5 ms·

The Shaggy God - Richard Stallman in Boston Magazine

45 points by altay 18y ago

mixmax 18y ago
"The most momentous product of Stallman's genius, Linux, was the first operating system to feature software that was entirely free." I believe this is not entirely accurate - I seem to remember someone else being involved in creating linux...
- gaius 18y ago
  Well, that someone used GCC and the first thing they ran on their new kernel was Bash ;-)
  - narag 18y ago
    :-) It's curious that nobody seems to remember that "that someone" ported GCC to x86.
    - gwniobombux 18y ago
      That credit is probably due to William Schelter. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Schelter http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Schelter
- mechanical_fish 18y ago
  Obviously this sentence is... flawed. But the most important lesson here is: Every sentence of the form "X invented Y" suffers from the same flaw. Consider "X invented the television": One canonical value of X is "Vladimir Zworykin", but maverick outsiders have a hero in Philo Farnsworth, and every Scot knows that the correct answer is "John Logie Baird". And all of them are right, in one way or another. Or the sentence "X invented the first antibiotic": is the correct value of X "Sir Alexander Fleming", "John Tyndall", or "molds in the Penicillium family"? (And why didn't the Penicillium get knighted as well? It did all the grunt work!) For the really strong form of this argument, google "James Burke connections".
sophist 18y ago
He's taking credit for Linux now? wtf?
- ojbyrne 18y ago
  I believe his argument is that just about everything outside the kernel came from the FSF. It's not entirely implausible but he is obnoxious about it. Apparently just insisting that it be called "GNU/Linux" wasn't too successful.
  - me2i81 18y ago
    gcc was an important piece of work that Stallman started. The rest of the GNU stuff was a bunch of knock-off code because the original code was bound up in lawsuits (just like the kernel) or later replicated because of licensing purity of essence concerns. Writing a second verson of tar, cpio, cron, etc. hardly counts as a great piece of innovation, and Stallman is kind of a git for acting like it is. The thing about Linux is that Torvalds just went ahead and wrote it, rather than wanking about it for years and years like Stallman did.
  - gaius 18y ago
    I guess if GNU had actually produced HURD back in the day Linux would be forgotten or never have happened, but what's done is done now.
    - mechanical_fish 18y ago
      Man, BSD conquers the desktop and it still can't get no respect. (Of course, its non-free "Mac OS X" disguise does fool a lot of people.) What I'm trying to say, of course, is that there's no reason why multiple takes on the Unix kernel can't live happily next to each other in the marketplace. Also, you can't just blame Linux for stealing potential mindshare from the HURD... it was a group effort. There was also FreeBSD, as well as non-free but well-respected options like Solaris.
      - gaius 18y ago
wallflower 18y ago
"Strictly speaking, the complete operating system should have been called GNU/Linux, representing the combined contributions of Stallman and Torvalds. Stallman always insists on the term, pronouncing it "GNU slash Linux." But in the popular mind, it came to be known as only Linux. Stallman has never gotten over that." The more I read about Stallman the more I find that his extreme stance is just who he is: "He's entirely consistent and uncompromising and I think the world needs someone like that," Perens said. http://www.informationweek.com/news/software/open_source/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=175802222&pgno=4&queryText=&isPrev= http://www.informationweek.com/news/software/open_source/sho...
- cmcginnis 18y ago
  Consistency in itself is not much of a virtue.
  - mattmaroon 18y ago
    "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds" -Emerson
    - andreyf 18y ago
      Emerson is talking about people that are consistent for fear of admitting they were wrong. I don't think Stallman's consistency is that kind...
- davidw 18y ago
  I'm glad he exists, though, because he makes me look like a moderate, even though I'm a pretty dedicated free software fan.
  - william42 18y ago
    That's the Overton window and I'm glad he's pushing it. Without him, we may still be in the world of non-disclosure agreements and closed Unices.
patrickg-zill 18y ago
Stallman got trolled (though he realized it) when Philip Greenspun did a parody page on "Heather Has Two Mommies and they go to the Zoo" : http://philip.greenspun.com/zoo/ http://philip.greenspun.com/zoo/ Stallman's PC response, laying all on the "right wing Christian movement": http://philip.greenspun.com/zoo/stallman-reaction.text http://philip.greenspun.com/zoo/stallman-reaction.text
coffeeaddicted 18y ago
I understand why Stallman wants the GNU in GNU/Linux. But what's always confusing me is - why the slash? He's a programmer, so he knows that this is usually used for paths. But that does not seem to make sense if he wants this as a single name which should always be used. You can't create a single GNU/Linux folder - at least not in GNU/Linux. So anyone know why he didn't use another character there?
- mojuba 18y ago
  Probably because GNU Linux without slash would mean there may be another Linux also that's not GNU. And yes, GNU/Linux reads like a path: here is the GNU world and here's Linux subworld.
  - huhtenberg 18y ago
    > .. there may be another Linux also that's not GNU Technically there may be one. While the history of Hurd shows that the opposite is not quite true. So all things considered it should really be Linux/GNU :-)
    - gaius 18y ago
      There are distros with BSD or Solaris kernels and a GNU userland.
- tjr 18y ago
  http://www.gnu.org/gnu/gnu-linux-faq.html#whyslash http://www.gnu.org/gnu/gnu-linux-faq.html#whyslash We're talking about a version of GNU, the operating system, distinguished by having Linux as the kernel. A slash fits the situation because it means “combination.” (Think of “Input/Output”.) This system is the combination of GNU and Linux; hence, “GNU/Linux”. There are other ways to express “combination”. If you think that a plus-sign is clearer, please use that. In French, a hyphen is clear: “GNU-Linux”. In Spanish, we sometimes say “GNU con Linux”.
robg 18y ago
Can anyone answer for me how Stallman has influenced the Cambridge tech community? What was interesting, as the author envisons "Mt. Hackmore", is that Stallman is the only East Coaster in that circle. Makes me think that in combining his personality and ethos with the venture community in Boston you could perhaps explain the very conservative investment environment.
edw519 18y ago
Stallman detests wealth He travels the world as a free software evangelist Which came first, the chicken or the egg? Does he detest wealth because he is a free software evangelist? Or is he a free software evangelist because he never figured out how to become wealthy himself?
- tjr 18y ago
  He was successfully charging $250/hour as a software consultant prior to taking up his "evangelist" role full-time. I think he could be quite wealthy if he were to attempt to be.
- gaius 18y ago
  Stallman is the recipient of a MacArthur Foundation grant, that's a cool $1M.
iheartrms 18y ago
haha...RMS didn't post that ad for himself on craigslist, I posted it on his behalf! It's so strange to see oneself indirectly referred to in an article which one otherwise has nothing to do with.

