05.30.23
Posted in Free/Libre Software, FSF, FUD at 1:33 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
After seeing some of the recipients of the Free Software Foundation Awards we’re not too shocked though
The Alphabet/Gulag-funded person, who loves to SLAPP/silence critics, will open these celebrations? What next? An award?
First speaker? Really??? Should he be speaking there at all?
Summary: It’s good that the FSF prepares an event to celebrate GNU’s 40th anniversary, but readers told us that the speakers list is unsavoury, especially the first one (a key participant in the relentless campaign of defamation against the person who started both GNU and the FSF; the "FSFE" isn't even permitted to use that name)
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Posted in Deception, Free/Libre Software, FSF, GNU/Linux at 12:57 am by Guest Editorial Team
2 days ago (earlier this month an RSS feed was added for the updates page):
Summary: A new and more detailed explanation of what the wordplay around “pleasure card” actually meant
The dichotomy of “business vs. pleasure” is well known. Given Stallman’s inclination to play with words and even change the name of things to either oppose or mock established concepts, we believe that’s one reason why he chose to call it a “pleasure card” instead of the conventional “business card.” And if we look at his lifelong activism for software freedom and other human rights, a second obvious reason is that he has never thought of making money as a main purpose of his life.
Handing out cards to those we wish to keep in contact with is normal and a better practice than asking for people’s phone number or email address. It’s better because it avoids pressuring the receiver. Traditionally, a man asked a woman how to contact her, which could make her feel pressured. Stallman avoids that. In case a woman is not interested in further conversations, she can reject the card, take it and throw it away, or chose to never phone or email him.
However, what some people complain about is not that Stallman hands out this card or how he calls it, it’s the wording in it. That wording is the result of Stallman’s inclination to playfulness. It’s recursive humor, something that hackers like. It’s recursive in that it is an example of what the card itself says: “unusual sense of humour.”
Even though Stallman hands out these cards to men and women alike, some women take it as highly offensive, to the point of describing it as “sexual harassment.” For the sake of advancing sensible thinking, intellectual honesty, and fairness towards victims of real sexual harassment, let’s stop hyperbolizing and recognize that it’s not anything near “sexual harassment.”
We don’t know which precise words some women find offensive. We suspect it could be the expression “tender embraces” and/or the word “exotic.” There is a wave a new puritans who seem to think that it is disgusting for people to admit they wish to find a romantic relationship, except perhaps when hidden in some dating website or app.
A “tender embrace” is a hug which expresses a feeling of warmth and caring, it does not normally refer to sex. With the level of exaggeration fueled by the new puritans we are witnessing these days, one cannot avoid wondering: if Stallman had started the Free Hugs Campaign, would he be accused of “sexual harassment” for that as well?
As for “exotic,” Stallman uses the word as a qualifier for music and dance. If we look at Stallman’s preferences in these two fields, we can see that most—if not all—of the music and dance he likes is foreign and mostly unknown in the U.S., which fits the dictionary definition: “From another part of the world.”
Margarita Lacabe, a not sexual girlfriend of Stallman’s from the 80s, gives testimony of how he would share his music with her and dance: “He had me over to his place to listen to Indonesian music (or something of the sort), while he danced…”
Fortunately though, not all women feel that Stallman’s cards are “meant to be sexual come ons.” Some even appreciate the sense of humor in them.
Here’s an ironic meme depicting the dangers of the card, and Richard Stallman dancing with a robot in his Bulgarian custom at MIT in the 70s. (Source)
And here is Stallman again performing a traditional dance with a member of the Yale Political Union who doesn’t look to have taken offense. (Source). █
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05.19.23
Posted in Free/Libre Software, FSF, Videos at 7:17 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
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Summary: As the NSA leaks turn 10 it’s important to remember the role Free software played in whistleblowing
Licence: CC BY 4.0
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05.05.23
Posted in Deception, Free/Libre Software, FSF, FUD at 2:58 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
After almost a year stallmansupport.org is back to being regularly updated!
Summary: A new syndication (XML/RSS) feed has been added to this page at stallmansupport.org — a site that RMS himself keeps endorsing in his public talks; we need to highlight some things that, whenever quoted, “trigger” the cancel mob once more (because they strike a nerve)
THE old “open letter” (2+ years old! Time flies!) against RMS may seem unimportant, but the “cancel mob” is still at it, as we shall show in the coming few days, maybe as early as this weekend. We’ll write about Amendment 130 and note that “opponents have now dusted off the term “freeware” after a very long hiatus to try to increase confusion about freedom and specifically about software freedom,” as an associate notes. We’ve just mentioned that in passing, showing yesterday’s words from a Microsoft front group (OSI today is not what it used to be).
