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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

#341

Post by robocat »

zeruch wrote: post #272
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…

"what does stallman think gamers are like?" He doesn't care, and likely has never given a single iota of thought to it, as he assumes what is best is to think like him. And dear RMS acolytes who will almost certainly bristle at this statement; I spent enough time around him and his satellites in the 90s/oughts, to feel quite comfortable saying this. He has near zero interest (and I would argue the capacity) to try to…

There are plenty of examples where somebody who has influenced the world was an idealist, out of touch with societal norms. RMS has serious faults, but his virtues have an immense value in my opinion.

‘The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.’.

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

#342

Post by the_af »

lovich wrote: post #334
ddingus wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At a minimum, those gamers need to look at the past, and their own future. See, when hardware was more open, I was able to preserve and continue to play the games I enjoy. In fact, I can disassemble them, learn from them, make my own. The gamers of today won't be playing the games of their formative years on their terms, if they are playing them at all. This is just one of the many things Stallman is right about. Lau…

>won't be playing the games of their formative years on their terms Do they care? Lots of these games are like fashion, where the core gameplay loop is pretty similar to exactly the same as previous games, just with a different art direction on top. The fact that its popular is what makes it popular until its not.

> "Do they care?"

I guarantee you that they will.

They might not think so now, but when in a couple or so of decades they suddenly remember a cherished videogame from their youth (maybe associated with the joy of discovering videogames, maybe with a memory of a friend who's passed away, maybe just because of doing videogame archaeology) and they cannot play it at all because of DRM or unsupported hardware (and the impossibility of porting it without breaking some law), then they will care.

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

#343

Post by mpol »

moth-fuzz wrote: post #293
RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #19

Stallman reminds me of a character in a Greek tragedy. He ends up bringing in the very thing he is fighting against. He makes GPL to give users control over programs. Companies end up using GPL software to power server side software which ends up giving users even less control than proprietary on-device software. He makes GCC to break free of vendors dominating compiler development. IBM(through Redhat) ends up being…

I think this is what a lot of people mean when they say that FOSS (and Open Source in general) 'lost' in the grand scheme of things. Sure, FOSS is running the entire show from sites to servers to databases to build systems to programming languages, but, whether or not you can actually see the code seems to hold little sway when the war is really over personal data and privacy. Who cares if I can see the tensorflow so…

If the war has shifted to open/closed data, does it mean the battle for free software was won? Saying we lost is a bit early. I do see lots of projects aiming for open data. That battle has not been decided yet, it's a long game.

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

#344

Post by Semaphor »

ddingus wrote: post #317
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…

At a minimum, those gamers need to look at the past, and their own future. See, when hardware was more open, I was able to preserve and continue to play the games I enjoy. In fact, I can disassemble them, learn from them, make my own. The gamers of today won't be playing the games of their formative years on their terms, if they are playing them at all. This is just one of the many things Stallman is right about. Lau…

FWIW, many Unity games are not protected/obfuscated at all. I can look at the full source code of my current favorite game, Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous.

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

#345

Post by Hackbraten »

joosters wrote: post #306
smackeyacky wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Have you tried getting a command-line program to build and run on an M1 Mac lately?

Yeah, it works most of the time. But when it doesn’t, e.g. due to some post-build script that massages the binary after signing it, it brings you a world of pain.

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

#346

Post by s1291 »

zrm wrote: post #246
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…

Try it this way: You create a game which is actually good. People want to play it a lot. It costs $0 and becomes popular. It's easy to mod so it gets a big community. And everything gets released on GNU/Linux two months before it gets ported to anything else.

"Free" in Free Software doesn't mean 0$ cost.

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

#347

Post by watwut »

robocat wrote: post #341
zeruch wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"what does stallman think gamers are like?" He doesn't care, and likely has never given a single iota of thought to it, as he assumes what is best is to think like him. And dear RMS acolytes who will almost certainly bristle at this statement; I spent enough time around him and his satellites in the 90s/oughts, to feel quite comfortable saying this. He has near zero interest (and I would argue the capacity) to try to…

There are plenty of examples where somebody who has influenced the world was an idealist, out of touch with societal norms. RMS has serious faults, but his virtues have an immense value in my opinion. ‘The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.’.

Tho, those unreasonable men also fairly often cause quite a lot of damage to their own causes and to world in general.

Also, I think that looking at history, claim that all progress was due to unreasonable men is false.

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

#348

Post by kergonath »

orbital-decay wrote: post #256
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…

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…

> Laughing at RMS had proven shortsighted in the past, and I don't think anything changed, it's still unwise.

I don’t know, I’ve been laughing at him for 20 years and nothing bad ever happened because of that. How is it unwise?

> For example, anticheats in multiplayer games is the major driving factor behind locking PCs down with DRM and chains of trust.

The driving force was (and still largely is) protecting copyrighted video content. That is bullshit, of course, but cheaters and video games were far down the priority pile when hardware DRM was designed. Now, it’s all about secure computing and sandboxes, and video games are still pretty much an afterthought.

> 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.

The average teenage gamer does not care. There are things we can do to improve the situation with DRM, but “how do you do fellow kids” from an old neck beard is way off the mark, and indeed laughable.

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

#349

Post by charcircuit »

belorn wrote: post #302
charcircuit wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>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.

Yes, the player will look like they are teleporting around, but they will still be able to kill you. No, it doesn't harm the player doing it because client side they are still moving around.

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

#350

Post by maratc »

ddingus wrote: post #319
mixologic wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like free software, and RMS's biggest blind spot is the network, between people, and between computers. Everything is framed and discussed in this old timey way of using computers, where you had a general purpose machine that was personal that you programmed to do things you needed, or installed software on, to also do something valueable. Now it seems like the vast majority of the needs and requirements to ru…

I do tons of useful stuff on my computers running software locally on those computers. You are right about network services working hard to own more and more of the interactions and make it increasingly difficult to manage one's relationships and interactions without those services. Frankly, I've responded by making damn sure I have interactions with the people I care about that are not owned by these services. Shoul…

> That's a social problem being attacked with technology

Any problem in the last couple of centuries is being attacked with technology. That's what the industrial revolution is about.

Steam engine? That's a transportation problem being attacked with technology. Covid vaccines? That's a healthcare problem being attacked with technology. Anti-missile missiles? That's an international relations problem being attacked with technology.

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