7 ms·

It could be argued that he is the exception that proves the rule. He did something great, but he did not start Linux, the company, and make billions. Also - Lin

It could be argued that he is the exception that proves the rule. He did something great, but he did not start Linux, the company, and make billions. Also - Linux would be useless without the GNU project - which is arguably very American.

hasenj 16y ago
GNU is very anti-capitalism. RMS talks about valuing "community and freedom" over "features". That's pretty much what the "communism" ideal is all about, right? Not saying GNU is communist, that's very taboo, but the ideals and motivation are definitely not "very American".
- pg 16y ago
  "GNU is very anti-capitalism." Fortunately, however, the source code is not aware of this.
  - hasenj 16y ago
    I didn't mean it as "against commercial use". I meant the spirit of it favors community over commercial use. The whole point of the GPL is to prevent people from "sealing away" the source code and favor commercial gains over the hacker community. I view capitalism as "valuing money above all things". Don't confuse capitalism with the free market; the free market existed over a thousand years ago. Many people got rich through trade. Perhaps not in Europe (I don't know).
    - anamax 16y ago
      > I view capitalism as "valuing money above all things". That's nice, but it means that no one can communicate with you because they agree that it means something else.
      - hasenj 16y ago
        Err, what's the other definition? "allowing people to sell stuff and earn money?", that's a very old notion, like I already said, it's not exclusive to North America, and it's not a product of the European Renaissance, it existed more than a thousand years ago.
        anamax 16y ago
        > that's a very old notion, like I already said So? That doesn't imply that your definition of capitalism is correct. > it's not exclusive to North America, No one said that capitalism was exclusive to NA, was invented by Europe, or is new. That said, capitalism isn't binary - it's a range and you left out important details. For example, what does "allowing" mean? What people? What stuff? The standard definition, cribbed from Wikipedia is "Capitalism is an economic system in which the means of production are privately owned and operated for a private profit; decisions regarding supply, demand, price, distribution, and investments are made by private actors in the market".
        hasenj 16y ago
        Propriety software is privately owned by the makers of the software, they control everything. GNU and the FSF were born because this model was deemed unethical by RMS and many who basically agree with him.
        anamax 16y ago
        >> Propriety software is privately owned by the makers of the software, they control everything. > GNU and the FSF were born because this model was deemed unethical by RMS and many who basically agree with him. Actually, free software is owned and controlled by its creators. They determine the terms and if you don't like those terms, you don't get to use it. You seem to think that "control" implies a particular class of terms. It doesn't. Control is actually the ability fo the creator to choose whatever terms she likes. BTW - RMS is an American and got his seed funding from Americans....
- davi 16y ago
  Your working definition of "American" seems blinkered. One of the sources of our cultural strength is the diversity of views that make up our intellectual heritage. In my opinion, RMS is a great American. John Muir, Edward Abbey, Wendell Berry, Helen and Scott Nearing. All great Americans.
- SkyMarshal 16y ago
  GNU, and FOSS in general, is neither capitalistic nor communistic. It is academic. It works in exactly the same manner that Western academia has for much of its recent existence, in which discoveries are published, shared, collaborated on, and built on, albeit at a pace much accelerated by the ability to collaborate in real-time over the Internet, instead of having to wait for the publication of monthly journal articles and expensive lab experimentations (like the LHC). Just because the people involved in FOSS are not doing this directly for money does not mean they're giving away the fruit of their labor for free, or being coerced as Soviet Communism was known for. While creating things that directly improve their own lives (scratching their own itches), they also gain the opportunity to spend their lives living their passion doing stimulating work, gain recognition amongst a group of peers spread all around the world, become known as experts in their field (leading to paying gigs from commercial outfits), and create things with the potential to advance the human race and make the world a better place. All of it 100% voluntarily, uncoerced. If