We’ve meanwhile noticed that software freedom-hostile sick-minded online bullies very strongly dislike the site. They get enraged when the site is mentioned or quoted. Hence, we’ll reproduce the new bits here.
The latest one is a blog post by Sylvia Paull. She wrote:
It’s been more than two years since MacArthur Fellow and founder of the Free Software Foundation Richard Stallman was forced to resign from his positions at MIT and the FSF.
In March of 2021, he was reinstated to the board of the FSF in recognition of the role he has played in founding and campaigning globally — with great success — for the concept of copyleft, or the freedom to use, study, distribute, and modify what would otherwise be proprietary software.
Stallman has opened our minds about the role of software, which permeates every aspect of our lives. He is not only a software developer, but he is also a philosopher of technology.
In hundreds if not thousands of talks he has presented in universities, national legislatures, computer companies, and high-tech conferences since he first announced the plan for the GNU operating system in 1983, he has warned about the dangers and limitations of proprietary software, while encouraging the adoption of free software.
I have heard Richard speak several times. In fact, I invited him to speak at one of my Berkeley Cybersalons, which featured conversations about the impact of technology on our lives. It’s been more than 50 years since I graduated from Reed College, and listening to Richard reminded me of the lectures at Reed that influenced my life. Those lectures to a 16-year-old freshman made me realize that ideas — like free software — have the power to shape the future.
And that’s why Stallman needs to be heard by young computer scientists and future startup founders in an endowed university chair for the philosophy of technology. It’s time for some tech millionaires to step up and acknowledge Stallman’s positive influence in the world and help him continue to free our minds.
As associate reminded us that “RMS was falsely accused regarding MIT's involvement with Bill Gates and Epstein.” Maybe the accusations of pedophilia were intentionally misdirected?
The following letter by Javier González was added to stallmansupport.org earlier this week as well (apparently yesterday). To quote:
When I read about the MIT incident I immediately thought, “witch hunt.” There are billions of people who stand to win from the work of the FSF and Richard Stallman’s principled adherence to free software. At the same time, there are thousands of powerful people, including billionaires, who stand to lose from the advancement of free software.
It is clear that there is an effort by the software billionaires to weaken the free software movement. (By the way, something similar happened to the newspaper The Guardian after it revealed the Snowden information. There was a change in management that was “milder” and put less emphasis on the environment.)
In any case, I support free software wholeheartedly, and Stallman has been very principled about doing software 100% free. The witch hunt is a reason for me to double the support to the FSF under rms. Onward!
The following seems to really enrage Gulagboy, who isn’t even trans and was in fact transphobic himself. It’s reproduced in this page (more from the Internet Archive):
The war on free software continues, this time with an attempt to “cancel” the founder of the free software movement and to coup the board of FSF.
And as a transgender person, it disgusts me much that some people try to use us as a weapon against free software, by falsely accusing one of our biggest allies of transphobia, when in fact there is none.
No, Stallman hasn’t “spent years on a campaign against using people’s correct pronouns,” there literally wasn’t such campaign. In fact, the cited GNU Kind Communication Guidelines literally advocate respecting people’s gender identity, and trying to twist them into something opposite is disingenuous and done with bad faith.
It’s worth noting that the Linux Foundation‘s Corbet detested this comment and said: “This is exactly the kind of comment I asked you not to post. We have been over this ground. Stop here, now.”
Yes, how dare trans people defend the falsely-accused RMS? How dare they? They do. Quit using trans people as “political props”. Gulagboy keeps doing that; he’s not trans and by his own admission he was in fact transphobic when he was an adult doing his Ph.D. █
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05.01.23
Posted in America, Free/Libre Software, FSF at 1:14 am by Guest Editorial Team
Reprinted with permission from Alexandre Oliva (FSFLA and FSF)
Banking institutions have sought to automate customer service through websites and, more recently, through TRApps.
https://www.fsfla.org/anuncio/2023-03-TRApps
What these banks are saving in offices and staff, we customers are paying for with security and freedom. They are morally bankrupt.
Genuine security never depends on secret software. On the contrary, transparency strengthens security.
Nevertheless, these banks impose on us, in the name of security (their own, not ours), various harmful behaviors:
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the use of software that we cannot control and whose actions on our computers are hidden from us;
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the use of too-short passwords; and
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the use of devices and operating systems designed to run under someone else's control, and to collect and exfiltrate our data.
Running software controlled by others always implies a loss of freedom, and a threat to security and privacy.
