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Years back, I used to be an FSF member. Not that I liked the GPL much (in fact, I mostly use the Apache License), but they raised important issues, and had a tr

Years back, I used to be an FSF member. Not that I liked the GPL much (in fact, I mostly use the Apache License), but they raised important issues, and had a track record of investing into fine software (GNU) that I benefitted from a lot. However, their campaigns were getting so off-target, that much of my sympathy dwindled, and I ended my membership. Childish 'anti' advertising, such as 'BadVista' and DDoSing Apple's genius bars (gee, that's will convince anyone who was visiting an Apple Store) only made the whole free software movement look bad, childish, and unsocial. To this day, they seem to put their energy into almost hilarious campaigns (Windows 7 sins? Seriously?). This open letter is on the mark, their current course only marginalizes the FSF and part of the FLOSS community. Whatever happened to relying on your own strengths, rather than caricaturizing the competition?

fluidcruft 16y ago
I am also a lapsed member exactly for the same reasons. The camp makes it impossible to spread the word (for example by linking to their site) because I feel like the cheesiness of the presentation would reflect poorly on me. Frankly they look like a bunch of clowns. Which is unfortunate. I do think they are entitled to their own flair and personality. Thankfully the GPL website is less polarizing. The free software manifesto is great and it isn't packaged in a cloak of easily-dismissed looniness.
lewispb 16y ago
Funny you should mention childish: http://www.fsf.org/facebook http://www.fsf.org/facebook
vog 16y ago
I'm a happy fellow of the FSFE (http://fsfe.org/ http://fsfe.org/), the European pendant to the FSF. Sometimes we also discuss FSF campaigns, and usually agree that those would almost certainly be counter-productive here in Europe, especially things like the "Windows 7 sins". However, we always thought: Well, the USA have a different culture, so maybe this kind of campaign is needed there, and probably our style of campaign would not work there. (With "our style" I especially mean: not to exaggerate, and to prefer positive campaigns over negative campaigns.) It is interesting to see that our objections seem to be also valid within the USA, too. Maybe it's time for some people to join the FSF and to encourage them to learn from their European branch.
- treeface 16y ago
  Perhaps this a silly question, but why don't you guys expand your campaigns to the US? Why the geographic limitation?
  - vog 16y ago
    Almost all campaigns need a local part that is absolutely vital for its success. For instance, if you want to address a German party, your chances are much better if you do that as a German citizen. Want to write a letter to a French ministry? Better find some French guys to do that. The closer your are to the target, the more effective you are. Also in the USA, what do you think will impress people more? Criticism by your own citizens, or criticism by some people far, far away? There's an old saw which seems to apply perfectly here: Think global, act local.
  - cybercrow 16y ago
    As vog already explained, in many cases it is good to have people locally availabe. But FSFE does world wide campaigns too. One example would be the Document Freedom Day: documentfreedom.org
- jdp23 16y ago
  Interesting! Exaggeration often does sell well in the US, but I don't think it's required. And negativity is very much in fashion here (alas) but positivity can be even more successful. So my guess is that your campaigns would work well here too. Are Americans allowed to join the FSFE?
  - vog 16y ago
    Feel free to do so. As far as I know, the FSFE fellowship is open to anyone: https://fellowship.fsfe.org/login/join.php https://fellowship.fsfe.org/login/join.php However, engaging in FSFE campaigns might become a difficult undertaking if you can't attend any of the local meetings. (Of course there are mailing lists, but those are, well, just mailing lists.) So for a US citizen, I think it would be more effective to join the FSF instead, and to stay in contact with the FSFE from there. Those connections should already exist and probably just need to be pushed forward.
8877workgold 16y ago
Over 20 years ago, I attained the PROFESSIONAL ENGINEER's License and have volunteered in many VOLUNTEER ORGANIZATIONS. These include 'open source' and the A.S.M.E. Which DIRECTLY AFFECTS YOU. How? The Supreme Court Case - called Hydrolevel showed that the voluntary organization was 'corrupt' and 'friendly relations' and even 'cult of PERSONALITY' played a part. every time your car or plane does NOT crash and you are not forced to flee from the nuclear plant, think of an engineer. warning: controversial. 1.)Mother Theresa doubted GOD!, yet she is a saint! without her, supposedly the organization (church) will endure. 2.)Warren Buffet, richest man on earth FIRED his successor, with no clear successor in sight. Both have NOT repeat NOT been charged with Insider Trading/collusion. 