Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement • Hacker News Board

Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement

#301

Post by tjpnz » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 8:06 AM UTC

jhbadger wrote: post #258

waplot wrote: post #230

> 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…

There are some really addictive games that are open source though. And some of them are quite rightly famous. For example, Nethack. I've played Nethack for countless hours over the course of decades. It's definitely given me more entertainment than 99% of all commercial games that I've bought, and I have it installed on all my computers (and there are even phone versions). https://www.thegreatestgameyouwilleverplay.c…

Doom 3 might technically qualify, the source code was released under the GPL years back. The caveat was that you needed the creative assets to play it (although I'm pretty sure it would happily run with custom maps).

I especially like this model. You get the source but the people who worked on the game still get paid.

Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement

#302

Post by belorn » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 8:06 AM UTC

charcircuit wrote: post #279

belorn wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not sure what you mean there. Wallhacks is the ability to see through walls. The server could simply not give out the information about what behind a wall and the wallhack exploit would stop working. It would also very likely introduce pop-in and latency issue as soon the client peeks behind the wall and now need updated information from the server. Fake lag is in a similar situation. The server could simply hol…

>It would also very likely introduce pop-in and latency issue as soon the client peeks behind the wall and now need updated information from the server. Which is why games that do that will still send you data about player who you are almost able to see. This will be their exact position and look direction along with what they are holding. Even limited wallhacks can give a competitive advantage. I think you misunders…

If the movement, location and actions occurs at the server, the effect of fake lag would just harm the player doing it. It would not make the character stutter for everyone else, as from the server perspective the player would just be standing still.

Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement

#303

Post by alkonaut » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 8:06 AM UTC

vjk800 wrote: post #227

Arainach wrote: post #9

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…

Solving the community game problem doesn’t require Anticheat, just groups of people who organize and nominate admins. But that niche doesn’t pay for the development of the games.

For a game to attract the amount of people required to finance AAA gamedev it needs console matchmaking (so people can enjoy it from the first minute), it might need to allow trustworthy competitive games bevause competitions are part of marketing.

Being able to switch off the anticheats on private/community server that are policed by admins would work. But again it’s a pretty small niche.

Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement

#304

Post by contrast » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 8:06 AM UTC

tjader wrote: post #103

starwind wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you just compare Stallman and the FSF to the Abolitionist movement, and paid software to slavery?

No. I made an analogy to another behavior that I hope everyone will agree is unethical. The point is that if you accept Stallman's position that closed source software is unethical his response is not unexpected.

Unless you have a low opinion of Stallman, why would you expect him to be so dismissive of the day-to-day concerns of someone who wants to support a family?

Using extreme ethical examples to justify a statement is how Godwin’s Law came about, way back in the 90s. It’s a well known tactic to make one’s own position sound reasonable, by implying that anyone is still arguing with you may as well be saying the Nazis weren’t so bad.

It’s a good rule of thumb that rather than making a logical argument, you are in fact bringing a rational discussion to an end by invoking slavery, Hitler, or other incontrovertible evil. They are not in any meaningful sense useful analogies for most discussions.

The guy wasn’t bringing up anything like slavery. Therefore Stallman’s response is quite likely unexpected to most people.

Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement

#305

Post by diffeomorphism » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 8:07 AM UTC

Gigachad wrote: post #203

danamit wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is possible to have free anticheat software. I do not hate anticheat as a gamer, but I do hate DRMs.

No it isn’t. Anti cheat is basically DRM/malware. If you could fully understand how it works you could just modify it / work your cheats around it.

No, not at all. You are making the same mistake as "security by obscurity". If fully understanding your anticheat breaks it, it was broken to begin with.

Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement

#306

Post by joosters » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 8:07 AM UTC

smackeyacky wrote: post #269

xiphias2 wrote: post #59

,, Macintoshes are moving towards being jails, like the iMonsters. It's getting harder for users to install even their own programs to run them.'' I feel this all the time, especially on my iPad Pro: I'm buying much more idevices than before, because I don't like the direction Windows has taken, and Apple gets always the newest TSMC slots (I buy the newest products from TSMC, they just happen to be made together with…

It amazes me that the very first personal computer I had was effectively useless without being able to write your own software. It wasn"t an Apple ][ but they encouraged software development, it was a huge part of 8 bit culture. 40 years later, trying to get something running on a modern Mac is painful, and they gatekeep it with Xcode and a variety of user hostile features. They have become what they despised in that…

40 years later, trying to get something running on a modern Mac is painful

Right click on app, select ‘open’. If you get a prompt warning about an unknown developer, pick the option to run the app anyway.

Getting angry about a prompt that you only ever see once (it won’t prompt you again) seems extreme.

Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement

#307

Post by Kinrany » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 8:07 AM UTC

User23 wrote: post #198

adwn wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 can make a lot of money writing free software at whatever FAANG is called now. I mean sure the source is never distributed because the binaries aren’t either, but it does meet the definition.

When Stallman says "free as in free speech, not free beer", he means freedom to use software in any way you want including changing it. Not zero price.

Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement

#308

Post by thinkingemote » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 8:08 AM UTC

ivan_gammel wrote: post #56

It won’t be major exaggeration to say that FSF and Stallman are irrelevant in 2022 and not much different from any other radical left group, struggling even to make sense for majority of people. The idea of completely free software where user could control the source code is an obsolete ideal. Not because it’s unviable economically, but because the size and complexity of modern software is far beyond the ability of i…

The FSF is at it's largest membership than it has ever had in it's life. It's healthy and people think it is very relevant.

Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement

#309

Post by thinkingemote » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 8:09 AM UTC

okareaman wrote: post #169

From what I can tell, RMS asserts we have the right to inspect the source code of the software that runs on our machines. What is the source of this right? Is it a universal human right? A self-evident inalienable right? Did RMS want to hack a printer one day and found he couldn't so he made up a right for us? Why are people who ship closed software evil? For someone who goes around moralizing and judging others, RMS…

you could have left out the last half of your paragraph and gotten a much better discussion.

Many people really don't know what Freedom actually means. The rights and origin of Freedom with computing should be understood. Is it a natural common law extension of property, for example?

But that last half was just highlighting that you are not after a discussion or answers to your questions, and that it was just rehashing the same old points.

Re: Richard Stallman – The state of the Free Software movement

#310

Post by alkonaut » Mon, Apr 18, 2022, 8:10 AM UTC

zufallsheld wrote: post #285

vhgyu75e6u wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He seems so out of touch with reality, advocating for everything being free open source, specially games would have stopped many of the now cultural references that exists. Making games is hard, making good games is harder and needs a team both motivated and financially compensated.

RMS does not mean free as in free bear but as in Libre.

But a game costs hundreds of millions of dollars to create. Just royalties to sports leagues etc can be massive, for a sports game for example.

RMS should work backwards from that assumption and explain how to get such games into gamers hands while maintaining freedom. If he can’t then he should probably give up arguing that people should stop playing or switch to something completely different than what they consider a “game” is.