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Richard Stallman steps down as as head of the GNU Project, effective immediately
- turndown 7y agoWho is his most likely successor? Will GNU strategy change(the kernel coming to the front of my mind) or will things basically be the same?
- loeg 7y ago> Will GNU strategy change(the kernel coming to the front of my mind)? Hurd? Who cares? Linux has always been and will continue to be its own thing; it isn't a GNU project.
- em3rgent0rdr 7y agoThe beauty about the free software movement he created is that is doesn't require a leader!
- mcguire 7y agoWhich is good, since it hasn't really had one since 1990 or so. Has anyone else noticed that Stallman hasn't been effective, outside of the hard-core FSF, in a very long time? I'm a big fan of the GPL licenses. I'm a moderate fan of the FSF. But geeze, Stallman has been a liability in terms of the outside world for a long time.
- hutzlibu 7y agoHow relevant is any GNU project today really? What is activly maintained and being used?
- detaro 7y agobash, gcc, coreutils, make, ... For GCC, less Stallman influence, if it happens as a result of this, might have some consequences. E.g. there was some discussions about (not) having features giving deeper insight into internals some years ago, which are helpful to e.g. make code inspection tools, but also could be used to feed a non-GPL codegen backend. Many "GNU" projects are really run independently though, with little influence.
- hutzlibu 7y ago"Many "GNU" projects are really run independently though, with little influence" Ok, I meant GNU projects, with actual ties to the organization and not just the name. If there is no real connection, then it does not really matter who leads GNU
- icebraining 7y agoI'd say the most used are Bash, GCC, glibc, Make, GRUB, Grep, Gnome, Emacs, Gettext, GIMP, GTK, Gzip, Less, Screen, Sed, Tar, and Wget. But that's just a small sample, you can see the whole list here: https://www.gnu.org/manual/blurbs.html https://www.gnu.org/manual/blurbs.html
- lokedhs 7y agoEmacs is a core project and is being heavily developed. Version 27 is about to be released soon.
- rowanG077 7y agoWow... It's really incredible how a bunch of SJWs have ruined one of the greatest forces of good. My heart goes out to him.
- mlevental 7y agolol you're welcome to take him in then https://stallman.org/seeking-housing.html https://stallman.org/seeking-housing.html
- rowanG077 7y agoI don't live anywhere even close to where he is looking for housing.
- lllr_finger 7y agoHis garbage opinions, and the need to share them, are what sunk him. He arguably had useful contributions but "one of the greatest forces of good" is a joke.
- rowanG077 7y agoCan you name 20 people who have factually done more good then Stallman that are currently alive?
- loeg 7y agoThat's not a great counter-argument. I mean, I could pull 20 names out of https://www.google.com/search?q=people+who+have+done+the+most+good https://www.google.com/search?q=people+who+have+done+the+mos... that I think have done more good than Stallman, but it's somewhat subjective. (I'd be hard-pressed to name 20 people you've heard of without Google. Why not ask for 1000 to be really sure the bar is absurd?) That said, there are 7 billion people on this planet and I suspect rather more than 20 of them have done more good than Stallman.
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- hprotagonist 7y agohttps://stallman.org/seeking-housing.html https://stallman.org/seeking-housing.html
- mlevental 7y agolol talk about out of touch. doesn't mention paying either. it's astounds me that people can be so dense that even after clear contradictions (don't be so obnoxious that you lose your job) they persist.
- dependenttypes 7y agoHave you considered the possibility that he might not be able to pay? Also, I am sure that there are many people who would offer him somewhere to live, he has quite a few fans.
- EmeraldMoon 7y agoI honestly would love to offer him a room, but I'm nowhere near Boston. This guy is a FLOSS hero -- his thoughts and opinions beyond FLOSS do not matter to me.
- happytoexplain 7y ago>his thoughts and opinions beyond FLOSS do not matter to me Why? That's an impressive amount of benefit of the doubt to give anybody, but so much more so if you're also willing to personally host that person. It's almost unbelievable. Do you in fact mean to say not that you don't care about his opinions, but that you simply have read about them and don't find them particularly condemnable?
