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Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

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Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#111

Post by donatj »

JamisonM wrote: post #96
donatj wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes? lol. Why does everything always come to the Trolley Problem? I think anyone who was ever in favor of any war would agree that sometimes a death is justified when it saves many more?

It is not the Trolley Problem, you seem to misunderstand the issue. There is no binary choice here, it is not comparable.

> Is it okay for someone to murder a person if they saved more than one life before ?

That is a yes or no question. That is literally a binary choice. Yes or no - is murder OK if that murder saves more than one person.

That is literally the Trolley Problem.

Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#112

Post by cma »

eesmith wrote: post #47
sn41 wrote: post #7

In the years to come, I believe free software will be recognised as one of the paradigmatic changes in how science itself is done. Now chemists and biologists have started talking about making data openly available and so forth. It's a shame that RMS has to spout forth on every issue, and in the current climate of outrage, science may have lost an important transformational voice. I think as a society, we need to cal…

Free software isn't about making data openly available. Stallman, at https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/selling.html , argues that free software developers should "charge as much as they wish or can, ... if you are redistributing copies of free software, you might as well charge a substantial fee and make some money ." If you have useful data, the free software principles say that you might as well charge a lot of money…

If I'm understanding right, those journals still kept it copyrighted, without copy-left provisions. It's more like the notion of open source, where the source may be viewable but isn't necessarily available for redistribution.

While Stallman says you can charge as much as you can, his terms say that once someone buys it they can immediately undercut you, and he admits that limits the amount you could charge sustainably.

Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#113

Post by ramshorns »

4bpp wrote: post #95
michannne wrote: post #38

It seems this thread and others like it has fueled a controversial honeypot, as some users are mass-downvoting comments that are perfectly in line with the content posted, simply because they stand for or against ousting Stallman, and others are doing the opposite -- mass upvoting comments that align with their predisposed view of the situation. I'd like to take sometime however to reiterate that freedom applies to a…

But consider the possibility that this might be perfectly rational behaviour for people who care about some side of the cause (even if it comes at the expense of HN as a forum): the victory condition for any belief is to be so universally accepted that its negation can not be expressed in polite company. If you come into a HN thread believing X and then see that every post stating X got downvoted into oblivion, maybe…

This is a fascinating take on the purpose of discourse. I'm not sure if I agree but I'm upvoting it because it made me think.

> the victory condition for any belief is to be so universally accepted that its negation can not be expressed in polite company.

Kind of! That's been the measure of progress as a society; several beliefs that were once fringe have become almost mandatory in polite company.

But we're still not talking about the linked article which is about a distinction between freedom and openness.

Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#114

Post by jammygit »

salawat wrote: post #109

Just wanted to drop a Cliff Notes of the RMS controversy. Specifically, Stallman has been accused of (1) Defending Jeffrey Epstein (while in reality Stallman was defending Marvin Minsky); (2) Describing Epstein's victims as entirely willing (while in reality Stallman was arguing that one specific victim of Epstein, Virginia Giuffre, was presented to Minsky as entirely willing because she was coerced by Epstein, not t…

I wish this entire topic wasn’t so focused on the speaker rather than the ideas

Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#115

Post by burtonator »

sn41 wrote: post #7

In the years to come, I believe free software will be recognised as one of the paradigmatic changes in how science itself is done. Now chemists and biologists have started talking about making data openly available and so forth. It's a shame that RMS has to spout forth on every issue, and in the current climate of outrage, science may have lost an important transformational voice. I think as a society, we need to cal…

RMS was and always will be a fraud.

Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#116

Post by tjpnz »

sn41 wrote: post #7

In the years to come, I believe free software will be recognised as one of the paradigmatic changes in how science itself is done. Now chemists and biologists have started talking about making data openly available and so forth. It's a shame that RMS has to spout forth on every issue, and in the current climate of outrage, science may have lost an important transformational voice. I think as a society, we need to cal…

>It's a shame that RMS has to spout forth on every issue, and in the current climate of outrage, science may have lost an important transformational voice.

The four freedoms are truly revolutionary and have grown on me over the years. If he had been a bit more focussed and perhaps even a little pragmatic it wouldn't be hard to view him as a Steve Jobs or Bill Gates like figure. At the very least we would be having conversations about software in terms of non-free and free versus proprietary and open source.

Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#117

Post by eesmith »

cma wrote: post #112
eesmith wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Free software isn't about making data openly available. Stallman, at https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/selling.html , argues that free software developers should "charge as much as they wish or can, ... if you are redistributing copies of free software, you might as well charge a substantial fee and make some money ." If you have useful data, the free software principles say that you might as well charge a lot of money…

If I'm understanding right, those journals still kept it copyrighted, without copy-left provisions. It's more like the notion of open source, where the source may be viewable but isn't necessarily available for redistribution. While Stallman says you can charge as much as you can, his terms say that once someone buys it they can immediately undercut you, and he admits that limits the amount you could charge sustainab…

I think you refer to the publication, and not the journal? I was referring to "making data openly available", quoting the top-level comment, and "If you have useful data" in my comment you replied to.

The data repository I mentioned is the PDB. Quoting http://www.rcsb.org/pages/policies :

> Data files contained in the PDB archive (ftp://ftp.wwpdb.org) are free of all copyright restrictions and made fully and freely available for both non-commercial and commercial use. Users of the data should attribute the original authors of that structural data.

That means it's available for redistribution.

BTW, the general trend is to use "source available" instead of "open source" when the source is available for viewing and perhaps local modification, but not for redistribution. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Source-available_software

Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#118

Post by akdas »

cat_plus_plus wrote: post #66
Frondo wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The complaints about stallman aren't a matter of thoughtcrime, they're a matter of entirely inappropriate behavior, not just once but repeatedly, over the course of decades. This was the one that disturbed me the most: "Going to an RMS talk in the early 90s and meeting with him in person was among the worst of my experienced - I was fifteen, still obviously underage, and skipping gym class to hear him speak at a prof…

Are you actually kidding me? As you are nearing adulthood as a teenager, you are sometimes able to sneak into adult spaces and experience a bit of adult off-color talk. Not everything is guarded by a fence, but maybe more tech events should be if the alternative is catering to child sensitivities. In any case, these comments would not even be PG-13 in a Disney movie. Also, if the idea is to protect under-18s from any…

Maybe I'm reading the GP's anecdote incorrectly, but the behavior in question seemed like targeted harassment, not just "a bit of adult off-color talk".

Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#119

Post by akdas »

michannne wrote: post #23
Frondo wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The complaints about stallman aren't a matter of thoughtcrime, they're a matter of entirely inappropriate behavior, not just once but repeatedly, over the course of decades. This was the one that disturbed me the most: "Going to an RMS talk in the early 90s and meeting with him in person was among the worst of my experienced - I was fifteen, still obviously underage, and skipping gym class to hear him speak at a prof…

If I had a de-platformed individual every time they made a comment someone took offense to, I'd end up with an animal farm. Definitely, his comments should not be overlooked, but intellectually benching someone because of what they've said is not how you handle these types of situations. Furthermore, his leadership qualities depend only on his ability to lead a group towards a goal, which he was doing swell at.

> his leadership qualities depend only on his ability to lead a group towards a goal, which he was doing swell at

It sounds like his behavior was alienating people who would have been willing to work toward that shared goal, but were instead pushed away. So based on what I'm reading, he was a poor leader in this regard.

Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#120

Post by kqr »

eesmith wrote: post #97
inimino wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Free software isn't about making data openly available. You must be allowed to redistribute the software, and you must be allowed to get, modify, and redistribute the code. Binaries and code are data. Maybe what you mean is that the biologists' and x-ray crystallographers' journals developed their push for data access independently of the free software movement, but it's a stretch to say that access to the data tha…

"Allowed to" is not the same as "required to." Open science people generally want people who publish papers to be required to publish the data. This might be in a public repository, or with the journal, and if there is a fee, that fee should effectively only cover cost. Stallman's conception of free software says that you should be able to charge as much as you want. Hence, these are different concepts. What I mean i…

Well, when you purchase GPL licensed software, the author is required to supply you also with the source code, and you must be allowed to redistribute this (under terms and conditions.)

Sure, there are distinctive features for each domain, but in broad strokes, I don't see the above description as very different from the one following:

When you purchase access to an open-data paper, the author is required to supply you also with the raw data, and you must be allowed to redistribute this (under terms and conditions.)

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