Stallman isn't great, but not the devil
arp242.net
arp242.net
1. There probably wouldn’t be free or open software if not for Stallman. We could argue it was inevitable, but frankly, Linux (the OS) wouldn’t have been built when it was without his efforts. At the time of gcc development, even compilers were big money.
2. Stallman is definitely on the autism spectrum. Nothing wrong with that, but one of the primary indicators are social issue. It’s not at all surprising he’s rigid, pedantic, etc. having met and organized event(s) with Stallman, he’s definitely a character, but I’ve never really seen him be outright mean. Simply put, he can be off putting, not politically correct and argumentative, but that’s kinda his baggage.
3. Free and Open source are definitely not the same thing. As we have seen from Amazon jacking peoples work and not giving back. Exactly what Stallman argued would happen has burned a large part of the open source community. Not saying there’s not a lot of good, but the concern was definitely warranted
All ready people are creating non-GPL tools in hopes of replacing their GPL cousins. And in most cases, one cannot use Linux on many devices without using closed source blobs. Right now it "seems" these blobs do not impact user privacy, but what is to stop these blobs from phoning home in the future.
Unless someone steps up to continue RMS FSF policies, he is very much needed.
How? What has he actually done - what have been his successes?
What can he do? He can't stop companies from writing software.
He's a champion of GPLv3, which companies are already avoiding like the plague and is driving them to development alternative SW to replace the GPLv3 tools.
The above proves my point, companies will not use the GPL-3 because thay cannot enhance Free Software with out giving back. It is all about money and Linux has turned into a big money maker for companies.
Conversely, I believe RMS is one of the last people in anything related to open source that can prevent a full corporate takeover of Linux.
He may be the most passionate, but the most passionate advocates for an issue are rarely those who actually make any progress on that issue. The passion itself is off-putting when one is in the direct focus of it, but it inspires others to actually do the work and make the progress.
RMS specifically is so off-putting that it is one of the first things his advocates say about him. His passionate views on free software, as well as everything else, are routinely dismissed entirely by anyone other than his closest adherents. It's hard to see how he can have any reasonable impact on any corporations that might try to "take over" Linux.
FSF and Stallman have no word in the decisions concerning the Linux kernel. Torvalds and Greg Kroah-Hartman, unlike RMS', seem like very pragmatical open source proponents. That's why the kernel has contributions from major companies, contains opaque binary firmware, and when it comes to GPL violations they're using carrots not sticks.
If you mean the Linux ecosystem in general, I still doubt that FSF has an impact outside its immediate proximity (the list of free GNU/Linux distributions).
Personally I find that the pragmatist side is predominant, and outside a small number of developers and users, RMS' stance on free software is not that popular.
it doesn't matter. If we medicalise socially unacceptable behavior, it hurts the victims while victimizing the transgressor. He needs to be banned from any conf and ignored by PR. The right thing to do is send him back to his mum's basement from whence he came while crucifying the ghouls at the FSF appointing him
Do we get to cancel you now?
Also, "whence" means "from where." The phrase "from whence" is redundant.
The inclination to pile on angry judgment of people amounts to failing to understand why people are the way they are. The anger is valid to the extent that it is a call to STOP bad behavior, but when it goes past that into retribution, it's counterproductive.
Dangerous people shouldn't be put in positions to cause harm, but they might as well fairly be medicalised.
And RMS isn't actually dangerous, more like overall exceptionally outlier-level of ethically consistent and moral combined with some sexist cultural baggage and extreme (autism most likely) social awkwardness. Dealing with his position is not a simple black-or-white issue, it's not simple. It should be addressed, and it might be best done with sympathy to understanding his likely autism. That does not make it an excuse. Any non-autist who is creepy is creepy for some other reason that we should also wish to understand.
But here's the thing: He DID become a leader, mostly because of his confrontational nature and strength of conviction (which is how most leaders for change do things - they step on lots of toes). He DID lead these organisations (rocky or not - doesn't matter) and they DID become a strong force in the software world. To call him unsuitable for a leadership position is just ignoring history and his ability to attract followers.
You may not like him as a person. You may be creeped out by him. You may dislike a lot of what he says and does (and really, who doesn't?). But removal without due process flies in the face of everything that makes us civilised. The normal process is to issue warnings/rules with consequences, and then implement those consequences when they're ignored. This is how we do things fairly - a shot across the bow first. The alternative is mob rule and capricious, changing ex-post-facto justice, which has time and time again been demonstrated to never end well.