- EmeraldMoon 7y agoI have attended his talks, listened to podcasts and read some of his conversations on mailing lists. I can see why people may not like him, or the way he talks. But we disagree with people all the time. I would be willing to host him just for the conversations, and because I feel like it's the least I can do for a man who shaped much of the software that I use everyday.
- ohashi 7y agoIs there some context I'm unaware of?
- ThrowawayR2 7y agoDefinitely peculiar. Three days ago, RMS stated that he intended to stay on as head of the GNU Project: https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/info-gnu/2019-09/msg00008.html https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/info-gnu/2019-09/msg00008... [EDIT] Quoting the text of the above link for convenience: > "On September 16 I resigned as president of the Free Software Foundation, but the GNU Project and the FSF are not the same. I am still the head of the GNU Project (the Chief GNUisance), and I intend to continue as such." Earlier discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21088690 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21088690
- mlevental 7y ago>Dr Richard Stallman why does he sign this way? he doesn't have a PhD. edit: i have never (ever) seen someone with an honorary doctorate actually call themselves doctor.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- dmm 7y agoHe has at least one honorary phd.
- saagarjha 7y agoHe has a number of honorary doctorates: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Stallman#Honors_and_awards https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Stallman#Honors_and_aw...
- TomBombadildoze 7y agoIf you consider Wikipedia and its citations to be reliable sources, it would generally be considered bad form to expect others to address you as Doctor. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honorary_degree#Use_of_title_associated_with_honorary_doctorates https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honorary_degree#Use_of_title_a...
- motohagiography 7y agoThe GPL was always a virus, but it appears it could mutate and metastasize under new governance. Sort of puts whomever replaces him and their backers under suspicion. Who benefits? Edit: to be clear, the GPL was designed to be viral.
- gnulinux 7y agoGPL is the biggest force that makes software bearable today. Have you ever worked back when everything was prop code? It was insanity. Getting devs change just one line of code would take months, and nobody knew where bugs are coming from because nobody could read the entire code.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- jefft255 7y agoThese resignation messages are really short (the one from FSF being the other)!! Not much context in there. I get that he said a lot of things which some think are so-so, some think are terrible. Maybe he decided he’s so bad at this he won’t even try to explain what happened, choosing to resign without saying a word.
- tptacek 7y agoThe Internet has created in all of us an expectation that other people's lives happen primarily to enlighten and engage us, the bystander audience. In reality, most resignations are approximately this concise.
- Ensorceled 7y agoI’ve been in industry for 32 years now and not single one of my resignation letters contained any reason beyond “decided to pursue other opportunities”.
- djsumdog 7y agoI'll sometimes include a "Thank you" or "I enjoyed working with everyone," if it's true. But even with that, none of mine since I graduated University have ever been more than two to three sentences tops. Resignations should always be short and to the point. Nixon's was one sentence: https://watergate.info/1974/08/09/nixons-resignation-letter.html https://watergate.info/1974/08/09/nixons-resignation-letter....
- Ensorceled 7y agoYep. “I wish $company all the best” etc. Just never a reason.
- djsumdog 7y agoI think the two recent resignations are specifically over the mailing lists posts where he quibbled on using the term rape in the case of statutory rape, and specifically the departments that had continued to take funding from Epstein after his original convictions.
- dx87 7y agoEDIT: It seems like the sites can't be held responsible because they didn't create the false information, they just disseminated it. Leaving up the wrong part of my comment for context. The sites that ran articles quoting the garbage medium article should get sued over this. RMS lost his job and doesn't have anywhere to live because someone who never met him decided to write a hit piece instead of talking like an adult.
- tptacek 7y agoOn what legal theory do you propose that sites who run articles quoting a Medium article should be sued? Before you say "libelslander", if that was your plan, you should do some reading about how libel in the US works.
