Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Stallman’s Law

gnu.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 150 posts

Re: Stallman’s Law

#51

Post by loup-vaillant »

edblarney wrote: post #43
stcredzero wrote: post #10

Here's the thing about Richard Stallman -- he's absolutely correct in all of his principles and all of his underlying thinking. He's as intellectually farsighted as anyone I can think of in tech. However, all of the movement around him and the resulting "outreach" efforts have been rather shortsighted in comparison. Let's use environmentalism as an analogy. There is a place for an absolutist intellectual position, wh…

That some corporations can abuse IP is obvious, but that doesn't remotely imply that the concept of IP itself is either dysfunctional or immoral. Stallman is completely wrong in all these statements. He's very shortsighted in fact, his views are 19th century if anything, and they're not even very intellectually founded, or well expressed.

I just DuckDuckWent "richard stallman predictions", and found this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3418340 It enumerates a number of predictions Richard Stallman made, that turned out to be true.

Do not dismiss him too quickly.

By the way, the concept of IP is obviously dysfunctional: ideas and expressions are non rival goods. They are not moved, borrowed, nor stolen; they are only copied from substrate to substrate (be it a mind, a piece of paper, or a computer). Property rules simply don't work there.

What does work is monopoly rules, such as copyright, patents, and trademarks. The use of "property" to describe such limited state granted monopolies is an obvious piece of newspeak, an Orwellian ploy to make those laws look better than they are, and frame the discussion: if you're against monopoly, you're a normal person. If you're against property, you must be a thief of sorts.

Re: Stallman’s Law

#52

Post by gmluke »

stcredzero wrote: post #10

Here's the thing about Richard Stallman -- he's absolutely correct in all of his principles and all of his underlying thinking. He's as intellectually farsighted as anyone I can think of in tech. However, all of the movement around him and the resulting "outreach" efforts have been rather shortsighted in comparison. Let's use environmentalism as an analogy. There is a place for an absolutist intellectual position, wh…

> he's absolutely correct in all of his principles

I don't think principles are matters of fact. A set of principles may be consistent with each other, and/or you may agree with them, but that is not to say that one who holds them is correct.

Re: Stallman’s Law

#53

Post by tehlike »

gaur wrote: post #17

No, you can't just take a statement and call it a "law", even in a facetious sense. Murphy's law, Betteridge's law, or other facetious laws are at least roughly formulated as "if X, then Y" (or sometimes "Y happens"), which mimics the structure of actual scientific laws. Stallman's statement is formulated as "if X, then maybe Y" (or "Y could happen").

that sounds like you are trying too hard to not see what he's trying to say.

Re: Stallman’s Law

#54

Post by roflchoppa »

marcus_holmes wrote: post #29
roflchoppa wrote: post #6

Interesting that the more "advance" technology gets, the lower our reasonable expectation of privacy becomes. I want to know when the average person gets on a computer, and surfs around, what data do they expect is kept for just themselves vs shared with the service.

I don't think the "average person" even thinks about data privacy at all. I've seen people tell other people to "get off MY feed!" as if it's a thing they own and can control. As long as the platform can maintain this illusion, everyone will be happy.

thats a good point, also interesting that people get territorial over digital space.

Re: Stallman’s Law

#55

Post by loup-vaillant »

gaur wrote: post #37
bertiewhykovich wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"If corporations dominate society and write the laws, then each advance or change in technology is an opening for them to further restrict or mistreat its users." Also, you definitely can, tongue-in-cheek, call a general statement a "law." It's not meant to be taken in a literal sense; it's meant for humorous or broadly pragmatic effect.

You've explicitly rewritten it as "if X, then maybe Y", exactly as I said. "If corporations write the laws, then maybe they will restrict or mistreat their users." That's not a law.

That's not a "maybe" any more by now. Corporation are meant to maximise profits, at the expense of everything else, except braking the law —and even that is debatable. Some jurisdictions even have laws to enforce that mindset.

As soon as profit maximization is at odds with the user's interests (that's pretty much all the time), the corporation will naturally act against the user's interests.

From this, I'm pretty sure "law" is a relatively accurate descriptor.

