[flagged]
This is an exceptionally poor argument.
1. Coders are biased and often not aligned with users whose rights FSF is there to protect. Just look at any OSS vs FS discussion on this site to see examples.
2. Your "probably" here is too big of an assumption and of not much consequence. I have a degree in humanities, do not work in IT and have contributed code to Free Software.
3. You somehow imply that formal education affects _leadership_ in a _rights_ organization and a technical one would be preferable. That's a long shot.
Good initiatives require strong argumentative basis to have a strong wide following, you're providing a counterexample.
Programmers understand software ecosystems, of which free software is just a subset. I also see a lot of programmers advocating leaderships and other non-technical skills generally. If you observe a pattern where a lot of coders seem biased, maybe there's something else going on?
> Good initiatives require strong argumentative basis to have a strong wide following
The FSF has circular logic all throughout their ideology. They only want to argue if you let them frame the conversation with their own conclusions along with a full deconstruction of views they didn't come up with, like open source, which they explicitly work to discredit and do not represent. It is little wonder that their following is not wide nor strong because they are divisive and completely incapable of working with others or incorporating ideological diversity. They are eclipsed by the EFF and several other organizations built around open source applications in terms of fund raising at this point. Don't listen to me. Just go look at some financials. You'll see how little they represent these days.
Some do, some don't and happily (or begrudgingly but willingly) contribute to building a hostile larger ecosystem.
> …of which free software is just a subset.
We're mostly talking about the movement here, but OK. Don't see what's your point here.
> If you observe a pattern where a lot of coders seem biased, maybe there's something else going on?
Of course, self-interest. Mostly the need to minimize work/pay and improve hiring or promotional perspectives.
> ...because they are divisive and completely incapable of working with others or incorporating ideological diversity
That's a great argument as it applies equally to uncommunicative, autocratic, self-absorbed, deceptive entities as well as to principled, unswayed and self-consistent ones.
I'm not arguing FSF is a pinnacle of leadership, au contraire.
This isn't a dig, I've known and admired quite a few people who were absolute geniuses at hardware and/OR software, real engineers but they couldn't even manage a group lunch. It's just an entirely different skillset.
Let me frame it another way:
Software is like soccer, big tech is the FIFA, free software is you amateur football team.
- The FIFA will always tell you they love amateur soccer.
- The FIFA can be run by MBA, manager but your local group of friend/team cannot.
- Someone (probably the FIFA) is telling you your local team need the manager types for you to play soccer with others.
- If an overweight man who never played soccer come to invite you to play soccer in the weekend for free you might not go. If Pele come you will go.
- If an overweight man who never played soccer offer you a job at FIFA you will probably accept because you love soccer and for the money.
- The FIFA is more interested in people watching TV and ads on Sunday than people playing soccer outside. Ultimately they want you to love soccer but it need to be their way. And their way is watching TV and buying their jersey.
This is probably why Theo de Raadt might be a big A-Hole and said no to the FIFA but he is a good player and still have a fit team having fun outside every Sunday.
I wouldn't have bet on this outcome 20 years ago.
All those open source now corrupted foundations with the beautiful websites and the big titles and leadership pages pretend to be something they are not.
I work for a company that makes a very popular open source product. The users lead our development, not the coders. Hell, I don't even code, and I get to tell the engineers what to fix based on what our users complain about.
I suppose if you think of free software as a bunch of solo-coded GitHub projects, it can feel like the coders are king, but you absolutely don't maintain a project like Linux, or any of the major distros thereof, by giving coders supreme authority over decision-making...
Those who are in the wider use have been started and kept people like RMS. There are hundreds of them in dustbin or with minimal use.
In this instance John Gilmore is funding the work. He's not doing it himself.
Focus on outcomes: mainline kernels, modem firmware, reproducible builds, verified boot, power management, app ecosystems, and sustained funding. Credit the projects pushing those fronts and press FSF to support them: attack decisions, not résumés or gender.
> It is very feminine and obviously doesn't work that well.
> Librephone will serve existing developers and projects who aim to build a fully functioning and free (as in freedom) Android-compatible OS.
and while the differences have consequences in the grand scheme of things what mattered is what the trillion dollar corporations wanted, because the FSF didn't manage to do shit, not even the feminine coordination (nor the masculine rallying cry to arms!)
Today, I have access to quality tools on my computer and my computer runs Linux without any of the drama that proprietary equivalents bring and looks visually fantastic. My computer feels mine again and for that, I remain eternally grateful to the FSF.
... it seems to me that Stallman and the FSF got complacent by their relative (and out of my ignorance I'm now assuming that also unexpected) success, and also they completely misunderstood their value proposition, ie. the product, it was not gcc, emacs, or Hurd or whatever, it was the innovation to allow and foster technical public capital accumulation. (and still, it's absolutely a not solved problem to this day. the wheel is reinvented too fucking many times, even in software.)
... of course they do deserve credit, gratitude and a lot of respect and support for their integrity and steadfastness!
Praise the Heavens that at-least 3/10 staff are coders. That is a far better ratio than most NGOs.
It's wonderful that you've been privileged enough to not need to understand the point of "social justice", but it's not a bogeyman preventing you from being a leader.
Not really. https://replicant.us is an FSF-supported project. But it kind of died due to the lack of contributors.
IMHO, postmarketOS is better than Replicant or any other Android Rom, because it doesn't depend on Android.
This is where the Stallman hard, radical and long term vision make a lot of sense in retrospect. Because we see now Google is pulling the rug.
and concentrate effort on the components that don't have this (ie. drivers, hardware, codecs, whatever), but instead what we got is 20 more years GnomeJS and whatnot.
Apps built in HTML/JS/CSS, straight from 2009.
The feminine vibe doesn't really land, and seems to kind of undermine the rest of what you're trying to say.
There's no shortages of OSS floating around with individuals butting heads about splitting hairs to their preferred interpretation, forking away into oblivion or to a standstill alone.