251–260 of 623 posts
> Ubuntu of course is a non-free distro, and I wouldn't recommend that anyone use it. I use Ubuntu because it came with the computer, although it is a old version, and I have removed many of the included packages. (If I was setting it up myself, then I might prefer one without systemd (and without Wayland, if possible); I would also need it to be based on free software, although I do not require that the package mana…
What's wrong with Wayland?
Around the 8 and 9 min mark RMS talks about old hardware losing software support, like 32 bit systems. I am a kernel developer and the kernel removes code for a lot of older systems all the time (often lesser known 32bit ARM systems). Phoronix reported that 5.18 removed the Andes NDS32 CPU arch code. https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=linux-51... The reason they do this is because a lot of these syst…
I suspect most kernel developers mostly operate with virtual machines in mind, but as a sysadmin I would argue that physical machines also has their use cases. I also suspect that if the linux kernel stop supporting 32-bit machines, others will continue. Are the BSD people thinking about dropping 32-bit support?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
A few years ago I saw an indie game developer recount his experience with Stallman[1]; he doesn't see how he can release his games as Free Software while making a living, pay his rent, pay for his children's education, etc. So he asked Stallman what to do about that. Stallman's reply? "You should not be making those games, it is unethical." To say that is non-constructive would be an understatement; it's just shuttin…
When you buy a game from Jason Rohrer, you get the source code too. (It's also on GitHub.) What you're actually buying is an account on the official multiplayer server (which is also open source). I thought this was a really interesting model. Maybe it wouldn't work so well with singleplayer games. However, there's a similar example with the sprite editor / animation software Aseprite, which is open source but you ha…
Now sadly no longer on the Apple App Store
I guess that is what happens over time at the walled garden: You don't pay, you don't play
[1] http://hcsoftware.sourceforge.net/jason-rohrer/
update: gotta go scrounge for my box of old iPod touches with dead batteries if they have the games as local iTunes sync no longer works.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
>Even people who don't care in the slightest about free software think anticheat is detestable. [[Citation Needed]]. Trying to play a multiplayer game that doesn't implement effective anticheat is miserable. The arms race is unfortunate but 100% understandable, and I wouldn't play any game that doesn't implement some form of it.
This is due to how multiplayer in modern games is orchestrated. In the old days, you would play multiplayer with your friends and their friends on a private server or some kind of community server where cheaters could quickly be recognized and banned by the admins. Now this communal way of playing online games is largely gone and replaced by match making which makes multiplayer basically the same as playing against c…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The hyperbole doesn't help. Stallman would not tell you that you need to starve in the streets. He is well away that most programmers get paid at least median income, and often much more, and they are normally people who can make choices in their lives, few of which will involve starving in the streets. You don't have to agree that the choices are attractive to acknowledge that they do not need to include starving in…
> He is well away that most programmers get paid at least median income, and often much more Yes, by working on unfree software , an occupation which he uncompromisingly condemns. Programmers working exclusively on free software would be earning much, much less on average.
You mentioned exclusively, that's true that you might have to write custom, closed code for customers at many of those companies. But that's still better than exclusively working on non free software.
> Now, more free games? It doesn't satisfy an urgent practical need, obviously... But the crucial thing is, free ones might make it easier for some people to say, 'Let's move off this non-free thing, and play a game that is free. So we can have the same pleasure, but without paying freedom as the price.'“ i'm sorry but i just can't read this without laughing. what does stallman think gamers are like? i can only imagi…
It's not just about free software either (that's a higher-level target), it's also about the hardware and freedom of running your software on your machine, and owning your computer in general. For example, anticheats in multiplayer games is the major driving factor behind locking PCs down with DRM and chains of trust. It's already so bad that you practically need a separate machine for many games if you want to run anything remotely resembling a VM on your main one, and it's going to get much worse. (ex. TPM requirement in some games on Win11)
And sure, an "average teenage gamer" is happy to give it away, because the only thing they care about is cheaters. The problem is, this is imposed on everyone, directly or indirectly.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Belaboring the point: you should have SOME working understanding of the physics of your homes use of energy. You should be able to fix your home when something’s wrong with it, so long as it’s not something catastrophically wrong that requires professional help (such as the fire brigade). The point: computers are different from everything else. Pre-writing man is a fundamentally different character to literate, histo…
> The qualitative shift of computational man finds that what he has read can be made into action, simply by it having been written, yet this does not hold true for a person who is handed Durants history of the world, or Livy’s history of Rome (before having been taught Latin, even!) and being told, you have knowledge, even though you can’t get through it all. I think you have much too high a regard for your own inter…
I’m allowed to be idealistic about some things. Aren’t we all?
> Now, more free games? It doesn't satisfy an urgent practical need, obviously... But the crucial thing is, free ones might make it easier for some people to say, 'Let's move off this non-free thing, and play a game that is free. So we can have the same pleasure, but without paying freedom as the price.'“ i'm sorry but i just can't read this without laughing. what does stallman think gamers are like? i can only imagi…
> “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…
A few years ago I saw an indie game developer recount his experience with Stallman[1]; he doesn't see how he can release his games as Free Software while making a living, pay his rent, pay for his children's education, etc. So he asked Stallman what to do about that. Stallman's reply? "You should not be making those games, it is unethical." To say that is non-constructive would be an understatement; it's just shuttin…
Made me imagine one of those xkcd:
Me: here is the code.
RMS: what? this is the compiled software.
Me: but the code is there in assembly.
RMS: that's unethical, give me the source code.
Me: ok, here, the source right before compilation.
RMS: this is obfuscated code, still unethical.
Me: granted, here it goes without obfuscation.
RMS: no, wait, the code is so micro-optimized it's no easy to understand, that's not open enough, and, unethical.
Me: ugh but I didn't save the unoptimized version, I just kept optimizing until it got this way.
RMS: look if we can't understand it we won't be able to inspect it, so this is still unethical.
Me: fine, I refactored the code.
RMS: it's undocumented, how are most people going to understand it, imagine a whole operating system undocumented, just, unethical!
> Now, more free games? It doesn't satisfy an urgent practical need, obviously... But the crucial thing is, free ones might make it easier for some people to say, 'Let's move off this non-free thing, and play a game that is free. So we can have the same pleasure, but without paying freedom as the price.'“ i'm sorry but i just can't read this without laughing. what does stallman think gamers are like? i can only imagi…
Laughing at RMS had proven shortsighted in the past, and I don't think anything changed, it's still unwise. It's not just about free software either (that's a higher-level target), it's also about the hardware and freedom of running your software on your machine, and owning your computer in general. For example, anticheats in multiplayer games is the major driving factor behind locking PCs down with DRM and chains of…
Now it seems like the vast majority of the needs and requirements to run software locally have been replaced with networked services and a browser/thin client interface.
Which means, that in order to do anything useful, you need to communicate with some other service that is running software that has access to your data. The 'freedom' to inspect the code that runs on your computer is useless without both the freedom to see what happens upstream, and also some level of trust or confidence that the service you're using really isnt doing something nefarious.
Take something as old and as open as IRC. I have absolutely no way of knowing if the server Im connecting to is actually running the software I think it is, unmodified. The only people who have that level of access, have root on the server.
Even RMS's free game example is bad. One of the players can modify their copy to cheat, and the other players dont have any real option in that situation.