45 points by altay 18y ago

"The most momentous product of Stallman's genius, Linux, was the first operating system to feature software that was entirely free." I believe this is not entirely accurate - I seem to remember someone else being involved in creating linux...

gaius 18y ago
Well, that someone used GCC and the first thing they ran on their new kernel was Bash ;-)
- narag 18y ago
  :-) It's curious that nobody seems to remember that "that someone" ported GCC to x86.
  - gwniobombux 18y ago
    That credit is probably due to William Schelter. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Schelter http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Schelter
mechanical_fish 18y ago
Obviously this sentence is... flawed. But the most important lesson here is: Every sentence of the form "X invented Y" suffers from the same flaw. Consider "X invented the television": One canonical value of X is "Vladimir Zworykin", but maverick outsiders have a hero in Philo Farnsworth, and every Scot knows that the correct answer is "John Logie Baird". And all of them are right, in one way or another. Or the sentence "X invented the first antibiotic": is the correct value of X "Sir Alexander Fleming", "John Tyndall", or "molds in the Penicillium family"? (And why didn't the Penicillium get knighted as well? It did all the grunt work!) For the really strong form of this argument, google "James Burke connections".

sophist 18y ago

He's taking credit for Linux now? wtf?

ojbyrne 18y ago
I believe his argument is that just about everything outside the kernel came from the FSF. It's not entirely implausible but he is obnoxious about it. Apparently just insisting that it be called "GNU/Linux" wasn't too successful.
- me2i81 18y ago
  gcc was an important piece of work that Stallman started. The rest of the GNU stuff was a bunch of knock-off code because the original code was bound up in lawsuits (just like the kernel) or later replicated because of licensing purity of essence concerns. Writing a second verson of tar, cpio, cron, etc. hardly counts as a great piece of innovation, and Stallman is kind of a git for acting like it is. The thing about Linux is that Torvalds just went ahead and wrote it, rather than wanking about it for years and years like Stallman did.
- gaius 18y ago
  I guess if GNU had actually produced HURD back in the day Linux would be forgotten or never have happened, but what's done is done now.
  - mechanical_fish 18y ago
    Man, BSD conquers the desktop and it still can't get no respect. (Of course, its non-free "Mac OS X" disguise does fool a lot of people.) What I'm trying to say, of course, is that there's no reason why multiple takes on the Unix kernel can't live happily next to each other in the marketplace. Also, you can't just blame Linux for stealing potential mindshare from the HURD... it was a group effort. There was also FreeBSD, as well as non-free but well-respected options like Solaris.
    - gaius 18y ago

