Slashdot Mirror
RMS Immature, Slashdot and Community Arrogant?
Non-Newtonian Fluid writes "There's an article over at ZDNN that claims RMS is "immature politically" and "insists on a reward for [himself]" for claiming Linux should be called GNU/Linux. Furthermore, in a lengthy talkback article, Slashdot and the Linux community as a whole are accused of the same arrogance. Perhaps this merits a discussion of the way our community deals with outsiders.... " Now, before everyone turns on the flamethrowers, let's think about the matter-is this true? The problem with most of these situations is that they do have some inherent truth to them. The question, of course, is how much?
I think that there is obviously a lot of truth in this. However, it's really only a half truth, in that while the observations may be correct, the conclusions the writers have drawn from them are less so.
For the RMS article, one has to agree that at times things do get sidetracked on to silly issues like the GNU/Linux one. However, the writer of the article fails to realise that to a lot of people, the political (ie freedom) aspects of open source/free software are just as or more important than the code itself. Thus it's neither surprising nor counter-constructive that a good proportion of discussion about such software is spent discussing these sorts of political issues.
Basically, the author looks on from the outside and percieves a problem that is only there because of his ignorance of the people and issues involved. Yes, it may look bad to him, but what would be worse is that people who don't know about free software never got the chance to hear about what the free is really supposed to mean.
Are some elements immature politically? Again, probably true, you can't expect everyone in a group as large and diverse as those who write/use/advocate open source software to all be informed or even interested in politics. In RMS's case, I believe this is true, he is politically immature in that he desperately clings on to the idea that he's a capitalist when all his writings on GNU's philosophy page are far more compatible with a socialist system. But he's not the only one guilty of this, or other contradictory political thoughts.
As for the second article, well, that is the nature of the beast that is the internet. If you speak out in a forum where there are enough people, you're bound to get flamed by at least a few. It wouldn't matter if it was Linux, MacOS, Windows, BeOS, FreeBSD, or something non computer related. He even acknowledges that he did get help, so I'm not quite sure what his problem is. He should just ignore the flames, and use the useful information, rather than taking them personally.
And it hardly takes a genius to point out that zealots of all OS religions are pretty much the same. That's why they're called zealots, dammit! If he's going to judge the usefulness of the software, or even the quality of the "community" based on the rantings of a few quick to flame zealots, then he's going to come up with the wrong answer every time.
As for his thoughts on slashdot, well, since he calls it a Linux site (It's news for nerds: stuff that matters - which is a whole lot more than just Linux), I think he shows himself to be so ill informed that it doesn't even need a response.
There are things we can take away from these articles, but nothing that wasn't already known by a lot of people - that some people in the open source/free software community are too quick to flame, and also that some of our "celebrities" aren't perfect, and don't necessarily know everything about everything.
"Now watch what you say or they'll be calling you a radical, liberal, fanatical, criminal." - Supertramp, The Logical So
I read the article,
I read the talkback,
I read the essay on the "security hole" in open source.
By the same token this fellow should watch his back. His mechanic might put a bomb under his car just in case he doesn't pay up. His banks can be robbed by their employees, and his system administrators may design back-doors in his trusted networks.
After all the IE security holes, backorifice, the PGP exploits etc... this fellow has the gaul to say that a closed source system is immune to malicious backdoors? The only peer review closed-source seems to get is in backdoor exploits!
Excuse me while I kill my locksmith. He knows too much.
If he wants to make a point, he should at least place emphasis on the kind of subtle attacks which are possible. Unfortunately, I don't think he knows enough about computers to be able to recognize them.
I think I'll go put a floppy in my drive and "comprimize" my "top dog" access on my NT box. It is certainly harder to prevent than slipping backdoors into Linux.
(Damn, I've just wasted a half-hour of my life... oh well.)
One of the things that I always appreciated about the 'hacker' community, was that you simply couldn't establish yourself in it without the respect of your peers. The general perception that there was a desire for knowledge and a desire to share knowledge, along with a certain lack of respect for those who did not have that ideology, made for a place where one was judged by ones contributions and not by ones status.
