What a nice piece of backstabbing. Class.
I suppose you could interpret it that way. It reads to me more like a statement of values, going forward.
Joint Statement on the GNU Project
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Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project
#12Genuine question, what exactly do these maintainers want ? Stallman has already quit his leadership role/position, right ?! Is there something more that he or the GNU project needs to do ?
> Genuine question, what exactly do these maintainers want ? Stallman has already quit his leadership role/position, right ?
No. There was some confusion on this point because a note was posted to https://stallman.org/ announcing that RMS stepped down from leadership of GNU, but this turned out to not have been posted by RMS (or with his authorization).
(It was apparently posted by someone who added RMS as an entry to the "what's wrong with…" series, with a link to the Medium post that kicked all this off. Without commenting one way or the other on the underlying issue, that is a fairly funny bit of Internet vandalism)
Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project
#13Genuine question, what exactly do these maintainers want ? Stallman has already quit his leadership role/position, right ?! Is there something more that he or the GNU project needs to do ?
jordigh beat me to the right answer, here's Stallman's email https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/info-gnu/2019-09/msg00008...
Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project
#14How mechanically centralized is leadership in the GNU project? Does rms sign off on every change? I'm wondering how expensive it would be (assuming he does not want to step down) for the community to fork away from him or route around him.
In practice, GNU is almost nothing. Years ago there was more cohesion, and there are some guidelines that GNU maintainers nominally follow, but in practice each GNU package mostly does its own thing. A lot of decisions are made in a don't-tell-mom kind of way, i.e. we just try to make sure that rms doesn't notice when we do something he doesn't like, such as calling it win32/win64 instead of w32/w64 like he prefers.
One of the things I hope will happen with this statement is that we will regain cohesion and we will be able to stand together again like we once did. There's lots of good people in GNU, and I think we need someone like GNU. Principled, uncompromising, and now hopefully friendlier and more helpful than we have been.
Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project
#15If I believed for a second that any successor candidate to lead the GNU project gave as much of a fuck about software and personal freedom as Stallman did/does, I might support them. My confidence that this will transpire, however, is not high.
Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project
#16How mechanically centralized is leadership in the GNU project? Does rms sign off on every change? I'm wondering how expensive it would be (assuming he does not want to step down) for the community to fork away from him or route around him.
In practice, GNU is almost nothing. Years ago there was more cohesion, and there are some guidelines that GNU maintainers nominally follow, but in practice each GNU package mostly does its own thing. A lot of decisions are made in a don't-tell-mom kind of way, i.e. we just try to make sure that rms doesn't notice when we do something he doesn't like, such as calling it win32/win64 instead of w32/w64 like he prefers.…
"Uncompromising" and "friendly" are not terms that one typically finds together.
Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project
#17> We, the undersigned GNU maintainers and developers, … [18 signatures] Does anyone happen to of know what fraction of GNU maintainers those 18 names represent? Does this represent a majority of GNU maintainers or a small fraction?
Here's [1] the list of contributors to GNU. Note that it also includes past contributors.
Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project
#18fuck the GNU project. I no longer can take it seriously after the events that have occurred. Disgusting bunch of people.
That "disgusting bunch of people" wrote a ton of the underlying software that powers the internet. You might not like them, but show a little respect.
Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project
#19Earlier quoted context omitted.
In practice, GNU is almost nothing. Years ago there was more cohesion, and there are some guidelines that GNU maintainers nominally follow, but in practice each GNU package mostly does its own thing. A lot of decisions are made in a don't-tell-mom kind of way, i.e. we just try to make sure that rms doesn't notice when we do something he doesn't like, such as calling it win32/win64 instead of w32/w64 like he prefers.…
"Uncompromising" and "friendly" are not terms that one typically finds together.
We can be friendly without having to compromise freedom. We don't have to be friendly to those who would want to use our software to take freedom away from others. We should be friendly to everyone who wants to use our software freely, regardless of their skill level.
My view is that GNU should be working towards making sure we can get our software into as many people as possible by giving it an attractive interface, simple installation instructions, and a welcoming community, while at the same time refusing to collaborate with any who wish to proliferate non-free software.
Re: Joint Statement on the GNU Project
#20Oh my god.
"all computer users" with the implication that Stallman is not representing the ones who demand to go straight to lynch mob behavior without a shadow if due process as soon as the word "sexual" is mentioned? And therefore Stallman should be thrown out of the project that is his creation and life's work?
That's got to be one of the most forced political readings ever of that point in the manifesto. Well, if that's the argument, I'm a computer user too and every one of these signatories have just demonstrated themselves unfit to represent me. Enough of the witch hunt, and hands off Richard Stallman's thoroughly earned standing in the GNU project!