3 ms·

I remember in the 90s when I was first exposed to Richard Stallman’s ideology of only using free software. At the time, It seemed crazy not to use free (as in b

I remember in the 90s when I was first exposed to Richard Stallman’s ideology of only using free software. At the time, It seemed crazy not to use free (as in beer) software, but of course he was right in so many ways. We now live in a world where most people’s primary computing devices are made by only 2 companies. One of them has complete control over what the device owner can run, and the other has effective/de facto control over what the device owner can run. Say what you will about zealots, but they are looking out for problems before they become problems...

redis_mlc 6y ago
FYI: for people in the know, what Stallman wrote 100% made sense at the time, and we just faintly hoped he was wrong. Of course, anybody familiar with US IP law knew that hope was very misplaced, as a single company like Disney can lobby for federal copyright law to be rewritten at will - it has been extended to 100+ years at this point to make Mickey Mouse eternally exclusive. What blind-sided even cynics are the non-competes on hair stylists and sandwich-makers in the same town. These expose the true nature of business owners to enslave their staff at every opportunity. Amazon's lobbying to retain non-competes for professional staff (salaries over $100k) in Seattle is another indicator. (I have chosen to work in California for that reason.) Make no mistake, corporations are waging a war to control the American population, who don't even know they've been targeted yet. One of their most effective weapons is arbitration of both employees and consumers. After all, who pays the arbitration firm? The only potential good news is that when courts get fed up enough, they sometimes toss out one-sided non-competes and ToS links. This happened in Canada a few decades ago. Insurance companies wrote more-and-more clever policy language until the courts ruled that simplified language was required so that the average consumer could understand the meaning. (Note that the courts in Canada are scholarly and experienced appointees, rather than lobbied and elected officials as in the US.)

redis_mlc 6y ago

FYI: for people in the know, what Stallman wrote 100% made sense at the time, and we just faintly hoped he was wrong. Of course, anybody familiar with US IP law knew that hope was very misplaced, as a single company like Disney can lobby for federal copyright law to be rewritten at will - it has been extended to 100+ years at this point to make Mickey Mouse eternally exclusive. What blind-sided even cynics are the non-competes on hair stylists and sandwich-makers in the same town. These expose the true nature of business owners to enslave their staff at every opportunity. Amazon's lobbying to retain non-competes for professional staff (salaries over $100k) in Seattle is another indicator. (I have chosen to work in California for that reason.) Make no mistake, corporations are waging a war to control the American population, who don't even know they've been targeted yet. One of their most effective weapons is arbitration of both employees and consumers. After all, who pays the arbitration firm? The only potential good news is that when courts get fed up enough, they sometimes toss out one-sided non-competes and ToS links. This happened in Canada a few decades ago. Insurance companies wrote more-and-more clever policy language until the courts ruled that simplified language was required so that the average consumer could understand the meaning. (Note that the courts in Canada are scholarly and experienced appointees, rather than lobbied and elected officials as in the US.)