugs!
Consider that, there are many open source software, widely used all over the world, by governments, companies, schools, hospitals, individuals,
Do you seriously think that, it never occurred to anybody in the world, to intentionally create extremely hard to catch bugs, in any/all widely used open source software, to use as secret backdoors, to any target computer system???
IMHO, anybody who really care about computer/internet security, should/must better stay away from any/all open source software!!!
Games differ from tools for one big reason: They're typically not used for profit. One common pattern to fund development of free software is "eating one's own dogfood," in which a company improves the software that it uses in its line of business through which it realizes a profit. This doesn't apply nearly as cleanly to games, which are made for use in recreation by individuals.
A car company may develop software "to design complex parts for a car". An electronics company may develop software "for complex PCB design". A record label, a production music library, etc. may develop software "to create music". Even Disney, widely hated for its lobbying attacks on the public domain, has released the OpenSubdiv code library for CGI animation in order to interoperate with CGI tools made by and for other studios. Involving the public in improving these processes helps each such company turn a profit.
Games, not so much. The only companies that make profitable use of games are esports leagues, and as I understand it, one of the big draws of esports is use (under license) of proprietary games with which viewers are already familiar.
Recursive code filled the memory and caused unintended acceleration.
Yet Emacs, GIMP, and numerous other GNU applications use Lisp languages for user scripting. Lisp languages are based on recursion as a core control structure. Emacs uses Elisp, and GIMP ships with Script-Fu, an implementation of Scheme. A bunch of applications are scriptable in Guile, an implementation of Scheme.
Yeah, RMS is really stretching the definition of "proprietary" when it comes to JavaScript. He's using it to describe intentionally obfuscated and poorly commented JavaScript, which is not the same as a binary blob. I'm pretty sure he's smart enough to know the difference, he's just being an asshole.
You could always use LibreJS's whitelist feature on irs.gov (or whatever the site is).
Zealots would claim: "If you've whitelisted one site, you've failed."
And you are still allowed to petition your government for redress of grievances by snail mail, email and twitter which I believe still has a JS-free interface.
During some calls for public comment, the US government has outright stated that it will refuse to consider any comment submitted through snail mail or email. In one case, the US Copyright Office stated, and I quote, that it "cannot allow submission of comments outside the regulations.gov system on the basis of your objection to the use of proprietary software."
Provide the source code to your "auto-de-obfuscator" and auto-minifier, including any "internal maps" it uses, along with the program in obfuscated form. Once you've done so, the obfuscated form is indeed source code.