Bonum Certa Men Certa

Ethical Censorship of One's (Co)Founder

When is it not ethical to censor or banish one's founder?

THIS IS ETHICS*! Maybe it's about corporate agenda and politics rather than objective ethics



Summary: Yesterday the OSI was justifying its growing culture of censorship [1], which includes banning its co-founder Eric Raymond (mentioned alongside Stallman yesterday [2] -- another canceled founder) in the name of problematic "ethics" [3] that corporate media is also covering/promoting this week [4]

Related/contextual items from the news:


  1. The Hard Work of Critical Conversations in Open Source

    Open source is bigger and more diverse than ever before. With that success comes challenges, some new and some old, but all of them on a larger scale than ever before.

    As we grow and convene more people and viewpoints, the conversations will get more difficult. In some ways, that’s good--vigorous discussions help us clarify our shared understanding and pushing the boundaries helps us find where those boundaries are. We evolve appropriately to meet the needs of a changing world.

    But the challenges of cross-cultural discourse amongst people with strong convictions are readily apparent. This has come into stark relief, over the last two years, across contentious elections and experiments in licensing. We need to provide a safe and productive environment for the communities we convene. The world of open source is large and diverse. We appreciate the continued efforts of the people who were here at the beginning and recognize that while many new people have joined the community, many more do not feel like they’d be welcome participants--and we are lesser for it.

  2. Basic Blockchain: The Organization of the Future

    Stallman was followed in the 1990s by Eric Raymond, whose essay ‘The Cathedral and the Bazaar’ served as a call to arms for what he began to term the ‘open-source’ software movement, accompanying the release of his open-source operating system Linux. With open source, the source code (written instructions) of the software is openly published for anyone to use for free. The socially understood price, however, is that if you make improvements, you need to publish those improvements back to the code so that others can take advantage of them. Instead of the proprietary software licensing model of companies like Microsoft, open-source companies like Red Hat made their money from selling services and solutions to enhance the open-source software implementation.

    [...]

    The organisation of the future may or may not live on a blockchain, but without question blockchain holds the potential to make that future organisation more effective. One of the challenges of decentralised decision-making is the loss of coordination of activities. In complex systems this can lead to gridlock and chaos, as nobody knows what the rest of the organisation is doing or how their work fits in with the greater whole, sometimes leading people to working cross-purposes.



  3. “the road to Hell is paved with good intentions” – and other news

    These days the Free and Open Source Software community is seeing its theoretical foundations somewhat challenged. First, there are those who would like to see the official definition of Open Source changed so that it matches their marketing and lobbying needs. It is a rather complex issue here, on which I will likely write about some time in the future. There are also those who have a business model issue as (much) bigger companies seem happy to distribute their own, Open Source licensed software on their platform (read: cloud platforms) but do not necessarily enable an effective revenue sharing across the ecosystem. Next, there is a growing momentum towards what is sometimes referred to as “ethical” open source licenses. By inserting the compliance or adherence to more or less specific ethical norm, these licenses would supposedly force their recipients to accept these norms by using the software distributed under these licenses. In other words, if a license comes with the obligation for me or for my employer to comply with human rights, I can no longer use nor distribute the software if I know or suspect I’m not respecting the norms contained within the declaration of Human Rights as expressed by the United Nations.

    Complying with human rights, however, may be the best case scenario here. Other cases include a general “Do No Evil” clause, which by definition is impossible to comply with. Practically, it disregards the abyss of “Evil” both individuals and corporations or governments are capable of doing to the point of being a metaphysical absurdity. In the case of the Human Rights clause, one would have to believe that it would be scrupulously followed by entities and people who are already in violation of human rights…

    More troubling is the question of who sets what’s good and evil. In the case of human rights, there’s some loose consensus about its importance and about its moral values in countries that are mostly western and democratic. The rest of the world has many examples of daily, ongoing and continuous violations of human rights. In other words, ethical standards are important, but ethical standards work and can be enforced within organizations. Within Free and Open Source Software Licenses they raise troubling questions.

    Enter the case of Eric S. Raymond (aka ESR). Eric S. Raymond, co-founder of the Open Source Initiative, the man who initially coined the terms “Open Source” and the author of the seminal “the Cathedral and the Bazaar” book, was discussing how he felt such ethical open source licenses were in direct violation with specific points of the Open Source Definition. In the course of this discussion, things became heated. As a result, Eric Raymond got moderated out of the mailing lists of the organization he co-founded. His last posts were indeed somewhat rude, but not out of the ordinary level of a heated exchange on a mailing list. Eric did end up publishing a good post summarizing an other wise precise and relevant chain of thoughts.

    I hope this moderation was done as a temporary measure in order to bring some peace to the discussion. Be that as it may the discussion reveals a troubling tendency at the level of the Open Source Initiative: some people would like to turn Open Source and Hacker’s ethos into something it is not, a political movement that is only very partially about software and a lot about liberal ideas.



  4. Should open source be ethical?

    The Open Source Initiative (OSI) is the governing body of the definition of what it means to be Open Source and which licenses are accepted as Open Source licenses. It coined the modern use of the term “open source” and maintains the Open Source Definition.

    Right now there is a group of people who want to take over OSI and change the Open Source Definition to include ethical clauses. These clauses include things such as prohibitions on human rights abuses. Presently such licenses violate the Open Source Definition.



