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Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement
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Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
Stallman has a vision that you and I should be typing our comments and playing our games from machines that are under our control, i.e., whereby we can inspect and modify all of the code that is running on them. That is not the case, and all Stallman is saying, is that this is bad for us. The Free Software Foundation was founded in 1985. From there since Free Software has only lost ground. I don't think Stallman woul…
> That is not the case, and all Stallman is saying, is that this is bad for us. Right, but to most people, that's still an extreme position. Because again, like 99.99% of games are non-free, and especially the way he phrased it is gonna come across as a crank. Stallman strikes me very much as the kind of person who communicates poorly, in an inflammatory way, and gives zero shits how much this bothers anyone else. Wh…
Put a bunch of smart, pragmatic people in a room and you’ll only end up with the current state of the software industry. The stricter the rules, the more durable the movement.
He could definitely benefit from coming across as more pleasant and affable, though.
Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement
#33> But typically these games are not solitaire; you're playing with other people. And using a non-free program together with other people? That's particularly bad. Because it means that those people are pressuring each other to keep running that non-free program. I wonder what Stallman would say about anticheat software. Even people who don't care in the slightest about free software think anticheat is detestable. But…
I wonder What Stallman would think of ROM hacking, and other mod communities that reverse engineer proprietary games, and fundamentally transform (either through direct hacks or rebuilding from decompiled source) them into something more akin to open culture. Legally? No, which is why I doubt he'll ever comment on it, but I imagine he might say that this is a distopian notion where people have to break laws to take ownership of culture because everything is fundamentally non-free.
Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement
#34> “Well, first of all, I don't think there's anything bad about playing a game. Unless the game is non-free — then it's bad for you, if you play it. I get that Stallman's shtick is being as hardline as possible about free software, but it really feels like sometimes this hurts the free software movement. Imagine trying to bring in a normal, non-technical person who plays video games as one of their hobbies (describes…
Stallman has a vision that you and I should be typing our comments and playing our games from machines that are under our control, i.e., whereby we can inspect and modify all of the code that is running on them. That is not the case, and all Stallman is saying, is that this is bad for us. The Free Software Foundation was founded in 1985. From there since Free Software has only lost ground. I don't think Stallman woul…
>From there since Free Software has only lost ground
That's not true, it gained ground for a long time after that. "Free" as in freedom software, by Stallman's definition, probably peaked in the early 2000s.
And I would say that the losses mostly started happening when the FSF stopped producing software that people wanted to use. They effectively ignored the entire internet revolution.
Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement
#35Earlier quoted context omitted.
> That is not the case, and all Stallman is saying, is that this is bad for us. Right, but to most people, that's still an extreme position. Because again, like 99.99% of games are non-free, and especially the way he phrased it is gonna come across as a crank. Stallman strikes me very much as the kind of person who communicates poorly, in an inflammatory way, and gives zero shits how much this bothers anyone else. Wh…
Put a bunch of smart, pragmatic people in a room and you’ll only end up with the current state of the software industry. The stricter the rules, the more durable the movement. He could definitely benefit from coming across as more pleasant and affable, though.
He's extremely dogmatic, and so far his movement really doesn't seem to be working? Hard to way how much of that is his fault, though.
Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement
#36I really think far too many people are missing why Stallman and the FSF are so valuable. It's not that everyone should behave exactly like them; it's that they provide a useful extreme endpoint such that there can exist a reasonable "Overton Window" of Free/Open Source/ Whatever Software.
I 100% support what they do and preach knowing FULL well I will likely never 100% do as they recommend. That's not actually a big problem.
Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's 2022 and it's close to impossible for you and me to own a computer that we control. Even the thought of owning a computer we control is now seen as "extreme". If we did go through hops to have a machine that we control, it'd be practically impossible to use it to communicate with our friends and family, because all of our communications go through third party servers that we do not control. In exactly which way…
By framing playing virtually all video games in existence as being "bad for you".
I read that more to mean that by playing games that are non-free, you are fueling the existence of more non-free games, and thus doing damage to yourself in the sense of "freedom" since you are perpetuating non-free software. The game itself is not causing harm to you.
Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement
#38> “Well, first of all, I don't think there's anything bad about playing a game. Unless the game is non-free — then it's bad for you, if you play it. I get that Stallman's shtick is being as hardline as possible about free software, but it really feels like sometimes this hurts the free software movement. Imagine trying to bring in a normal, non-technical person who plays video games as one of their hobbies (describes…
Stallman has a vision that you and I should be typing our comments and playing our games from machines that are under our control, i.e., whereby we can inspect and modify all of the code that is running on them. That is not the case, and all Stallman is saying, is that this is bad for us. The Free Software Foundation was founded in 1985. From there since Free Software has only lost ground. I don't think Stallman woul…
> The Free Software Foundation was founded in 1985. From there since Free Software has only lost ground. I don't think Stallman would agree that "lack of pragmatism" is really what's stopping things from changing for better.
Or maybe the FSF has absolutely miserably failed at actually getting their message out there?
The Right to Repair movement has been more successful; there's quite a bit of overlap between the concept of Free Software and Right To Repair: both are fundamentally about "I can do to the machine I bought whatever I want!" And it seems both the public and lawmakers are receptive to this argument. Right to Repair hasn't been as successful as I'd like (yet), but a lot more successful than Free Software. It seems to me that part of the blame squarely lies with FSF's inability to actually communicate their message effectively. Open Source has been more successful either.
I never like this kind of externalizing of issues and blame other people/corporations/governments because it's just not helpful. Even if you're 100% correct about all of that, you can't change what other people/organisations do where you have no influence, but you can influence what you do, so it's almost always better to think about "what can I/we do better?" rather than "what can they do better?"
Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
Stallman has a vision that you and I should be typing our comments and playing our games from machines that are under our control, i.e., whereby we can inspect and modify all of the code that is running on them. That is not the case, and all Stallman is saying, is that this is bad for us. The Free Software Foundation was founded in 1985. From there since Free Software has only lost ground. I don't think Stallman woul…
> That is not the case, and all Stallman is saying, is that this is bad for us. Right, but to most people, that's still an extreme position. Because again, like 99.99% of games are non-free, and especially the way he phrased it is gonna come across as a crank. Stallman strikes me very much as the kind of person who communicates poorly, in an inflammatory way, and gives zero shits how much this bothers anyone else. Wh…
[deleted]
Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement
#40Important bit of state from the Show-Don't-Tell Department: > “Due to unforeseen technical difficulties, RMS gave his talk over audio only.”
I was checking in every once in a while when it was live once the video crapped out. I popped in and he was trashing Zoom, which I found a tad ironic...