wallflower 18y ago

"Strictly speaking, the complete operating system should have been called GNU/Linux, representing the combined contributions of Stallman and Torvalds. Stallman always insists on the term, pronouncing it "GNU slash Linux." But in the popular mind, it came to be known as only Linux. Stallman has never gotten over that." The more I read about Stallman the more I find that his extreme stance is just who he is: "He's entirely consistent and uncompromising and I think the world needs someone like that," Perens said. http://www.informationweek.com/news/software/open_source/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=175802222&pgno=4&queryText=&isPrev= http://www.informationweek.com/news/software/open_source/sho...

cmcginnis 18y ago
Consistency in itself is not much of a virtue.
- mattmaroon 18y ago
  "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds" -Emerson
  - andreyf 18y ago
    Emerson is talking about people that are consistent for fear of admitting they were wrong. I don't think Stallman's consistency is that kind...
davidw 18y ago
I'm glad he exists, though, because he makes me look like a moderate, even though I'm a pretty dedicated free software fan.
- william42 18y ago
  That's the Overton window and I'm glad he's pushing it. Without him, we may still be in the world of non-disclosure agreements and closed Unices.

patrickg-zill 18y ago

Stallman got trolled (though he realized it) when Philip Greenspun did a parody page on "Heather Has Two Mommies and they go to the Zoo" : http://philip.greenspun.com/zoo/ http://philip.greenspun.com/zoo/ Stallman's PC response, laying all on the "right wing Christian movement": http://philip.greenspun.com/zoo/stallman-reaction.text http://philip.greenspun.com/zoo/stallman-reaction.text

coffeeaddicted 18y ago

I understand why Stallman wants the GNU in GNU/Linux. But what's always confusing me is - why the slash? He's a programmer, so he knows that this is usually used for paths. But that does not seem to make sense if he wants this as a single name which should always be used. You can't create a single GNU/Linux folder - at least not in GNU/Linux. So anyone know why he didn't use another character there?

mojuba 18y ago
Probably because GNU Linux without slash would mean there may be another Linux also that's not GNU. And yes, GNU/Linux reads like a path: here is the GNU world and here's Linux subworld.
- huhtenberg 18y ago
  > .. there may be another Linux also that's not GNU Technically there may be one. While the history of Hurd shows that the opposite is not quite true. So all things considered it should really be Linux/GNU :-)
  - gaius 18y ago
    There are distros with BSD or Solaris kernels and a GNU userland.
tjr 18y ago
http://www.gnu.org/gnu/gnu-linux-faq.html#whyslash http://www.gnu.org/gnu/gnu-linux-faq.html#whyslash We're talking about a version of GNU, the operating system, distinguished by having Linux as the kernel. A slash fits the situation because it means “combination.” (Think of “Input/Output”.) This system is the combination of GNU and Linux; hence, “GNU/Linux”. There are other ways to express “combination”. If you think that a plus-sign is clearer, please use that. In French, a hyphen is clear: “GNU-Linux”. In Spanish, we sometimes say “GNU con Linux”.

robg 18y ago

Can anyone answer for me how Stallman has influenced the Cambridge tech community? What was interesting, as the author envisons "Mt. Hackmore", is that Stallman is the only East Coaster in that circle. Makes me think that in combining his personality and ethos with the venture community in Boston you could perhaps explain the very conservative investment environment.

edw519 18y ago

Stallman detests wealth He travels the world as a free software evangelist Which came first, the chicken or the egg? Does he detest wealth because he is a free software evangelist? Or is he a free software evangelist because he never figured out how to become wealthy himself?

tjr 18y ago
He was successfully charging $250/hour as a software consultant prior to taking up his "evangelist" role full-time. I think he could be quite wealthy if he were to attempt to be.
gaius 18y ago
Stallman is the recipient of a MacArthur Foundation grant, that's a cool $1M.

iheartrms 18y ago

haha...RMS didn't post that ad for himself on craigslist, I posted it on his behalf! It's so strange to see oneself indirectly referred to in an article which one otherwise has nothing to do with.