Bonum Certa Men Certa

Plotting and Analysing the Letter in Support of Richard Matthew Stallman (RMS) Being Reinstated by the Free Software Foundation

Video download link



Summary: "An open letter in support of Richard Matthew Stallman being reinstated by the Free Software Foundation" has been signed by 6,731 people (it may reach 7,000 later this summer) and here's how to generate a chart based on this very latest data

IT already feels like "hot summer" over here; this past spring the founder of the Free Software Foundation came under a lousy attack by mostly misled people, commandeered by front groups of monopolies. They've been defaming the founder of the Free Software Foundation for a number of decades (the GNOME Foundation tried 12 years ago), but this time there seems to be some urgency in removing him. We spent many days explaining the who and the why. This isn't the subject of this post and video.



"For those who want to reproduce the charts, detailing nearly 10,000 people who signed petitions in Microsoft’s proprietary software monopoly (GitHub), the video above explains the basic steps."For those who want to reproduce the charts, detailing nearly 10,000 people who signed petitions in Microsoft's proprietary software monopoly (GitHub), the video above explains the basic steps. Here are the basic commands from the video above:

cd /tmp rm -rf rms-open-letter.github.io rm -rf rms-support-letter.github.io

or just

rm -rf rms-open-letter.github.io rms-support-letter.github.io

Get the latest data:

git clone https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io.git

git clone https://github.com/rms-support-letter/rms-support-letter.github.io.git

Now run python3 count.py

There may be missing python libraries (depending on the system), but they can be added/installed from repositories. They're widely available and used.

Here's the code from count.py:

 



# author: Kezi # license: gplv3

import time import os import subprocess from threading import Thread

from datetime import datetime

start_time = 1616522054+60*60*4 stop_time = int(time.time())

path_open = "/tmp/rms-open-letter.github.io" # https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io.git path_support = "/tmp/rms-support-letter.github.io" # https://github.com/rms-support-letter/rms-support-letter.github.io.git

cwd = os.getcwd()

def count_open(): lol=subprocess.check_output(['sh', '-c', f"cd {path_open}; cat index.md | grep -e \"^1.\" -e \"^- \" | wc -l"]) return int(lol)

def count_support(): lol=subprocess.check_output(['sh', '-c', f"cd {path_support}; ls _data/signed/ | wc -l"]) return int(lol)

def checkout_open(date): try: subprocess.check_output(['sh', '-c', f"cd {path_open}; git checkout -f `git rev-list -n 1 --before=\"{date}\" main`"]) except: pass

def checkout_support(date): try: subprocess.check_output(['sh', '-c', f"cd {path_support}; git checkout -f `git rev-list -n 1 --before=\"{date}\" master`"]) except: pass

def time_machine(timestamp): print("time machine", datetime.fromtimestamp(timestamp), timestamp)

date=datetime.utcfromtimestamp(timestamp).strftime('%Y-%m-%d %H:%M') thread1 = Thread(target = checkout_open, args = (date, )) thread1.start() thread2 = Thread(target = checkout_support, args = (date, )) thread2.start()

thread1.join() thread2.join()

dates=[] points_open=[] points_support=[]

for i in range(start_time, stop_time, 60*5): time_machine(i)

dates.append(datetime.fromtimestamp(i)) points_open.append(count_open()) points_support.append(count_support())

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt import matplotlib.dates as md

plt.subplots_adjust(bottom=0.2) plt.xticks(rotation=25) ax = plt.gca() xfmt = md.DateFormatter('%Y-%m-%d') ax.xaxis.set_major_formatter(xfmt) plt.plot(dates, points_open, label="rms hate letter")

plt.subplots_adjust(bottom=0.2) plt.xticks(rotation=25) ax = plt.gca() xfmt = md.DateFormatter('%Y-%m-%d') ax.xaxis.set_major_formatter(xfmt) plt.plot(dates, points_support, label="rms support letter")

plt.legend() plt.show()



The latest chart below (shown after running in the terminal, as shown in the video:

