Published yesterday, reproduced with permission

Letters of support or signatures are more about the message than the person; beware personification tactics (e.g. Assange instead of Wikileaks or defamed SUEPO representatives/BoA judges instead of EPO staff)

Summary: New instructions for those who want to combat a censorious trend that seeks to annul, based on lies, voices of software freedom advocacy

First of all, thanks to our friends who have set up the letter in support of RMS. Thanks to all the people who invest their time in adding the signatures that arrive everyday.

We have received requests mainly from non technical people to clarify the process of signing without using GitHub^[1]. In response, we have set up this page to try to explain it as clearly as possible. Feel free to contact us if you still have doubts.

1. Add your signature at https://codeberg.org/rms-support-letter/rms-support-letter/issues/1.
   To do this, the first step is to register.

   
   
   

   • Scroll to the very bottom of the page, and you will see Sign in to join this conversation. Click on Sign in. On that page, choose REGISTER.

   
   
   

   • Enter a username, email address, password, and the Captcha code. This will send a message to your email to activate your account.

   
   
   

   • Go to your email, open the message, which will have a link to a page that will ask you to confirm your password. Enter your password. You will then be told that your account has been activated.

   
   
   

   • Now that you are registered, go back to https://codeberg.org/rms-support-letter/rms-support-letter/issues/1. When you scroll to the bottom of that page, after the last comment, the comment field will be open.

   
   
   

   • You may now write your “comment,” which should consist of ONLY two lines.
     Example:

     
     
     

     name: Your real name
     link: mailto:my-email-address@example.com

     
     
     

     Note that there should be no space between the colon in “mailto:” and the email address.

     
     
     

     Instead of your email address, you can add your website, like this:

     
     
     

     name: Your real name
     link: https://mywebsite-example.com

     
     
     

   • Now click on the green button that says COMMENT and you are done.





2. Send and email to either ~tyil/rms-support@lists.sr.ht or signrms@prog.cf.
   Important: The email should be in plain text not HTML. How to compose an email in plain text.

   
   
   

   In the subject of the email, write something like “Signing RMS Support Letter” or similar.

   
   
   

   In the body of the email, follow the guidelines as above. ONLY two lines, and the “link” line can be either your email address or your website:

   
   
   

   name: Your real name
   link: mailto:my-email-address@example.com

   
   
   

   Note: The procedure we have described here for sending these emails implies more work for the volunteers in charge of adding the signatures. Therefore, it is intended to be used by non technical people only, in which cases exceptions are likely to be made. The preferred method is the one described in the letter at https://codeberg.org/rms-support-letter/rms-support-letter/issues/1; that is, to send an email attaching a “patch.” The patch makes it easier and faster to add the signature.

How to write emails in plain text(#plain-text)

Each email client or email web platform has its own method for setting the composition format. Here we are describing only two. It shouldn't be difficult to find the one that applies to what you are using.

• GMAIL

  If you are using the Gmail web interface (at your own risk!):

  
  
  

  1. Click Compose (upper left angle).
  2. In the email composition window, go to the lower right angle and click on the three vertical dots (more options). Select Plain text mode.




• Thunderbird

  
  
  
  1. Go to Edit -> Account Settings -> Composition & Addressing
  2. Uncheck “Compose messages in HTML format.”

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References and Notes

1. GitHub is a site that a number of people refuse to use for several reasons, among which: it requires nonfree JavaScript, it discourages copyleft licenses, it's owned by Microsoft.^↑