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We Need to Save What Made Linux and FOSS Possible

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Re: We Need to Save What Made Linux and FOSS Possible

#51

Post by pixelbath »

iaarn wrote: post #9
oldjokes wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This one really freaks me out. Especially since many of the TOS are downright abusive. Discord, for example, reserves the right to read through and listen to all your communications and monetize that in any way and you agree to let them sell all that to anyone, forever. The fact that we're just sort of expecting everyone to slave away on github every night and weekend to remain employable is pretty disgusting too. Th…

Friendly reminder that Mozilla has decided to abandon IRC and the Rust community has therefore moved to Discord, a platform that is abusive regarding data and requires you to use a closed source javascript application to access the service. Mozilla is a bad example because their leadership is simply pathetic, but you get the point. This trend is very, very dangerous. But well the writing was on the wall when many ope…

While Mozilla seems to be a large open source/web advocate, I always have a hard time with the fact that, as an organization, most of their revenue comes directly from Google buying the top spot in default search engines.

Re: We Need to Save What Made Linux and FOSS Possible

#53

Post by pdonis »

Searls says that the fight for general purpose computing is the one most worth having: but I think he's using a definition of "general purpose computing" that most non-developers won't even understand, much less agree with.

The problem is that development is an extremely special purpose--one that most people don't do and don't understand the needs of. As a developer, I want a level of control over every aspect of my computer that most people don't want, need, or even think of. To most people, "general purpose computing" just means their computer (or more likely their phone, these days) can run any app they want it to run. It doesn't mean what Searls (and the people whose articles he references, like Doctorow) takes it to mean.

And to the ordinary person, the idea that it is essential to society that developers have the freedom to configure their computers however they want, regardless of what the government or some corporation says, doesn't sound like something worth fighting for; it sounds like something scary. They don't think of Stallman developing Gnu or Linus Torvalds developing Linux; they think of computer viruses and worms running rampant.

Re: We Need to Save What Made Linux and FOSS Possible

#54

Post by crankylinuxuser »

jakelazaroff wrote: post #40
kazinator wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why have users chosen those environments? Because they don't give a rat's ass about the freedom aspect of free software. If software A requires four clicks to do something, but B has a way to do it in 3, they are on B without a second thought. But in this case, those users are not just any old end users; the are actually supposed to be FOSS developers, so there is a heavy irony there. I think what is doing on is th…

> Because they don't give a rat's ass about the freedom aspect of free software. If software A requires four clicks to do something, but B has a way to do it in 3, they are on B without a second thought. Isn't this kind of the point, though? To compete with proprietary software, free software needs to actually be competitive. "It's not as good as this other (proprietary) software, but it's free" won't cut it.

Until you want your data.

Turns out data roach motelling is a big thing. And it's even better for the corp interests if they can tie hardware and software to irreplaceable APIs that lock the user down to the whims of the owner.

It's time to take the fight back to "Owner"... If you purchased it, why can't you do what you want? Why are you prevented from doing arbitrary actions?

Re: We Need to Save What Made Linux and FOSS Possible

#55

Post by the_af »

Drdrdrq wrote: post #37
kazinator wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why have users chosen those environments? Because they don't give a rat's ass about the freedom aspect of free software. If software A requires four clicks to do something, but B has a way to do it in 3, they are on B without a second thought. But in this case, those users are not just any old end users; the are actually supposed to be FOSS developers, so there is a heavy irony there. I think what is doing on is th…

>> Why have users chosen those environments? > Because they don't give a rat's ass about the freedom aspect of free software. If software A requires four clicks to do something, but B has a way to do it in 3, they are on B without a second thought. Convenience always wins. Always. Users do care about free (as in beer) and they care if the product or service will disappear without warning (hello Google!). But the defi…

> Convenience always wins

Yes, but convenience also leads to greedy "algorithms" prone to getting stuck in local maxima. Convenience can make us lazy and choose the wrong long-term solutions.

This applies to more things than just tech ("convenience" may make us choose foods that are wrong for our health, for example).

Re: We Need to Save What Made Linux and FOSS Possible

#56

Post by eclipseo76 »

shmerl wrote: post #21
iaarn wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Friendly reminder that Mozilla has decided to abandon IRC and the Rust community has therefore moved to Discord, a platform that is abusive regarding data and requires you to use a closed source javascript application to access the service. Mozilla is a bad example because their leadership is simply pathetic, but you get the point. This trend is very, very dangerous. But well the writing was on the wall when many ope…

Why couldn't they use Matrix instead of Discord?