- dx87 7y agoSo here's what I found are generally the requirements for libel: False assertion of fact: There must be a false assertion of fact about a person; Communication: Such false statement was unprivileged and communicated or published to a third-party; Fault: There was fault on the part of the plaintiff, amounting to at least negligence; Damages: The statement or publication caused damage to the plaintiff or was ‘defamatory per se’ or ‘libelous per se’. So point for point: False assertion of fact: Sites wrote that RMS said the sex slaves were entirely willing to be sex slaves. Communication: It was published online for everyone to see. Fault: The sites didn't verify that he didn't actually say that, and were negligent in not doing any research beyond what was presented in the medium article. Damages: RMS lost his job and it appears he's currently homeless. How is what happened to him not considered libel?
- tptacek 7y agoKen White has covered this at length: you can't be sued for libel for quoting someone else's story. You have to be relating the veracity of the false facts yourself, based on your supposed knowledge of what happened. "I believe this story I read elsewhere" doesn't count.
- nkkollaw 7y agoIs this another victim of the awful all-American outrage culture, or there's some actual reason why he should throw away his life's work?
- tptacek 7y agoResigning from an organization doesn't destroy the organization, let alone the work that organization has done in the past.
- vbezhenar 7y agoAfter that event I don't trust to both FSF and GNU organizations. I kind of accepted them because of RMS, but now they are irrelevant. I'll look forward where RMS will go.
- krapp 7y agoPeople like you are a perfect example of why the cult of Stallman is bad for Free Software.
- IntelMiner 7y agoWhy?
- vbezhenar 7y agoThey treated him unfairly. He did nothing wrong.
- faichai 7y ago...and to finally take a shower and use some deodorant!
- dependenttypes 7y agoThere is a non-zero possibility that a rogue employee did this. He does not sign his web stuff with his GPG key after all. Also, it is there twice https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#27_September_2019_(GNU_Project) https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#27_September...
- ceejayoz 7y agostallman.org has employees?
- dependenttypes 7y agoI should have said volunteer, but it could as well be a FSF employee. And yes, he does not manage the site himself.
- mattl 7y agoHis personal site is not related to the FSF. It’s hosted by Positive Internet in the UK.
- mrob 7y agoThere seems to be something weird going on. Check archive.org's recent version on the site: https://web.archive.org/web/20190928070003/https://stallman.org/ https://web.archive.org/web/20190928070003/https://stallman.... "What's bad about" section has a "Richard Stallman" link to the Medium post, and the "donate to the Free Software Foundation" link goes to the "Richard Stallman Eats Something From His Foot" Youtube video. The Youtube link is especially suspicious because Youtube uses proprietary Javascript, which RMS has never supported.
- Sadkov 7y agoJavascript proprietary? Are you, people, all <redacted-expletive> here?
- 7y ago
- kome 7y agoFor context, a good commentary you need to read: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21090851 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21090851
- psb 7y agoMy feeling about Stallman is that he is that rare creature, a fundamentalist lefty. Its a pretty lonely island and I'm actually a little surprised he has lasted this long
- typon 7y agoHe's not a lefty. He's a fundamentalist libertarian.
- jcranmer 7y agoI'd say he's more communist, since he seems to believe that private property just shouldn't exist. Libertarians by contrast would tend more on the scale of "you should be able to do whatever you want with your private property."
- claudiawerner 7y ago> since he seems to believe that private property just shouldn't exist Although I'm sympathetic to that idea myself, that just isn't true in Stallman's case. He's a Bernie/Stein voter and he's read something by Emma Goldman, but I think that's the extent of his "lefty" gland.
- wwright 7y agoThe latter is what he wants. He is happy for people to charge for software, but he advocates that the owner must have full control.
- icebraining 7y agoSome argue that copyright undermines private property: https://mises.org/library/against-intellectual-property-2 https://mises.org/library/against-intellectual-property-2
- shitgoose 7y agonot even close:)) he is a fundamentalist statist.
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- ckaygusu 7y agoI'm completely in awe with how a significant portion of this community believes (directly or indirectly) the accomplishments of a person makes being a decent human being optional. This leads to a "strong-rules-all" culture and I think what we're seeing is just modern barbarism.
