Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF • Hacker News Board

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#791

Post by nrclark » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 6:19 PM UTC

zucker42 wrote: post #784

nrclark wrote: post #767

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know that this opinion is controversial - but I think GPLv3 really hurt GNU a lot. And that license was 100% RMS's doing, as well as the decision to force it onto most/all GNU projects. GPLv3 basically forced the embedded Linux community to dump the GNU userspace in favor of Busybox. That's a lot of active developers who stopped using and contributing to Bash, Coreutils, and a whole host of other projects. RMS prop…

Why did GPLv3 force the embedded Linux community to drop GNU?

Basically, GPLv3 has a requirement that you need provide your users instructions for modifying/replacing any GPLv3 software that ships on a device that you sell. That means, in essence, that your users need to be allowed to install modified versions of any GPLv3 software.

As a consequence of this, you can't have signed/encrypted firmware unless you provide your users with the private-keys.

You also basically can't stop people from inspecting/modifying any secret-sauce parts of your design, at least not without jumping through an awful lot of hoops. Because if your users must be allowed to install a modified version of Bash (for example), then all bets are off for what they'd insert to get access to the rest of your filesystem.

Lots of companies have IP that they want to protect. Maybe it's DSP modelling plugins that your engineers wrote. Maybe it's programs that access private APIs on the company servers. Maybe there's shared firmware across products in a feature-differentiated product family. Maybe there's a legal requirement that customers can't modify your firmware, for something like FCC or FAA compliance. None of these kinds of models are feasible if your users can modify your rootfs. So in essence, it means your product can't include GPLv3 software if you also want to ship IP that you need to protect.

When GPLv3 was released, the FSF basically pushed it onto every GNU package. Which they could do, as owners of the copyright on all code in all GNU-managed projects. So that means bash, coreutils, make, bc, find, grep, sed, gawk, libtool, gpg, gzip, tar, wget, etc. And also more subtle items like readline, which finds its way as a dependency into all kinds of things. This essentially meant that all of it became verboten for lots of developers to include in their products, forcing them to move to alternatives like Busybox.

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#792

Post by seba_dos1 » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 6:27 PM UTC

jolux wrote: post #287

seba_dos1 wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you don't understand those power imbalances, you are bound to do harm. That's not a bad point. But then it turns out that it's not really connected to the statements about Minsky, is it? > Somebody who doesn't understand that is not fit to be a leader. This is stretching it way too far, since this assumes that understanding of power in hypothetical scenario that doesn't connect to yourself somehow translates to…

> That's not a bad point. But then it turns out that it's not really connected to the statements about Minsky, is it? The statements about Minsky are harmful. What reason is there to be coming to somebody’s defense when they are credibly accused of something like that? Frankly I don’t want friends who would react like Stallman did if I were to be accused as seriously as Minsky has been. People who are going to do har…

> What reason is there to be coming to somebody’s defense when they are credibly accused of something like that?

Accused of what exactly? See, the whole point of Stallman's statements was to clarify what exactly Minsky was being accused of, no more no less. He didn't even doubt those accusations in any way. It's plainly written there in his e-mail. You're being dishonest.

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#793

Post by pseudalopex » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 6:34 PM UTC

prepend wrote: post #789

pseudalopex wrote: post #752

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Crossing state lines to have sexual relations invokes federal law. The federal age of consent is 18."[1] [1] https://www.cwsdefense.com/blog/2020/january/state-lines-and...

Again, I think any sex with a minor is unethical, regardless of law. But in this particulars of Minsky’s situation he didn’t cross state lines for purposes of sex, he crossed for other purposes. IANAL, but I think this would be important for determining if age of consent was violated. If there was some sign of intent that Minsky planned on traveling just to sex this person then I think the reference you provided appl…

I think you're reading too much into informal phrasing. And a reasonable person would suspect prostitution or coercion.

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#794

Post by novok » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 6:41 PM UTC

orthoxerox wrote: post #388

novok wrote: post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Autistic MtF programmers is something that happens enough to be a trope, joke or meme.

This usually doesn't fix their issues beyond dysphoria, though.

Somewhere in the comments here, one of them said "estrogen fixed my social autism". That is really surprising.

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#795

Post by dang » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 6:49 PM UTC

fsflover wrote: post #504

dang wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unrelated to the topic, but could you please stop creating accounts for every few comments you post? We ban accounts that do that. This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html . You needn't use your real name, of course, but for HN to be a community, users need some identity for other users to relate to. Otherwise we may as well have no usernames and no community, and that would be…

Technically, such guideline prohibits anonymous speech, because how you speak can reveal your identity after a certain threshold...

These are all questions of degree and how to balance trade-offs, so while you've raised one legitimate concern (among the many), I don't think an absolute statement like "prohibits anonymous speech" is accurate.

