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

When People Call a Best/Close Friend of Bill Gates a "Serial Rapist"
Good thing that the Linux Foundation keeps the "Linux" trademark ("Linux Mark") clean
Microsoft Bankruptcy in Russia, Shutdown in Pakistan, What Next?
It seems possible that in 2025 alone Microsoft will have laid off over 50,000 workers
What Matters More Than "Market Share"
The goal is freedom, not "market share"
Credit Suisse collapse obfuscated Parreaux, Thiébaud & Partners scandal
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
UK Media Under Threat: Cannot Report on Data Breach, Cannot Report on Microsoft Staff Strangling Women
The story of super injunction (in the British media this week, years late)
Under the Guise of "MIT Technology Review Insights" the Site MIT Technology Review Posts Corporate Spam as 'Articles'
Some of the articles aren't even articles but 'hit pieces' against Free software and some are paid advertisements
Brett Wilson LLP Has Track Record in Scam Coin Cases (e.g. Craig Wright and More), Now It Works for 'Crypto' Scam Purveyors
But wait, it gets worse
Will Brett Wilson LLP Handle Its Own Winding Up Petition or be Struck Off for Overt Abuse of Process?
Today we sue not only the first Microsofter
 
CALEA / CALEA2 is the Real Problem, Not Chinese Operatives Exploiting CALEA / CALEA2 (as Any Other Nation Can)
CALEA / CALEA2 is more of a front door than a back door
99.99% Uptime in First Half of 2025
Since January there was only one noticeable outage
Nils Torvalds and Anna "Mikke" Torvalds (née Törnqvis) Hopefully Use GNU/Linux by Now
"Torvalds Family Uses Windows, Not Linus’ Linux"
Attack of the Slopfarms
FUD-amplifying bots with slop images, slop text (LLM slop)
Not My Problem, I Don't Care
Context/inspiration: Martin Niemöller
Honest Journalism About the European Patent Office Ceased to Exist After SLAPPs and Bribes to the Media
The EPO is basically a Mafia
Life Became Simpler When I Stopped Driving and I Don't Miss Driving When I See "Modern" Cars
Gee, wonder why car sales have plummeted...
Why I Believe Brett Wilson LLP and Its Microsoft Clients Are All Toast
So far our legal strategy has worked perfectly
EPO Jobs Are Very Toxic and Bad for One's Health
Health first, not monopolies
Response to Ryo Suwito Regarding the Four Freedoms
the point of life isn't to make more money
Microsoft's Morale Circling Down the Drain
Or gutter, toilet etc.
Tech Used to be Fun. To Many of Us It's Still Fun.
You can just watch it from afar and make fun of it all
Links 17/07/2025: "Blog Identity Crisis" and Openwashing by Nvidia
Links for the day
Greffiers and the US Attorney of the Serial Strangler From Microsoft
The lawsuit can help expose extensive corruption in the American court system as well
The People Who Promoted systemd in Debian Also Promote Wayland
This is not politics
Victims of the Serial Strangler From Microsoft, Alex Balabhadra Graveley, Wanted to Sue Him But Lacked the Funds (He Attacked Their Finances)
Having spoken to victims of the Serial Strangler From Microsoft
Links 17/07/2025: Science, Hardware, and Censorship
Links for the day
Gemini Links 17/07/2025: Staying in the "Small Web" and Back on ICQ
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, July 16, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, July 16, 2025
Exclusive: corruption in Tribunals, Greffiers, from protection rackets to cat whisperers
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Links 16/07/2025: Chip Bans and Microsoft’s “Digital Escort” Program
Links for the day
Ubuntu Becomes Microsoft GitHub, Based on Decision Made by British Army Officer
You're hopeless, Canonical
Revolving Doors: One Day You're a Judge, the Next Day You're an Attorney Paying Public Officials and Working for Violent and Dangerous Microsoft Employees
how the US justice system works
Sharing Code and Recipes
It helps explain the triviality of software freedom
Slopwatch: Noise, Plagiarism and Even Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt/Fear-mongering/Dramatisation
What are we meant to do to prevent a false association or misleading connotations? Game the LLMs? No. Boycott slopfarms.
How Many Women Has Microsoft's Alex Balabhadra Graveley Already Strangled and Where Does That End?
If you too are a victim of this man and wish to share information, contact us
Gemini Links 16/07/2025: BaseLibre Numerical System and Simple Web Browsing with TLS
Links for the day
Links 16/07/2025: Fascist Slop Takes "Intelligence" Clothing, New Criminal Case Against MElon
Links for the day
"We Might Save Somebody's Life"
I follow the example of my father
Why I am Suing the Serial Strangler From Microsoft, Alex Balabhadra Graveley, in the UK High Court This Week
Out of respect to the process and to the Court, I shall not share any pertinent details about the case
Links 16/07/2025: China’s Economy Grows Steadily, France Takes Action Regarding Harm to Children by GAFAM and Fentanylware (TikTok)
Links for the day
It is Not About Politics
Beware the people who try to make this about politics
Good Journalism Saves Lives
a shocking number of women die or get seriously hurt every day due to violence from a partner
Recognition of Women's Contributions to Free Software
Being passive is not an option when bad things are happening
Slopfarms Are Going to Perish Because Public Opinion is Changing
Many slopfarms will simply go offline
19 Years of Standing Up for Justice, Equality, and Truth
This week we shall take it up a notch
Gemini Links 16/07/2025: Tmux and OCC25 Working TLS
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, July 15, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, July 15, 2025
Links 15/07/2025: LLM Pollution and Pushback in Ukraine
Links for the day
Gemini Links 15/07/2025: xkcd, New Cert, and Alhena Gemlog
Links for the day
Links 15/07/2025: Press Freedom at Risk and New Facebook Blunders
Links for the day
Reboots Should Never be Necessary
"BUT WHAT ABOUT SECURITY!!"
There's Still Hope for the World Wide Web
Let's hope that the trajectory of the Web won't be leading us to over-reliance on Google, nor will it reward worthless slopfarms
Gemini Links 15/07/2025: Smolweb and Alhena 5.1.7
Links for the day
The Danes Want GNU/Linux
David Heinemeier Hansson recently moved to GNU/Linux
Cory Doctorow Explains Why Software Freedom Matters, Whereas "Open Source" Misses the Point and Helps Monopolies
It's a very long article
BillPR (EpsteinGate-Bribed NPR) is Turning Into a Partial Slopfarm that Promotes Slop
"I went on a date with a chatbot!"
Two Weeks Passed Since Latest Large Wave of Microsoft Layoffs, More Expected Next Month
Blaming the debt on "AI" is just self-serving storytelling
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, July 14, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, July 14, 2025
Gemini Links 15/07/2025: Gemini "Style Sheets" and Switching From Microsoft GitHub to Codeberg
Links for the day