Re: Stallman’s Law

#56

Post by fapjacks »

ktRolster wrote: post #12
stcredzero wrote: post #10

Here's the thing about Richard Stallman -- he's absolutely correct in all of his principles and all of his underlying thinking. He's as intellectually farsighted as anyone I can think of in tech. However, all of the movement around him and the resulting "outreach" efforts have been rather shortsighted in comparison. Let's use environmentalism as an analogy. There is a place for an absolutist intellectual position, wh…

This is why I found the FSF animosity towards "Open Source" perplexing I think you've misread something somewhere. Here is what the FSF says about "Open Source," and it doesn't seem like animosity: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-software-for-freedom.htm... "We disagree on the basic principles, but agree more or less on the practical recommendations. So we can and do work together on many specific projects."

Maybe, but I used to work for a guy who organized a Free Software con some years ago, to which rms was invited. I watched the video of a former Sun employee up on stage talking about Open Source when rms walks into the room and, having discovered this presentation was about Open Source and not Free Software, audibly says "You fucking screwed me!" to my former boss. Whatever the FSF site says now, the animosity was definitely real.

Re: Stallman’s Law

#57

Post by omphalos »

roflchoppa wrote: post #6

Interesting that the more "advance" technology gets, the lower our reasonable expectation of privacy becomes. I want to know when the average person gets on a computer, and surfs around, what data do they expect is kept for just themselves vs shared with the service.

I think it's because of the common assumption that the system that controls your data must also house the application that interacts with this data. When decentralized applications finally arrive (the inklings are already here) users won't be forced into this false choice. In that sense, companies like Google and Facebook are behind the curve, and don't really represent technological "advancement", but rather a social shift that has legitimized itself by falsely presenting itself as inevitable.

Re: Stallman’s Law

#58

Post by ghaff »

cyphar wrote: post #22
daveguy wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Disagree on the basic principles" is diplomacy 101 fail -- a great way to project animosity. It is the basic principles on which they agree .

What are the basic principles of "open source"? Because as far as I'm aware, they don't include "user freedom". It's all about practical benefits which are not the primary benefits of free software (the primary benefit of free software is freedom).

>Because as far as I'm aware, they don't include "user freedom".

I'd largely disagree with that. I see "Open source" described (and describe it myself) as something that has many advantages as a way of developing software and developing communities (users and developers) around that software. But, at the same time, it's absolutely about letting users maintain control and being able to directly influence the direction of development.

Re: Stallman’s Law

#59

Post by yesbabyyes »

stcredzero wrote: post #10

Here's the thing about Richard Stallman -- he's absolutely correct in all of his principles and all of his underlying thinking. He's as intellectually farsighted as anyone I can think of in tech. However, all of the movement around him and the resulting "outreach" efforts have been rather shortsighted in comparison. Let's use environmentalism as an analogy. There is a place for an absolutist intellectual position, wh…

There is this quote by the late, great philosopher Sidney Morgenbesser. I really like it, and I have shared it with RMS who, to my surprise, wasn't familiar with it. Professor Morgenbesser, whose field of study was American Pragmatism, was asked about his thoughts on pragmatism.

It's all very well in theory, but it doesn't work in practice.

Re: Stallman’s Law

#60

Post by stcredzero »

JacksonGariety wrote: post #32
stcredzero wrote: post #10

Here's the thing about Richard Stallman -- he's absolutely correct in all of his principles and all of his underlying thinking. He's as intellectually farsighted as anyone I can think of in tech. However, all of the movement around him and the resulting "outreach" efforts have been rather shortsighted in comparison. Let's use environmentalism as an analogy. There is a place for an absolutist intellectual position, wh…

Freedom is not so simple: “This procedure thus implies a certain logic of exception: every ideological Universal–for example freedom, equality–is 'false’ in so far as it necessarily includes a specific case which breaks its unity, lays open its falsity. Freedom, for example: a universal notion comprising a number of species (freedom of speech and press, freedom of consciousness, freedom of commerce, political freedom…

Just because your quasi-mathematical model breaks, that doesn't necessarily mean this has anything to do with reality. We have high confidence that mathematical models in physics and chemistry often do have consequences and say something about reality. Economics has an interesting track record here as well. In the realm of ethics, politics, and ideology? Ehhh...not so much.
Post reply on HN