3.)President George Washington knew some or (many) of his officers were suspect like General Benedict Arnold. Our pledge is to the trust of 'open source' and the 'rule of law' above 'rule of man.' The man is NOT the organization. It is my sad and unfortunate duty to request Dr. Stallman immediately designate at least three potential successors. His position will be like Guido, founder of Python, BENEVOLENT DICTATOR of the 'ADVISORY COMMITTEE.' This committee has NO formal powers. Such successors will give most of THE POWER to the ORGANIZATION, not the person. Warning: highly controversial. Stallman's committee will be forming alliances with WOMEN GROUPS (yes, he is single) - that's STRATEGIC alliances, not personal ones. Stallman's committee has NO RIGHT to SPEAK for all of us. Stallman's committee shall have PERMANENT FUNDING, including a small stipend for the 'leader.' After all he has not had a career working for MAJOR CORPORATIONS and saved HUGE amounts of money. The only other choice is to ask for ABOLISHMENT OF THE FSF! I am against this choice. Dear Alexeymk.com: Thank you for speaking up. Thank you for showing your IGNORANCE of history. Why do such GREAT DISASTERS like Hurricane Katrina and drowning of New Orleans, GREAT Dust Bowl (overfarming), BP Oil Volcano Spill, Japan Nuclear Meltdown (not presently, the U.S. has MANY MORE OLD Reactor/Fuel Waste Pools) and the presence of closed source Microsoft/Adobe software at the nuclear and critical infrastructure? History of 'Open Source' in World War II: The AXIS and GERMANS were winning! So, the ALLIES (that's including the U.S.A.) broke their codes/secrets. Now, most of the leading research is OUT OF THE U.S.A. and the U.S.A. leads in areas like Windows botnets. Go, America! The movement of Dr. Stallman, EMERITUS shall be accompanied with CASH PRIZE, honors, awards, recognition from WORLDWIDE universities and other volutary/non-profit organization. GOOGLE, now that it has lost the lawsuit on Linux, will perhaps (repeat perhaps) KICK IN a very small amount of FIVE MILLION DOLLARS. I shall be one of those to congratulate (I don't know him personally) Dr. Stallman as to his GREAT PRIZE WINNING, promotion and forthcoming WEDDING. This 'crazy conspiracy' movie is pure FANTASY with 'no programming side effects', LOL http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_Matrix http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_Matrix Morpheus to Neo: The very minds of the people we are trying to save. But until we do, these people are still a part of that system, and that makes them our enemy. ...And many of them are so inured, so hopelessly dependent on the system, that they will fight to protect it. Maybe you have seen the movie and have been 'infected' by the CRAZY meme? PS: Dear Alexeymk.com: When you see a flock of birds, using Particle Swarm Optimization, does the flock CONSPIRE to travel together? Can DISTINCT PATTERNS be caused by a MATRIX of stupid birds, not speaking to one another?
Joeri 16y ago
"Whatever happened to relying on your own strengths, rather than caricaturizing the competition?" This is exactly what my issue with the FSF is. Their stated goal is to deliver freedom to software users, but in my opinion they've totally failed at this in recent years by sticking to the GPL, which at this point does more harm than good. First of all, the GPL creates an unhealthy incentives structure. In GPL software, there's little incentive to add the features that end-users need. Corporations can afford to pay developers to add features to GPL software, but end users don't stand a chance. Most developers will build the features they personally find most useful, and because of this there are very few GPL-licensed pieces of software that have superior usability for non-technical users when compared to proprietary alternatives. If a feature isn't necessary for the developers personally, it faces an uphill battle to get into the software. But let's discount that discussion and assume that it's true that an open license produces software whose fitness for purpose matches that of closed software, for all users. Even in that case the GPL isn't helping. Suppose facebook released their entire codebase under the GPL tomorrow. Would it actually make their users any more free? Would the risk of privacy intrusion be any less? Would it be easier to set up a competing platform? That's three times no in my book. The GPL's freedom, that you can build any software you want with it, is its biggest deficiency. By not including a standard of ethics in the license itself, developers are free to add user-hostile features. As long as you could fork the project to remove those features, this wasn't an issue, but what use would it be to fork facebook's code? The FSF's only recourse at this point to achieve their long-term goal of user freedom is to go back to the drawing board and develop a new GPL-incompatible license that enforces a code of conduct on the part of the users _and_ developers of the software (not just a license but a contract). Basically they need to three-laws-ify software licenses. You can only exercise your freedom to adapt the software in so far that you don't hurt the freedom of others. I don't know if someone like stallman has the mental agility to make this strategy shift though, so I suspect the FSF will remain largely irrelevant to the future battle between free and closed.

