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Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

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Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#151

Post by annoyingnoob »

linuxftw wrote: post #100
malvosenior wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes I’ve read the original email thread.

If you have the source material, why don't you quote it directly. Since we're talking about the recent email thread, then you'd know RMS didn't start that conversation, so you can't blame him for injecting the discussion anywhere.

RMS has no children. RMS is not trained/educated in child development or child care. RMS is entitled to his own opinion, however he has no basis for an informed opinion. RMS shit the bed more than one time on the subject of children. RMS has had the protection of others for too long. His backward opinions on children over many years caught up with him. RMS has done great things for free software but that does not give him a free pass to be a terrible human in other aspects of life. If RMS stuck to his area of expertise we would not be having this conversation.

Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#152

Post by hdfbdtbcdg »

knocte wrote: post #62
ariabuckles wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It wasn't just this incident. RMS alienated so many women from open source and free software over the last 30 years, and we've lost all of those potential contributions. He's been getting breaks for 30 years. That he has also done some very good things isn't a good argument for continuing to tolerate his harmful behaviour after he's been asked to fix it for literally decades, and hasn't.

I agree with you about all the past bad behaviour, but the e-mail about Minsky was a bad choice to be the "last straw". It was an email calling for accusation-inflation prevention, which the media portrayed as completely the opposite (and this way of manipulation information from the media should be criminal, in my opinion).

If we made deliberate or negligent defamation a criminal offence it might restore some sanity to society.

Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#153

Post by lliamander »

toofy wrote: post #134
roenxi wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it is even worth focusing in on specific issues; throwing mud at Stallman's character is post-hoc rationalisation for a situation created by thoughtcrime. Even if the mud sticks, the major problem is that Stallman was forced to resign after what appears to be (from public info) a moral panic. People acting on moral panics is really bad; good process is slow process. There are real complaints about Stall…

I don’t mean to quibble and I really want to strsss this next point: I’m absolutely as lost as we all seem to be regarding how some people in our communities should be dealt with. I don’t yet know how we’ll choose to handle them. But anyway, using the term “thoughtcrime” feels incredibly disingenuous and could easily be misconstrued as intentionally inflammatory. Obviously you wouldn’t be intentionally inflammatory o…

"Thoughtcrime" here refers to the mere expression of taboo opinions, independent of a person's actual behavior towards others.

It seems to be the case that Stallman did engage in inappropriate behavior - which perhaps should have been dealt with differently by CSAIL, MIT, the FSF board etc. The appropriate response may very well have been to ask for his resignation.

But those behaviors are not why he was asked to resign. Reference to his past behavior was a post-hoc rationalization. It seems the real reason he was fired was because he expressed a difference of opinion over the nature of Marvin Minksy's guilt as a result of his association with Epstein.

Well, it wasn't even about the opinion he expressed, rather he was fired because someone publicly misinterpreted his opinion, and that mistaken opinion was picked up by the media.

Well, it wasn't even about the misinterpreted opinion. He was fired because MIT is (I'm sure) facing some very serious scrutiny over it's entanglements with Epstein, and the very real concern that one of it's famed professors may have been a co-conspirator in a powerful and depraved criminal ring. The whole Stallman affair serves as a nice deflection from that scrutiny.

As it stands, it does not even look like Minsky ever participated in said criminal activity (as far as I can tell, the victim only said that she was compelled to offer herself to Minsky, and another witness claimed that Minksy turned her down). While there likely were many powerful people who were knowing participants in Epstein's activities, it seems that Epstein was also someone who liked to befriend very smart STEM folks, and not all of them may have been aware as to what exactly Epstein was involved in.

Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#154

Post by watwut »

michannne wrote: post #38

It seems this thread and others like it has fueled a controversial honeypot, as some users are mass-downvoting comments that are perfectly in line with the content posted, simply because they stand for or against ousting Stallman, and others are doing the opposite -- mass upvoting comments that align with their predisposed view of the situation. I'd like to take sometime however to reiterate that freedom applies to a…

Isnt that how all discussions about free software evolved since ever?

Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#155

Post by ben509 »

egdod wrote: post #86
michannne wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Horrible" is completely subjective.

"Horrible" is sometimes subjective. There are things that pretty much every reasonable person would agree are horrible.

> pretty much every reasonable person

Reasonable is subjective.

Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#156

Post by concordDance »

akdas wrote: post #119
michannne wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I had a de-platformed individual every time they made a comment someone took offense to, I'd end up with an animal farm. Definitely, his comments should not be overlooked, but intellectually benching someone because of what they've said is not how you handle these types of situations. Furthermore, his leadership qualities depend only on his ability to lead a group towards a goal, which he was doing swell at.

> his leadership qualities depend only on his ability to lead a group towards a goal, which he was doing swell at It sounds like his behavior was alienating people who would have been willing to work toward that shared goal, but were instead pushed away. So based on what I'm reading, he was a poor leader in this regard.