The development of Linux and the free software movement has always seemed to me to be a culmination on the kind of G-File hacker/phreaker of the 80's, with the benefit of resources that allowed an international and inexpensive media upon which to frame our world-view. The end result has brought a commercially sound status to what was never truly a business concept. Political skill was NEVER a benefit in this case. You can be an asshole but if you are right, someone is going to know. If no one knows you are right, well you tried.
Now alot of people are "NAMES" which is often a dangerous position. I remember associating with NAME hackers and knowing that for some of them, the NAME was all they had. This is true in ANY community, where past achievement is rewarded. The person who founded X or created X or did X is remembered with respect no matter WHAT they contribute recently.
Not so with Hackers. Respect for knowledge and skill is always there, and we worship some of the same idols, but to sustain a name in a world in which anyone can take your intellectual contribution, and modify it and make it theirs, requires a certain sense of promotion either by ones own effort, or by others.
The fact is that when I choose a product, I rarely base my opinion on that product on the specific person who invented it or the person who made it. We rely on umbrella organizations, corporations, research institutes, to give a mark of quality.
In the case of the Slashdot world, the people arguing over such things as the merits of different licenses to some extent are a rarefied breed. The majority of linux users don't care about the legal ramifications of using software because they would have taken it whether the license permitted it or not. By showing source code, it is all over. The license be damned. The fact that the corporate world needs those licenses to contribute to the movement, and the fact that the corporate world is BUYING the concept that those licenses have some value and that equivalent licenses (Apples) with certain restrictions, will be honestly followed, is a bunch of SHIT. Once I have your source code, you have to prove I have it. The hacker outside of the US doesn't have any obligations. The only thing that prevents abuse is HONOR, and that is a case in which any LEGAL effort is immediately suspect.
Control of information is not truly possible. Just as Microsofts patent on use of XOR to allow proper rendering of an onscreen pointer is absurd, so is the licenses. Those who create this show of legalese with terms like free or open as the adjective are marketing. The news sees the marketeers, they see the hype, then they realize that those 'hyping' are not really altruistic, despite the common sense that says that NO ONE who fights for abstracts is truly altruic, then they are offended by arrogance, aggressiveness, a sense of cockiness, that was part of our community when the term hacker wasn't even used in movies, let alone in boardrooms...
Every piece of software I design I provide legal protection for MY right to reuse code I developped. I attempt to avoid stealing other peoples code, but I often learn techniques of coding by looking at source code. In the end, I protect myself.
That is the goal of most of the public voices, as far as the press is concerned. Most of us are just taking advantage of every resource we have, and our interest in being a public face on a community so self-interested is not there. We are too busy...
We contribute to the movement because when we find a solution to a problem, we contact others and let them have our fix. When we take someone elses work and make it prettier, we thank the person who gave us that original work by returning the effort. But it is all self-interest. We are all arrogant thieves, stealing from each other, and happily calling it freedom and openness. If the walls came down, we would grab all the free software before it stopped being free and would hide it and share it more carefully, but we wouldn't lose a step. We would simply develop technical methods of protecting ourselves where legal methods failed...
A bizarre little rant cause I think it is time to stop patting ourselves on the back. I have been programming for 20 years and I want to remind folks that Apple ][+ came with a reference manual with the entirity of the intellectual property of Apples chip design, rom design, and listings for their OS, and basic. Open source isn't new. I used to type in programs from magazines. We aren't special. We are lucky to have seen in 30 years a transformation of computers into community builders, from corporate slaves.
Lucky... Not better or special...
Any sense of arrogance was there from the begining. It isn't new, and it isn't controllable.
I think the fact that Free Software isues are debated openly makes disagreements SEEM larger.
Has anyone ever worked for a software company where there weren't serious disagreements over direction, features, etc.? Of course not. Can you imagine if members of the press where privy to every meeting in some of these companies? There would be non-stop articles like, "Serious battle at Abobe over licensing", "Microsoft divided over corporate direction".
The Free Software Community does not have one official designated spokesman to give reporters nice quotes that say everyone agrees and is happy. Instead, our discussions are open in forums such as slashdot. Any reporter (especially ones with FUD in mind) can grab an uninformed flame and quote it.
It's important for the public to understand that free software means input from EVERYONE. Of course there will be disagreements. That's a strength, not a weakness.
Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.