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John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation
61–70 of 431 posts
Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation
#62Re: RMS, without passing judgement: - I think people can have great ideas but not be great long term leaders. FSF has high ideals, and fundamentally needs buy in from people on a lot of levels for them to succeed. It needs community. They could be really thankful to RMS’s getting things going but I don’t really understand why, now, they would add him back to the board. Is he saying new things that aren’t linear from…
In FSF's case, Stallman might be a good fit to contribute his software freedom ideas. As long as there are other people who can focus on PR.
Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation
#63I'm creating a throwaway that I hope won't irk dang. If this breaks the rules, I'm sorry and I'll stop. Richard Stallman single-handedly created the free software movement, and he's the reason we all have jobs. Google and Facebook might not have been possible in a world where you couldn't spin up a server for free and compile code without paying a license. Richard Stallman has said some sexist and edgy things. He als…
done some sexist and edgy things. On stage, spoken directly at women.
Also, Stallman is a totally incompetent leader - the project is sufficiently niche that I won't name it, but the maintainer mentioned to me that he entered rms's bad book merely by virtue of having children.
Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation
#64It was briefly discussed in this episode of floss weekly https://twit.tv/shows/floss-weekly/episodes/622?autostart=fa... and I think the guest made an interesting observation in that quite a big issue in FSF is that the board is entirely self-selected, the community is not really involved. Thus, the future of the GPL is entirely in the hand of a few people who picked themselves so to say.
What does this even mean? As Linux staying on v2 shows, the FSF doesn't have any real control over GPL licenses. And I'm fairly sure the only limitation on modifying the GPL myself is I couldn't use the word "GNU."
Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation
#65Earlier quoted context omitted.
See https://rms-open-letter.github.io/ and the counter-letter https://rms-support-letter.github.io/
One is signed by the directors of major open-source projects and initiatives. The other is mainly signed by Russian bots.
Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation
#66I'm creating a throwaway that I hope won't irk dang. If this breaks the rules, I'm sorry and I'll stop. Richard Stallman single-handedly created the free software movement, and he's the reason we all have jobs. Google and Facebook might not have been possible in a world where you couldn't spin up a server for free and compile code without paying a license. Richard Stallman has said some sexist and edgy things. He als…
Given this, we can't use an "end justify the means" argument, which means we have to hold people accountable in isolation from any positive impact they may have had.
Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation
#67[0] https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-March/235091.html
Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
I could see companies starting to screen applicants using these lists. Different companies would choose which list to use according to their own politics and culture. Totally hypothetical: Coinbase and Google will probably turn rms-open-letter into a denylist. Twitter will do the opposite. This is all conjecture, but I could see it happening. It's why I feel I shouldn't sign.
One list is full of people who have achieved big things, and are in positions of power. The other is full of throwaway and inactive github accounts.
(FWIW I haven't signed either, and don't know enough about RMS' actions to commit to a perspective).
Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation
#69I'm creating a throwaway that I hope won't irk dang. If this breaks the rules, I'm sorry and I'll stop. Richard Stallman single-handedly created the free software movement, and he's the reason we all have jobs. Google and Facebook might not have been possible in a world where you couldn't spin up a server for free and compile code without paying a license. Richard Stallman has said some sexist and edgy things. He als…
> I don't want to live in a world where we can't be forgiven. Forgiveness requires accountability and commitment to change, neither of which have been forthcoming.
Re: John Sullivan resign as executive director of the Free Software Foundation
#70I'm creating a throwaway that I hope won't irk dang. If this breaks the rules, I'm sorry and I'll stop. Richard Stallman single-handedly created the free software movement, and he's the reason we all have jobs. Google and Facebook might not have been possible in a world where you couldn't spin up a server for free and compile code without paying a license. Richard Stallman has said some sexist and edgy things. He als…
You've always lived in this world and this is the America you grew up in. You were lied to.
The government has stayed very professional in this, and by that I mean complete absence, which is American freedom of speech.