that's not Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness, I don't know what is. Go reread what Ayn Rand says about trading value for value. Whether you're trading the fruits of your labor and talent for money, or for something else of value to you, either fits just fine with her philosophy. Ultimately, she was an advocate for the creation and fair exchange of value and real wealth, of which money is just a store, and without coercion. There is absolutely nothing about FOSS that is incompatible with her beliefs. This is one of the biggest problems with the Conservative movement these days, a misunderstanding and misapplication of their own ideology. Too many seem to have merely a superficial understanding of it, a worldview that if corporations, direct profit motive, and consistent % improvements in quarterly statements aren't the driving force behind something then it can only be the antithesis of Truth, Justice, and the American Way. Be it FOSS, Net Neutrality, movements to reduce corporate spending in politics, if corporations are against it or orthogonal to it, then it must be anti-American. Einstein once advised that 'everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler.' I think the right would do well to reconsider their world view with that in mind.
  - hasenj 16y ago
    GPL is not designed for academic research. MIT and BSD licenses are, but the GPL is certainly not. > Just because the people involved in FOSS are not doing this directly for money does not mean they're giving away the fruit of their labor for free, or being coerced as Soviet Communism was known for Read my reply to PG. I wasn't trying to imply that GNU has any similarity to the USSR; that's very silly. I actually support the ideals of GNU, but I'm not ideological about it. I'm fine with selling closed software, so long as one is not just leeching off open source without contributing anything back.
- drats 16y ago
  RMS sold GPLed software in the early days. RMS is also someone who made deep personal sacrifices to see a certain vision of freedom prevail, or rather be preserved. That seems to me to be very American.
  - hasenj 16y ago
    Sacrificing yourself for the greater good? Doesn't sound very American to me. The fact he made sacrifices instead of making billions to develop software is a proof of my point about GNU being very far from the ideas of capitalism.
    - drats 16y ago
      I said "freedom" and you changed that to "greater good" to try to win the argument. Stallman was pursuing his lifestyle, people started to mess with it, so he created a legal document to secure his own freedoms and those of others. This enabled him to live his life as he wanted and helped a lot of other people - many who disagree with him on points minor and major - to live their lives the way they want to. In that sense its an individualistic community that values freedom protected by a clever legal document. Now if you think "making money" describes the USA better than "individualistic community that values freedom protected by a clever legal document", you'd be wrong. I am not from America, but looking from afar I often get sick of the crude anti-Americanism that seems to get an intellectual free pass all the time. What can be more American than high level science? Given the endless Nobel prizes and technical innovations of the USA I'd think you could point to the AI lab at MIT as being a good symbol (among many) for the American contributions to science. It's ultimately American. Smack bang in the middle of the one of the first states which has always been an intellectual powerhouse mirroring the parts of England from which its settlers first came. A place which also bears the name "the Cradle of Liberty" with many political triumphs. The "blue states", as a reductionist might call them, don't play themselves up to us in the rest of the world, or domestically, as often as they perhaps should; that doesn't mean they aren't powerful or haven't changed the world in massive ways. And more than just residing in a center of American liberty and intellectual achievement Stallman used a clever legal document to do it. Lawyer jokes aside, using the beautiful common law system to protect rights, what could be more American? Starting a revolution rather than play along with it when someone gets up in your face and starts messing with your lifestyle. Tell me which country fits that description better than the USA. Yes, there is more than one America, there is Wallstreet and the Ayn Rand impulse you point to. I am not denying those exist, but don't try to claim them as being the only America or claim that they are the summation of one of the most important countries (perhaps "the most important country") in the history of human civilization. Stallman is as American as apple pie.