His social awkwardness, his public opinion on contentious issues like abortion or what is considered rape, the fact that he makes people feel uncomfortable. These are distractions that push people away and weaken the foundation's focus on free software. He may be right on those issues, he might not be.
Mob rule is bad, cancel culture is bad. His removal at the hands of such a cancel culture mob is probably part of why he is being put back in a leadership position. But I absolutely understand why people are puzzled by the board's move to bring him back.
This is one question. Another is: "Should the Twitter mob decide about it?
"Arrest this man, he talks in maths"
If you think someone needs to be cancelled because you think they're 'creepy and obnoxious': grow the fuck up.
My own suspicion is that "cancellation" doesn't describe the act itself, so much as the person it happens to. The general trend seems to be that, if it's someone from relatively higher on the social power scale losing a position or status due to poor behavior, it's cancellation. If it's someone from relatively lower on the social power scale, it's just the same old, run-of-the-mill social consequences that have existed since time immemorial.
All of the crybaby trolls have done zilch compared to RMS.
maybe being OK with that is part of being a mature adult
The problem with RMS (and way too many other public figures) is the inability to just keep their mouths shut every once in a while.
Everyone - especially in the age of social media - would be much better off not sharing every personal opinion on every subject with the entire planet; lest they're willing and able to deal with the inevitable backlash.
this is hard, admittedly, but it seems like the right thing to me
It's not just "hard" - it's outright impossible. You're basically wishing for no one to ever be offended again for any reason.
That's not human nature, though, so the best way to avoid unnecessary drama is to stick to the old "Talk is silver, silence is golden" as far as discussing controversial (off-)topics in public is concerned.
Emphasis on 'in public' and 'off-topic', because that's what this is about. Might not be as important for the average Joe or Jane, but as soon as your name becomes entangled with the cause you fight for, it's a different story entirely.
Sure, you can voice pretty much any opinion you can think of in certain, even quite public settings (Bars, conferences, book signings, etc.) and it wouldn't necessarily affect your life or public opinion on your person in any significant way.
As soon as the media is present, however, or if you do it on the internet, you inevitably address everyone - including the extremists and enemies to your cause who are just waiting for a slip-up - and that's just asking for an overblown out-of-proportion response.
Yes, strange people say socially uncomfortable stuff and behave weirdly. Often they say stuff that is not socially acceptable. We can manage this, I hope. Especially considering his real contribution to changing computing as we know it.
can you picture him as the head of a company like Nokia, CISCO, an insurance company, bank or literally any other thing outside the raggedy FSF? He would have not survived past day #1 because public perception matters in power.
I wouldn't applaud the FSF as an organization too much considering how well it has served the majority of people doing the legwork nor even as a "movement".
Are you sure you want to paint with such broad strokes regarding those on the autism spectrum?
Sure, but I'd also rather not have a person like this represent the community I'm a part of. I also don't think we should discriminate against blind people, and we should go out of our way to accommodate them when we can (by making accessible websites for example). But I'd rather not be chauffeured by a blind person.
Stallman is a person like all of us: with his strengths and weaknesses. You can accept him as a person as he is, "warts and all" so to speak, while also declaring he's not a good person to do a particular job.
I'll disagree that this is "cringe" (which is a word that I hate, unrelatedly), it's actually pretty funny and probably a good way to communicate their message while still conceding the compromise, in my opinion. But that's mostly a small disagreement and obviously not the main point of the article
Totally agree with RMS (and this word is not RMS' invention: http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/crackers.html ) Also I agree with "global heating" instead of "global warming" and almost all of his neologisms.
>Stallman’s views in general on computing are stuck somewhere about 1990.
You might think that compiler theory has advanced at least a little bit since the publication of the book of Dragon - but my opinion is that it is not.
> The “GNU Operating System” (which does not exist, has never existed, and most likely will never exist[1])
How about emacs?
Part of the general effort to get RMS removed, flagged for being part of a seemingly concerted PR campaign, nothing new here.
I see it as not spam; it’s a timely post about why a senior member of the open source community is not suitable for a leadership position that they have just taken up.
No, it's not. My thoughts are my own. I wrote it after reading through various discussions and feeling a more nuanced take was generally lacking and felt I had something to add to the conversation. Nothing more, nothing less.
i have a feeling that stallman promotes other stuff that many people don't really like, and they managed to cherry pick one thing about marvin minsky and focus all the fire on that. rms is some sort of bernie sanders with a technological brain. like aaron schwartz, he's pragmatic, and that is dangerous.
frankly, i just won't trust anything trending now as aaron schwartz's name was taken from the list of founders of reddit recently and reddit has gone... well there are threads and forums about that too.