Would the people who were pushed away actually have contributed much?

The few I've seen mentioned seemed a bit fragile and easily upset to be suitable for doing reasoned public advocacy.

Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#157

Post by marijn »

sn41 wrote: post #7

In the years to come, I believe free software will be recognised as one of the paradigmatic changes in how science itself is done. Now chemists and biologists have started talking about making data openly available and so forth. It's a shame that RMS has to spout forth on every issue, and in the current climate of outrage, science may have lost an important transformational voice. I think as a society, we need to cal…

He wasn't blacklisted for committing thought crime. The dumb Epstein email triggered a reevaluation of his consistent creepy and inappropriate behavior against current community standards, which resulted in a large part of the community deciding they didn't want anything to do with him anymore. Freedom of speech does not mean freedom from social consequences.

Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#158

Post by madacoo »

4bpp wrote: post #143
madacoo wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's start by assuming that a rational agent might choose as a goal the complete cessation of a particular belief. In that case I'd argue that downvoting patterns, as previously described, are not rational because, rather than having the intended consequence of reducing the likelihood of the expression of that belief, they would in fact simply cause that belief to strengthen and then be expressed elsewhere in altern…

I suppose it all depends on whether you think persuasion or group membership signalling is what primarily influences people's beliefs. I was under the impression there was a wealth of studies suggesting that people basically do not respond positively to logical argument but are easily swayed by what they think everyone around them believes, but I completely failed to find any of them (or studies to the contrary, on t…

It's definitely an interesting question as to whether goal-choice itself can be a rational activity. Of course, it is necessary for a rational agent to begin with axioms and from there make choices. It seems perfectly coherent to me that we could, from those axioms, choose a further set of goals, each of which can be attained following a course of actions, and so on.

And so I would contend that the goal 'cause the cessation of a particular belief' is not axiomatic at all, but an instance of a goal that serves something more fundamentally axiomatic. Like 'make the world more comfortable'. Or 'make the world conform to my expectations'. Or something like that.

From this model we could absolutely talk about choosing goals in a rational manner that aids certain axioms. The question then would be: could the axioms themselves be chosen in a rational manner? Probably not but then it doesn't seem impossible to argue that some sets of axioms are better than others. It would be nice, say, if the axioms guiding the behaviour of a rational agent, didn't contradict each other.

Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#159

Post by colonwqbang »

thayne wrote: post #145
cma wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I'm understanding right, those journals still kept it copyrighted, without copy-left provisions. It's more like the notion of open source, where the source may be viewable but isn't necessarily available for redistribution. While Stallman says you can charge as much as you can, his terms say that once someone buys it they can immediately undercut you, and he admits that limits the amount you could charge sustainab…

> It's more like the notion of open source, where the source may be viewable but isn't necessarily available for redistribution. I think you misunderstand the distinction between open source and free software. Open source software also needs to be available for redistribution. The main practical difference is Free Software also requires that if you make any changes to the software, those changes must _also_ be releas…

No, you are thinking of copyleft software. "Free software" means the same thing as "open-source software".

See for instance this GNU page where permissive licenses like the MIT license are also described as "free software licenses":

https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html

Re: Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2007)

#160

Post by lliamander »

zapzupnz wrote: post #22
Frondo wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The complaints about stallman aren't a matter of thoughtcrime, they're a matter of entirely inappropriate behavior, not just once but repeatedly, over the course of decades. This was the one that disturbed me the most: "Going to an RMS talk in the early 90s and meeting with him in person was among the worst of my experienced - I was fifteen, still obviously underage, and skipping gym class to hear him speak at a prof…

> The complaints about stallman aren't a matter of thoughtcrime, they're a matter of entirely inappropriate behavior, not just once but repeatedly, over the course of decades Indeed. A lot of people leaping to his defence have only a very surface-level understanding of his past record and think the accusations are something new or recent. Nobody expects the people who change the world to be perfect, but it really doe…

I'm sure not all are aware of his history of inappropriate behavior, but some of us are. I think those of us who are bothered by his ousting are bothered for two reasons:

1. The triggering event was someone misquoting him and the media running with that misquote

2. The timing and manner in which MIT handled the situations suggests that they were hypocritically trying to deflect from their own complicity in the Epstein scandal, rather than addressing Stallman's behavior in good faith.

3. While Stallman certainly benefited from some protection for his behavior, the organizations which supported him also greatly benefited from him. The FSF saying that Stallman does not speak for them is particularly rich, considering they exist to promote his ideas.

I'm not saying I care for his behavior, or that all of it should get a pass. There's also a lot that I just don't agree with him about. However:

1. I don't like seeing the media twist people's words

2. I don't like seeing organizations throw people under the bus during moral panics

Also, I fear that it's becoming harder to be a weird nerd in tech[1].

[1]https://medium.com/@maradydd/when-nerds-collide-31895b01e68c

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