hasenj 16y ago

GNU is very anti-capitalism. RMS talks about valuing "community and freedom" over "features". That's pretty much what the "communism" ideal is all about, right? Not saying GNU is communist, that's very taboo, but the ideals and motivation are definitely not "very American".

pg 16y ago
"GNU is very anti-capitalism." Fortunately, however, the source code is not aware of this.
- hasenj 16y ago
  I didn't mean it as "against commercial use". I meant the spirit of it favors community over commercial use. The whole point of the GPL is to prevent people from "sealing away" the source code and favor commercial gains over the hacker community. I view capitalism as "valuing money above all things". Don't confuse capitalism with the free market; the free market existed over a thousand years ago. Many people got rich through trade. Perhaps not in Europe (I don't know).
  - anamax 16y ago
    > I view capitalism as "valuing money above all things". That's nice, but it means that no one can communicate with you because they agree that it means something else.
    - hasenj 16y ago
      Err, what's the other definition? "allowing people to sell stuff and earn money?", that's a very old notion, like I already said, it's not exclusive to North America, and it's not a product of the European Renaissance, it existed more than a thousand years ago.
      - anamax 16y ago
        > that's a very old notion, like I already said So? That doesn't imply that your definition of capitalism is correct. > it's not exclusive to North America, No one said that capitalism was exclusive to NA, was invented by Europe, or is new. That said, capitalism isn't binary - it's a range and you left out important details. For example, what does "allowing" mean? What people? What stuff? The standard definition, cribbed from Wikipedia is "Capitalism is an economic system in which the means of production are privately owned and operated for a private profit; decisions regarding supply, demand, price, distribution, and investments are made by private actors in the market".
        hasenj 16y ago
        Propriety software is privately owned by the makers of the software, they control everything. GNU and the FSF were born because this model was deemed unethical by RMS and many who basically agree with him.
        anamax 16y ago
        >> Propriety software is privately owned by the makers of the software, they control everything. > GNU and the FSF were born because this model was deemed unethical by RMS and many who basically agree with him. Actually, free software is owned and controlled by its creators. They determine the terms and if you don't like those terms, you don't get to use it. You seem to think that "control" implies a particular class of terms. It doesn't. Control is actually the ability fo the creator to choose whatever terms she likes. BTW - RMS is an American and got his seed funding from Americans....
davi 16y ago
Your working definition of "American" seems blinkered. One of the sources of our cultural strength is the diversity of views that make up our intellectual heritage. In my opinion, RMS is a great American. John Muir, Edward Abbey, Wendell Berry, Helen and Scott Nearing. All great Americans.
SkyMarshal 16y ago
GNU, and FOSS in general, is neither capitalistic nor communistic. It is academic. It works in exactly the same manner that Western academia has for much of its recent existence, in which discoveries are published, shared, collaborated on, and built on, albeit at a pace much accelerated by the ability to collaborate in real-time over the Internet, instead of having to wait for the publication of monthly journal articles and expensive lab experimentations (like the LHC). Just because the people involved in FOSS are not doing this directly for money does not mean they're giving away the fruit of their labor for free, or being coerced as Soviet Communism was known for. While creating things that directly improve their own lives (scratching their own itches), they also gain the opportunity to spend their lives living their passion doing stimulating work, gain recognition amongst a group of peers spread all around the world, become known as experts in their field (leading to paying gigs from commercial outfits), and create things with the potential to advance the human race and make the world a better place. All of it 100% voluntarily, uncoerced. If that's not Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness, I don't know what is. Go reread what Ayn Rand says about trading value for value. Whether you're trading the fruits of your labor and talent for money, or for something else of value to you, either fits just fine with her philosophy. Ultimately, she was an advocate for the creation and fair exchange of value and real wealth, of which money is just a store, and without coercion. There is absolutely nothing about FOSS that is incompatible with her beliefs. This is one of the biggest problems with the Conservative movement these days, a misunderstanding and misapplication of their own ideology. Too many seem to have merely a superficial understanding of it, a worldview that if corporations, direct profit motive, and consistent % improvements in quarterly statements aren't the driving force behind something then it can only be the antithesis of Truth, Justice, and the American Way. Be it FOSS, Net Neutrality, movements to reduce corporate spending in politics, if corporations are against it or orthogonal to it, then it must be anti-American. Einstein once advised that 'everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler.' I think the right would do well to reconsider their world view with that in mind.
- hasenj 16y ago
  GPL is not designed for academic research. MIT and BSD licenses are, but the GPL is certainly not. > Just because the people involved in FOSS are not doing this directly for money does not mean they're giving away the fruit of their labor for free, or being coerced as Soviet Communism was known for Read my reply to PG. I wasn't trying to imply that GNU has any similarity to the USSR; that's very silly. I actually support the ideals of GNU, but I'm not ideological about it. I'm fine with selling closed software, so long as one is not just leeching off open source without contributing anything back.
drats 16y ago
RMS sold GPLed software in the early days. RMS is also someone who made deep personal sacrifices to see a certain vision of freedom prevail, or rather be preserved. That seems to me to be very American.
- hasenj 16y ago
  Sacrificing yourself for the greater good? Doesn't sound very American to me. The fact he made sacrifices instead of making billions to develop software is a proof of my point about GNU being very far from the ideas of capitalism.
  - drats 16y ago
    I said "freedom" and you changed that to "greater good" to try to win the argument. Stallman was pursuing his lifestyle, people started to mess with it, so he created a legal document to secure his own freedoms and those of others. This enabled him to live his life as he wanted and helped a lot of other people - many who disagree with him on points minor and major - to live their lives the way they want to. In that sense its an individualistic community that values freedom protected by a clever legal document. Now if you think "making money" describes the USA better than "individualistic community that values freedom protected by a clever legal document", you'd be wrong. I am not from America, but looking from afar I often get sick of the crude anti-Americanism that seems to get an intellectual free pass all the time. What can be more American than high level science? Given the endless Nobel prizes and technical innovations of the USA I'd think you could point to the AI lab at MIT as being a good symbol (among many) for the American contributions to science. It's ultimately American. Smack bang in the middle of the one of the first states which has always been an intellectual powerhouse mirroring the parts of England from which its settlers first came. A place which also bears the name "the Cradle of Liberty" with many political triumphs. The "blue states", as a reductionist might call them, don't play themselves up to us in the rest of the world, or domestically, as often as they perhaps should; that doesn't mean they aren't powerful or haven't changed the world in massive ways. And more than just residing in a center of American liberty and intellectual achievement Stallman used a clever legal document to do it. Lawyer jokes aside, using the beautiful common law system to protect rights, what could be more American? Starting a revolution rather than play along with it when someone gets up in your face and starts messing with your lifestyle. Tell me which country fits that description better than the USA. Yes, there is more than one America, there is Wallstreet and the Ayn Rand impulse you point to. I am not denying those exist, but don't try to claim them as being the only America or claim that they are the summation of one of the most important countries (perhaps "the most important country") in the history of human civilization. Stallman is as American as apple pie.