Recent Techrights' Posts

Gemini Links 03/11/2024: Fantasy Life Day and Worship
Links for the day
[Meme] Write Us Drivers and GTFO!
When you realise sanctioning BRICS devs goes against the community
GNU/Linux "Market Share" in Lebanon More Than Doubled in a Few Months
Maybe it's a reaction to something? Assassination in Haret Hreik was in July.
Wall Street Has Demoted Intel, Seeing There May be No Future to Intel
Intel's loss isn't a loss to us
Free Software Licence Compliance is About Security Too
Linux as de facto proprietary off-the-shelf platform
The "Luddite" Complex
Sometimes simplest is best and sometimes "modern" is designed not with the buyers' interest in mind
SCO's Darl McBride Dead at Age 64
There's hardly any information about it, except we know he reached bankruptcy and 3 years later he died at a relatively young age
[Meme] Python Knows Its Bosses
Microsoft strings attached
[Meme] Debt of About $20 Per Active User
Facebook isn't laying off tens of thousands for "efficiency" but for survival
 
[Video] Richard Stallman's Talk in Spanish (in Peru Last Week)
Alternative URLs too
The Media Focuses on the Wrong Scandal
The real scandal at MIT was Gates
Decommissioning Copper Lines Makes Us Less Safe
We've essentially degraded the robustness or reliability of critical systems
Life of an Addicted Lolicon Who Can Also Code
Personal blog as an open diary
[Meme] Reporting Crime is Not a Crime
Obviously!
Manchester Party for Techrights
If you choose to come, of course we'll cover the cost of the food and treats (but not travel)
Privacy is Not a Crime (in Places Where It is a Crime the Regime is Typically Very Rogue)
Also, criminals lack "privacy rights" to hide their crimes from the public
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, November 02, 2024
IRC logs for Saturday, November 02, 2024
Nearly 40 Years Without Security Incidents
People who use Windows have come to sort of "accept" that security incidents are part of life or "normal"
[Meme] The Streisand Effect
Simon says, don't bother trying to suppress facts
Streisand Effect at IBM?
Trying to silence your workers isn't the best approach. It only makes colleagues even more curious.
Microsoft is a Gift That Keeps Giving (Future Stories to Techrights)
Microsoft has been trying to silence me using dirty tricks for nearly 20 years
Elon Musk Has Trashed Twitter for Ideological Reasons (and Propping Up Trump in Exchange for Financial and Political Favours Once in Public Office)
In case you didn't leave Twitter already, consider the fact that Twitter's (or "X"... whatever!) future is uncertain
Links 02/11/2024: Many Fakes in Social Control Media
Links for the day
GNU/Linux Usage Surveys: Up to 6.8% (With ChromeOS, Based on StatCounter) in Desktops/Laptops and Above 2% in Steam
Today StatCounter starts releasing graphs based on data for November
Gemini Links 02/11/2024: Petscop, Jokes, and RetroChallenge
Links for the day
Links 02/11/2024: Temu EU Probe and Shorts Trademark
Links for the day
The 'Turning-Free-Code-Proprietary Foundation' (Linux/Microsoft Foundation)
LF will basically become just as sinister as its corporate sponsors
Python Software Foundation is 'Cancel Culture' Rehomed
Python isn't grassroots and it doesn't really tolerate grassroots
DeVault "Closes Down His Mailing Lists Every Time There's a Scandal" and Also Censors Messages
Censorious code hosting platform
What Social Control Media Really Is
Social Control Media, in a nutshell, isn't just bad if its controller is some foreign or hostile nation
Taking Ethics Lectures From Drew
Projection tactics
Links 02/11/2024: Facebook Stock Falls (Soaring Debt), Apple’s Quarterly Profit Down
Links for the day
Gemini Links 02/11/2024: Burnout, Emacs Bookmarks, and Smooth Migration
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, November 01, 2024
IRC logs for Friday, November 01, 2024
Facebook's Debt Has Soared to All-Time High of Nearly 50 Billion Dollars
But the corporate media pretends all is well (while mass layoffs continue and slop takes over the social control media)
Geminispace Makes It Past 4,200 Capsules on November 1st
At last!
Links 01/11/2024: Election Interferences by X/Twitter/Musk, Strava as Espionage Tool
Links for the day
The October 2024 Web Server Survey Shows a Further Collapse for Microsoft in the Servers Market
Microsoft experienced the next largest loss of 699,464 sites (-3.45%)
Gemini Links 01/11/2024: TLS Sucks, twytere.com Announced
Links for the day
Links 01/11/2024: Few Things Are Cheaper Than This Antenna and "Nothing Lasts Forever"
Links for the day
Technology: rights or responsibilities? - Part V
By Dr. Andy Farnell
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, October 31, 2024
IRC logs for Thursday, October 31, 2024
R.T.O. is Another Name (or Acronym) for Voluntary Layoffs
Amazon is trying to get many workers to leave on their own
Microsoft's Acquisition of Activision (to Fake Revenue Growth by Buying Revenue) Was a Failure
Of course the mass layoffs at Microsoft aren't just a Microsoft thing
Stagnant, Shrinking Businesses and "IBM's Corporate Culture Since the Late 1980s... Over 35 Years."
Recently, IBM was using share price as a talking point, insisting the company was doing OK while tens of thousands were being laid off
Links 01/11/2024: World News, Political Catchup
Links for the day