The requirement to use these programs has become so common and persistent that it seems unavoidable. Thus, we have decided to expand our campaign against imposed taxing software beyond state-controlled institutions to also include private services and goods whose providers converge on such impositions.
https://www.fsfla.org/anuncio/2023-04-bancarrota#softimp
We share our board member Alexandre Oliva's recent account of his over 20 years of struggle against technological abuse by banks in his country. We highlight his recent legal victory: online banking services must be restored without requiring the installation of programs other than a standard browser. Read more:
https://www.fsfla.org/texto/bancarrota
About Imposed Taxing Software
Since 2006, we have been running a campaign against imposed taxing software: programs that are imposed in the sense that you cannot avoid them, and taxing in the sense that they burden you in a way that resembles a tax, but is exempt from social benefits and paid for with your freedom.
Nonfree programs are unjust and too onerous (even when they are nominally gratis), because they imply a loss of freedom, that is, of control over your digital life. When this burden (of suppressed freedom) is compounded with the imposition of use of such programs, they become profoundly oppressive: imposed taxing software.
Our initial focus was on oppressive software imposed by governments, such as mandatory tax-related programs and software required to interact with public banks.
https://www.fsfla.org/circular/2006-11#Editorial
While pressuring the government to liberate income tax software in Brazil, we have been updating and publishing a compatible and freedom-respecting version every year since 2007.
https://www.fsfla.org/anuncio/2012-10-Acesso-SoftImp
https://www.fsfla.org/~lxoliva/fsfla/irpf-livre/
In 2023, we extended the campaign to taxing software imposed by private providers: when freedom-depriving software is required to obtain or enjoy products or services.
To be clear, this campaign is not (solely) about software for taxation, but rather about software that is taxing (an unjust burden, because it taxes your freedom; the software is itself like a tax), and that, on top of that, is imposed, thus profoundly oppressive.
About FSFLA
Free Software Foundation Latin America joined in 2005 the international FSF network, previously formed by Free Software Foundations in the United States, in Europe and in India. These sister organizations work in their corresponding geographies towards promoting the same Free Software ideals and defending the same freedoms for software users and developers, working locally but cooperating globally.
https://www.fsfla.org/
Copyright 2023 FSFLA
Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of this entire document without royalty, provided the copyright notice, the document's official URL, and this permission notice are preserved.
Permission is also granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of individual sections of this document worldwide without royalty provided the copyright notice and the permission notice above are preserved, and the document's official URL is preserved or replaced by the individual section's official URL.
https://www.fsfla.org/anuncio/2023-04-bancarrota █
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04.27.23
Posted in Free/Libre Software, FSF, Videos at 12:43 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
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Summary: The above LibrePlanet talk by Anthony Wang was uploaded by the FSF 8 days ago (slides here; PeerTube link); From the official page: “Free software needs free tools! We’re making software development collaboration and hosting websites (a.k.a forges) talk to each other using shared protocols, hopefully allowing the free software community to create a decentralized network of self-hosted forge websites powered by fully free software, and whose UX design is geared towards filling human needs rather than company profits. We’ll explore this vision, talk about (and see) our latest development progress, examine the challenges, and present our roadmap for realizing this dream.”
Licence: CC BY SA 4.0
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04.26.23
Posted in America, Free/Libre Software, FSF, GNU/Linux at 5:29 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
A Presentation From a Puerto Rican Perspective:
Seems like Puerto Rico quickly adopted GNU/Linux this past year
Summary: The above LibrePlanet slide from Kevin Shockey was the last of a deck of slides; the presentation seems to have covered patents, preservation, and many other aspects; sadly the talk cannot be found, at least not yet, in PeerTube or in MediaGoblin and it seems to be covering important points from the perspective of colonies or natural disaster-prone places
Licence: GFDL 1.3
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Posted in Free/Libre Software, FSF, Videos, Wikipedia at 12:47 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
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Summary: The above LibrePlanet talk was was uploaded by the FSF a week ago (PeerTube link; talk’s slides); From the official page: “This talk will begin by shining some light on the vastness of Wikipedia’s technology landscape and the technical community behind it, supporting the development of projects in many different areas to set the room for understanding the need and role of developer advocacy for such a large community. It will then focus on the developer advocacy’s role in engaging the technical community behind Wikipedia and its sister projects, for example, through dedicated FOSS outreach, mentoring programs and events, awards and ceremonies for developer recognition, grants and partnerships, community metrics and health, platforms and services, developer portal, and more. Through this talk, the audience will gain insights into what a good return on investment means for such initiatives in nonprofit organizations and gather new ideas for building stronger developer communities.”
Licence: CC BY SA 4.0
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