RMS petitions.png



Still growing, but in relative terms not by very much. Here's how to sign.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Early Retirement Age: Linus Torvalds Turns 55 Next Week
Now he's almost eligible for retirement in certain European countries
Gemini Links 22/12/2024: Solstice and IDEs
Links for the day
BetaNews: Microsoft Slop is Your "Latest Technology News"
Paid-for garbage disguised as "journalism"
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, December 21, 2024
IRC logs for Saturday, December 21, 2024
Links 21/12/2024: EU on Solidarity with Ukraine, Focus on Illegal and Unconstitutional Patent Court in the EU (UPC)
Links for the day
[Meme] Microsofters at the End of David's Leash
Hand holding the leash. Whose?
Deciphering Matt's Take on WordPress, Which is Under Attack From Microsofters-Funded Aggravator
the money sponsoring the legal attacks on WordPress and on Matt is connected very closely to Microsoft
Gemini Links 21/12/2024: Projections, Dead Web ('Webapps' Replacing Pages), and Presentation of Pi-hole
Links for the day
American Samoa One of the Sovereign States Where Windows Has Fallen Below 1% (and Stays Below It)
the latest data plotted in LibreOffice
[Meme] Brian's Ravioli
An article per minute?
Links 21/12/2024: "Hey Hi" (AI) or LLM Bubble Criticised by Mainstream Media, Oligarchs Try to Control and Shut Down US Government
Links for the day
LLM Slop is Ruining the Media and Ruining the Web, Ignoring the Problem or the Principal Culprits (or the Slop Itself) Is Not Enough
We need to encourage calling out the culprits (till they stop this poor conduct or misconduct)
Christmas FUD From Microsoft, Smearing "SSH" When the Real Issue is Microsoft Windows
And since Microsoft's software contains back doors, only a fool would allow any part of SSH on Microsoft's environments, which should be presumed compromised
Paywalls, Bots, Spam, and Spyware is "Future of the Media" According to UK Press Gazette
"managers want more LLM slop"
Google Has Mass Layoffs (Again), But the Problem is Vastly Larger
started as a rumour about January 2025
On BetaNews Latest Technology News: "We are moderately confident this text was [LLM Chatbot] generated"
The future of newsrooms or another site circling down the drain with spam, slop, or both?
"The Real New Year" is Now
Happy solstice
Microsoft OSI Reads Techrights Closely
Microsoft OSI has also fraudulently attempted to censor Techrights several times over the years
"Warning About IBM's Labor Practices"
IBM is not growing and its revenue is just "borrowed" from companies it is buying; a lot of this revenue gets spent paying the interest on considerable debt
[Meme] The Easier Way to Make Money
With patents...
The Curse (to Microsoft) of the Faroe Islands
The common factor there seems to be Apple
Electronic Frontier Foundation Defends Companies That Attack Free Speech Online (Follow the Money)
One might joke that today's EFF has basically adopted the same stance as Donald Trump and has a "warm spot" for BRICS propaganda
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, December 20, 2024
IRC logs for Friday, December 20, 2024
Gemini Links 21/12/2024: Death of Mike Case, Slow and Sudden End of the Web
Links for the day
Links 20/12/2024: Security Patches, Openwashing by Open Source Initiative, Prison Sentence for Bitcoin Charlatan and Fraud
Links for the day
Another Terrible Month for Microsoft in Web Servers
Consistent downward curve
LLM Slop Disguised as Journalism: The Latest Threat to the Web
A lot of it is to do with proprietary GitHub, i.e. Microsoft
Gemini Links 20/12/2024: Regulation and Implementing Graphics
Links for the day
Links 20/12/2024: Windows Breaks Itself, Mass Layoffs Coming to Google Again (Big Wave)
Links for the day
Microsoft: "Upgrade" to Vista 11 Today, We'll Brick Your Audio and You Cannot Prevent This
Windows Update is obligatory, so...
The Unspeakable National Security Threat: Plasticwares as the New Industrial Standard
Made to last or made to be as cheap as possible? Meritocracy or industrial rat races are everywhere now.
Microsoft's All-Time Lows in Macao and Hong Kong
Microsoft is having a hard time in China, not only for political reasons
[Meme] "It Was Like a Nuclear Winter"
This won't happen again, will it?
If You Know That Hey Hi (AI) is Hype, Then Stop Participating in It
bogus narrative of "Hey Hi (AI) arms race" and "era/age of Hey Hi" and "Hey Hi Revolution"
Bangladesh (Population Close to 200 Million) Sees Highest GNU/Linux Adoption Levels Ever
Microsoft barely has a grip on this country. It used to.
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, December 19, 2024
IRC logs for Thursday, December 19, 2024