- pg_is_a_butt 7y agoLet's see how "weak-cancels-all" works out in the end, when all you morons already sold your souls to nice men who promised not to violate your privacy. You're all idiots.
- traderjane 7y agoThat's how the mainstream thinks all around the world; it's the rare position that believes principles rule society when consensus on any kind of vision for the human condition is so far out of reach.
- makomk 7y agoSadly, I reckon that even a lot of the folks who want Stallman gone are just as willing to turn a blind eye to someone doing the same things that he did if they have the right accomplishments and status, and that they just differ on who they're willing to do that for.
- tptacek 7y agoDo you reckon that? You look back over your recalled experiences and see example after example of the kinds of people condemning Stallman putting up with misogyny, harassment, and advocacy for pedophilia among higher-status people?
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- deleted 7y ago
- phillipcarter 7y agoGreat!
- CriticalCathed 7y agoThese witch hunts will be a significant topic in our history of this time. So, so, sad.
- starpilot 7y agoVery sad. I hope he is able to take some loyalists with him. Stallman forever.
- chrischen 7y agoLet’s not forget that John F Kennedy used his position of power to compel a woman to give his friend a blowjob in front of him, and JFK is still somehow considered a hero for simply having been assassinated. This is probably a bit of overreaction while MIT is in damage control mode.
- geofft 7y agoSomeone on Reddit says that his site might have been vandalized, and that it was previously vandalized yesterday: https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/dambxx/stallman_steps_down_as_a_head_of_the_gnu_project/f1qz2l9/ https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/dambxx/stallman_step... It's a bit suspicious because a) he just said two days ago that he has no intention of stepping down from GNU https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/info-gnu/2019-09/msg00008.html https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/info-gnu/2019-09/msg00008... and b) there's another copy of the entry dated yesterday, deeper on the page: https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#27_September_2019_(GNU_Project) https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#27_September... It 100% wouldn't surprise me if he didn't have adequate security for his personal website. He comes from a culture of leaving doors unlocked and passwords unset, and he also doesn't actually participate in the modern web (he has a daily cronjob that emails him text dumps of web pages he wants to read, he doesn't "browse" the web in any me), and his personal site is probably not actually run by the FSF or anyone else with experience in running websites.
- tptacek 7y agoI feel like I remember him running Unix servers back in the 1990s that were deliberately insecure, because computer security was itself immoral. I don't know that he actually runs this site, though.
- bbanyc 7y agoI've heard a story from an MIT staffer that the Morris worm of 1988 was first released from a public workstation logged in as username rms, password rms.
- devicetray0 7y agoI tried to verify this but couldn't find it. However, I did find that counter-hackers changed Morris' username from RTM to RTFM to get back at him [1], so I'm not sure he used the username 'rms'. Maybe the staffer got mixed up? [1] Page 155: https://books.google.com/books?id=oLHMBK0iGkkC&pg=PA155&lpg=PA155&dq=%22username+from+RTM+to+RTFM%22&source=bl&ots=dhPVbKrzKq&sig=ACfU3U1kQFPSxuynWlOGjXgGFPeRD_UJjQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwicncTM0vTkAhXrc98KHc3CC7UQ6AEwAHoECAIQAQ#v=onepage&q=%22username%20from%20RTM%20to%20RTFM%22&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=oLHMBK0iGkkC&pg=PA155&lpg=...
- chachachoney 7y agoG.N.U. is now undeserved.
- ezoe 7y agoWhile I thought RMS's technical knowledge wasn't updated properly since he pivoted his activities to be an evangelist of freedom rather than being a programmer. I believe he was directly responsible of the development stall of GCC, Emacs and various other projects. It's also his fault for not abandoning the Hurd sometime around the early 1990s. His forced resignation should better be happened earlier for the lack of skill, not by his opinion on the definition of pedophile and the correct understanding of intention in criminal law system.
