01.03.20
Billionaires and Corporations Are Revolting Against the Freedom of Free Software
They try to divide us and spur infighting, betrayals
Summary: Attempts to ‘sanitise’ or ‘socially-engineer’ Free software communities are underway; it may mean that we’re winning the battle (causing stress among corporate giants), but we must also be clever and cautious about it
What we nowadays see at the FSF, the Linux Foundation and even Debian is a sign of stress in corporate boardrooms. They strike hard at the very heart and core of Free software. Many people will likely be hurt — perhaps as a sort of ‘collateral damage’. Microsoft boosters have also stormed our IRC channels lately. We’ve learned this morning that they did the same thing in other GNU/Linux forums. We’re doing OK, we’ve learned to mostly ignore them (we don’t block or censor, ever).
“Microsoft boosters have also stormed our IRC channels lately.”Word to the wise, clue to the cautious: be careful what you say these days. The kapos are lurking, waiting for the next person to ‘make an example of’ for so-called ‘wrongthink’ (which may be something as trivial as criticising a government or a corporation that gave money to a project). They’re right there among us, sometimes as ‘fake’ community members, typically contributing no code but just lecturing and whispering, choosing targets for exclusion and shaming. █
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seankearon said,
January 5, 2020 at 3:20 am
This is the complete opposite to my experiences working for a huge multinational corporation. They actively encourage and promote the use of free and open source software. Do you have any evidence to support your claims?
Dr. Roy Schestowitz Reply:
January 5th, 2020 at 3:48 am
They strive to control the development and use; they remove what they perceive to be obstructions, such as RMS, copyleft, Torvalds telling off developers who truck in bad code…
seankearon Reply:
January 5th, 2020 at 4:47 am
I’m going to have to disagree with you here again. My experience just isn’t anything close to what you are inferring.
Well, sure, you obviously can’t include copyleft components in anything that is or may be used for commercial purposes. But that’s doesn’t stop people making copyleft components if they want to.
I can’t see how RMS is even relevant (other than being an intrinsic part of any copyleft discussion).
As for Torvalds telling people off who write poor code – nobody wants crappy code in any system, including commercial organisations who produce software. In all my years’ coding commercially I’ve never seen anyone say that crappy code is a good thing.
I don’t think the use of non-copyleft open-source software is such a terrible thing. And, my experience does not show that they are looking to cause harm to people who want to use copyleft software either. But, if you have any evidence to support your claims of some sort of lurking danger that I am just not seeing, then please do share that.