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#796

Post by pseudalopex » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 6:51 PM UTC

h_anna_h wrote: post #720

pseudalopex wrote: post #645

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stallman said he isn't autistic.[1] The people with autism I know abhor what Epstein did as much as anyone else. And they're pretty angry about unqualified neurotypicals diagnosing anyone they want to let off the hook. [1] https://www.computerworld.com/article/2551458/asperger-s-oxy...

> The people with autism I know abhor what Epstein did as much as anyone else So did Stallman. > Stallman said he isn't autistic His justification is basically that has no trouble with rhythms so he self-diagnosed himself as not having asperger's. I would suggest reading this subthread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26535390 and more specifically this post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26538554

> So did Stallman.

They don't see it that way.

> His justification is basically that has no trouble with rhythms so he self-diagnosed himself as not having asperger's.

Stallman said he didn't have most of the characteristics of Asperger's. Rhythm was just an example.

> I would suggest reading this subthread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26535390 and more specifically this post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26538554

BAP doesn't change the issue of unqualified people diagnosing someone they don't know. Or using it as an excuse.

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#797

Post by wrycoder » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 6:52 PM UTC

visitor1 wrote: post #755

wrycoder wrote: post #718

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those who read the extensive threads back in 2019 will remember that Minsky, at the time, commented to one of his associates about the interaction with the young woman. That’s how Stallman heard of it. And, further, there is no evidence that Minsky took any further action relative to her. Quite the contrary - he seemed bemused by the situation. Some of the discussion in these threads strongly implies that Minsky had…

Source please?

Minsky’s wife denied the allegations.

https://nypost.com/2019/08/09/jeffrey-epsteins-alleged-sex-s...

You will have to dig out the 2019 emails yourself, I didn’t bookmark them.

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#798

Post by symlinkk » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 6:56 PM UTC

pnt12 wrote: post #769

hutzlibu wrote: post #746

I am on a quest for facts, hard in this debate. So this was the original post that lead to RMS resign. https://selamjie.medium.com/remove-richard-stallman-fec6ec21... Here is a defending one. https://whoisylvia.medium.com/richard-stallman-has-been-vili... But there I have a question. Regarding the "Knight for justice (and hot ladies)" sign. "not the sign about welcoming “hot ladies” on his MIT Media lab office door,…

In your quest for truth, do you question yourself: what's the harm of the sign? Is it sexual assault? Harassing? A bad joke? And what should we do about it? Ask him to take it out? Refuse to have him at conferences and universities? Kick him from MIT and the FSF? We're too quick with our judgment and punishment nowadays. This level of offense used to be normal from the Christian prudes and the scared moms, not the pr…

The same people that celebrate women creating OnlyFans accounts and flaunting their sexuality online are pretending to be offended over this.

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#799

Post by koonsolo » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 7:11 PM UTC

lixtra wrote: post #658

koonsolo wrote: post #629

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "he once hit on me and I had to reject him". The latter is perfectly normal behavior unless you propose we criminalize being a man. If you are a superior to the person in question, I don't agree that it's normal behavior. In that case you put that person in a very tough position. Same for teacher/student. That's also why a lot of companies have a policy against that. Notice how I didn't specify the genders, since i…

What about befriending superiors? What if I refuse to befriend them? Wouldn’t they retaliate? Can I mention my favorite sports team at work? I consider prisoners and children/mentally unfit taboo. The rest is human and not per se bad or to be forbidden. Obviously some setups carry more risk.

I see no problem with any of those things.

But I still see a problem with making a move onto a subordinate, which can put that person in a very awkward position. Same way as you don't hit on your friend's partner. Some people are just off limits. If they want something, it's up to them to make the first move.

Re: Richard Stallman is coming back to the board of the FSF

#800

Post by jolux » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 7:12 PM UTC

seba_dos1 wrote: post #792

jolux wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That's not a bad point. But then it turns out that it's not really connected to the statements about Minsky, is it? The statements about Minsky are harmful. What reason is there to be coming to somebody’s defense when they are credibly accused of something like that? Frankly I don’t want friends who would react like Stallman did if I were to be accused as seriously as Minsky has been. People who are going to do har…

> What reason is there to be coming to somebody’s defense when they are credibly accused of something like that? Accused of what exactly? See, the whole point of Stallman's statements was to clarify what exactly Minsky was being accused of, no more no less. He didn't even doubt those accusations in any way. It's plainly written there in his e-mail. You're being dishonest.

>Accused of what exactly?

Accused of having sex with one of Jeffrey Epstein's sex trafficking victims.

>See, the whole point of Stallman's statements was to clarify what exactly Minsky was being accused of, no more no less.

It's quite plain what Stallman was responding to. Stallman himself even says he sees no reason to disbelieve it. Unfortunately, "I didn't know she was a 17-year-old sex trafficking victim when I raped her" is not much of a defense, to me, ethically. Stallman imagines a situation in which Minsky was duped into having sex with this person without knowing her situation or her age. Why does Minsky get the benefit of the doubt here? This is not a court of law, and he was not a stupid man, to say the least. He even organized an academic symposium on Little St. James with Epstein in 2011, after he was already registered as a sex offender.