- dimitar 7y agoI don't get why he doesn't simply apologize, take a few months break from publicity to think things over and then move on. Instead he seems to prefer to step down from what he has been doing for the last 30 years. Does he really regret nothing? On a human level I sympathize with the women he has offended (I know the story is also about his behavior over the years), but I also worry about him as well, I hope he stays in good health and spirit.
- BlackRing 7y agoBecause there's nothing to regret. The article was a hit piece, wildly inaccurate in it's editorialization that equates to a lie. People are foolishly listening to some ignorant ranting that takes everything out of context and my supposition is that it was something people when wanted to jump on when the opportunity arose. People, notably nicknamed SJw's, have been trying to target big names in GNU and Linux for years and is an established fact in many circles of honeytraps trying to snare some of these people. I don't buy this at all as anything less.
- dependenttypes 7y agoJust a tip (with no offence intended), you may want to avoid terms like "SJW" in the future if you want your post to be taken seriously or engage in honest discussion with others.
- BlackRing 7y agoWhen these people title themselves that way it's not inaccurate to use.
- dependenttypes 7y agoDoes not need to be inaccurate in order to make other people assume that you are yet another alt-right nutjob and avoid engaging in discussion with you.
- bitL 7y agoI just hope his next step is not going to be a suicide... RMS, hold on tight, many people are grateful for what you did for free software!
- happytoexplain 7y agoWhoa, does he have a history I'm not aware of (honestly asking)?
- bitL 7y agoHe's homeless now, many "friends" turned their backs on him, he's undergoing virtual lynching on social media and likely views his life's work a complete failure. Even without any prior history, it takes just one impulse to go over the edge; think of Aaron Swartz.
- krapp 7y agoHe's looking for "interim housing" for two to six months, and apparently this is something he does all the time. There's no evidence that he is homeless. Certainly none that he is suicidal. Please stop your concern trolling.
- bitL 7y agoIs it wrong to be worried about somebody's wellbeing? Or is it out of fashion these days? Or is it a privilege reserved only for pre-approved people?
- tptacek 7y agoIt is wrong to invoke suicide simply to make a message board thread more exciting, yes. If you know something specific about Richard Stallman's mental health, then you know who to alert about your concerns. Otherwise, Internet psychiatric diagnosis is a trope, and is forbidden on Hacker News. https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=author%3Adang%20psychiatric%20diagnosis&sort=byPopularity&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...
- CriticalCathed 7y agoRichard Stallman is a victim here. He's been taken out of context, provably so, and then the lies repeated and amplified by social media and even legitimate news outlets. It is a witch hunt, pure and simple. There is no smoke, there is no fire.
- tptacek 7y agoThe nominee is quoted as saying that if the choice of a sexual partner were protected by the Constitution, "prostitution, adultery, necrophilia, bestiality, possession of child pornography, and even incest and pedophilia" also would be. He is probably mistaken, legally--but that is unfortunate. All of these acts should be legal as long as no one is coerced. They are illegal only because of prejudice and narrowmindedness.
- kderbe 7y agoThat quote is from 2003. This quote is from 2019: Many years ago I posted that I could not see anything wrong about sex between an adult and a child, if the child accepted it. Through personal conversations in recent years, I've learned to understand how sex with a child can harm per psychologically. This changed my mind about the matter: I think adults should not do that. I am grateful for the conversations that enabled me to understand why.
- coleifer 7y agoSo true. His life's been ruined by a shrieking Twitter mob. Who's next? These sjws are complete parasites. They never fork. Just go after vulnerable people at the top and insinuate their way into established institutions. And they seem to be winning.
- smitty1e 7y agoRMS is an important historical figure. Having his inevitanle departure reduced to collateral damage of Jeffrey Epstein is a shame.
- justdoitagaim 7y agoCancel Stallman. Cancel free software. Cancel the internet. Cancel computers. Cancel the earth. Cancel the universe. Honestly... Cancel everything. Who the fuck needs any of that. Especially that universe thing. The dumbest invention ever. Finally a good reason to look forward to climate change destroying everything.
- Grue3 7y agoIt's not on the linked site. Fake news?
- Syri 7y agoWhoa. It was there an hour ago. I wonder what's up?