According to them, because they have special needs regarding moderation, because "muh harassment".

Re: We Need to Save What Made Linux and FOSS Possible

#57

Post by amyjess »

iaarn wrote: post #9
oldjokes wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This one really freaks me out. Especially since many of the TOS are downright abusive. Discord, for example, reserves the right to read through and listen to all your communications and monetize that in any way and you agree to let them sell all that to anyone, forever. The fact that we're just sort of expecting everyone to slave away on github every night and weekend to remain employable is pretty disgusting too. Th…

Friendly reminder that Mozilla has decided to abandon IRC and the Rust community has therefore moved to Discord, a platform that is abusive regarding data and requires you to use a closed source javascript application to access the service. Mozilla is a bad example because their leadership is simply pathetic, but you get the point. This trend is very, very dangerous. But well the writing was on the wall when many ope…

Calling people "pathetic" is generally a very bad way of convincing people of your argument.

Re: We Need to Save What Made Linux and FOSS Possible

#58

Post by the_af »

Funes- wrote: post #29
jordigh wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ideological reasons are practical reasons. We don't want to give you software freedom because we believe in some abstract ideology. We want to give you free software because we believe this is the way that you will eventually get the best software that will let you do the most. Indeed, for software of good quality, free software wins. GNU R has completely dominated most areas of statistical computing, for example…

>The ideological reasons are practical reasons. We don't want to give you software freedom because we believe in some abstract ideology. We want to give you free software because we believe this is the way that you will eventually get the best software that will let you do the most. While I wholeheartedly agree with this particular stance--doing away with ideology and sticking with ethics and pragmatism--, I am not s…

In fact, that's only the ideology of Open Source software.

Free/libre software (e.g. GNU and the FSF) believe in "free as in speech" for ideological reasons, not for tech quality reasons. In fact -- they argue -- one should sacrifice convenience and sometimes even short-term quality in favor of freedom. I certainly see the merit of that line of thought, though it's also a very hard road, and harder still to convince people.

Ideology is not a bad word :)

Re: We Need to Save What Made Linux and FOSS Possible

#59

Post by Drdrdrq »

michaelmrose wrote: post #44
Drdrdrq wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. The problem with FOSS are incentives which are not aligned. Sure, some developers will give their best for free... for some time. But sooner or later the going gets tough and maintaining (let alone developing further) your pet project becomes a chore. Will you still do it? For how long? And if you try to monetize the project to at least somehow offset the lost energy and time, and maybe even pay someone else to…

Android especially the google variants are pretty open and unlocked. The librem phone is due in Q3 of this year. If you crowd fund development instead of try to sell consulting or a premium version then Amazon can't pull the rug out from under you by offering hosting and support because you aren't in that business. You may never have an IPO or make a billion dollars but if as the song says we "Try just a little bit h…

> The common clause licenses isn't a "hybrid" its a proprietary software license. Calling it a hybrid is like saying a BLT without the bacon, lettuce, or tomato is a sandwich. It's not a solution its giving up.

Well, it's more like tiramisu with chocolate instead of coffee. In the end, as a user, I would prefer a convenient and polished product (that I can't sell) to worse product that respects some other people's definition of supposedly my freedoms.

Agree that crowd funding is another way, yes. Probably works for very few projects (font awesome comes to mind) though.

Re: We Need to Save What Made Linux and FOSS Possible

#60

Post by iaarn »

amyjess wrote: post #57
iaarn wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Friendly reminder that Mozilla has decided to abandon IRC and the Rust community has therefore moved to Discord, a platform that is abusive regarding data and requires you to use a closed source javascript application to access the service. Mozilla is a bad example because their leadership is simply pathetic, but you get the point. This trend is very, very dangerous. But well the writing was on the wall when many ope…

Calling people "pathetic" is generally a very bad way of convincing people of your argument.

You misunderstand, I'm not trying to convince anybody of anything, I'm merely conveying information.

The leadership of the Mozilla corporation is pathetic, toothless, and either useless or ill-intentioned. This is a comment and I'm not trying to convince you of these things, I'm stating my opinion. Readers of this comment should feel free to look at the decisions taken by those people these past years and agree or disagree with me.

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