fluidcruft 16y ago

I am also a lapsed member exactly for the same reasons. The camp makes it impossible to spread the word (for example by linking to their site) because I feel like the cheesiness of the presentation would reflect poorly on me. Frankly they look like a bunch of clowns. Which is unfortunate. I do think they are entitled to their own flair and personality. Thankfully the GPL website is less polarizing. The free software manifesto is great and it isn't packaged in a cloak of easily-dismissed looniness.

lewispb 16y ago

Funny you should mention childish: http://www.fsf.org/facebook http://www.fsf.org/facebook

vog 16y ago

I'm a happy fellow of the FSFE (http://fsfe.org/ http://fsfe.org/), the European pendant to the FSF. Sometimes we also discuss FSF campaigns, and usually agree that those would almost certainly be counter-productive here in Europe, especially things like the "Windows 7 sins". However, we always thought: Well, the USA have a different culture, so maybe this kind of campaign is needed there, and probably our style of campaign would not work there. (With "our style" I especially mean: not to exaggerate, and to prefer positive campaigns over negative campaigns.) It is interesting to see that our objections seem to be also valid within the USA, too. Maybe it's time for some people to join the FSF and to encourage them to learn from their European branch.

treeface 16y ago
Perhaps this a silly question, but why don't you guys expand your campaigns to the US? Why the geographic limitation?
- vog 16y ago
  Almost all campaigns need a local part that is absolutely vital for its success. For instance, if you want to address a German party, your chances are much better if you do that as a German citizen. Want to write a letter to a French ministry? Better find some French guys to do that. The closer your are to the target, the more effective you are. Also in the USA, what do you think will impress people more? Criticism by your own citizens, or criticism by some people far, far away? There's an old saw which seems to apply perfectly here: Think global, act local.
- cybercrow 16y ago
  As vog already explained, in many cases it is good to have people locally availabe. But FSFE does world wide campaigns too. One example would be the Document Freedom Day: documentfreedom.org
jdp23 16y ago
Interesting! Exaggeration often does sell well in the US, but I don't think it's required. And negativity is very much in fashion here (alas) but positivity can be even more successful. So my guess is that your campaigns would work well here too. Are Americans allowed to join the FSFE?
- vog 16y ago
  Feel free to do so. As far as I know, the FSFE fellowship is open to anyone: https://fellowship.fsfe.org/login/join.php https://fellowship.fsfe.org/login/join.php However, engaging in FSFE campaigns might become a difficult undertaking if you can't attend any of the local meetings. (Of course there are mailing lists, but those are, well, just mailing lists.) So for a US citizen, I think it would be more effective to join the FSF instead, and to stay in contact with the FSFE from there. Those connections should already exist and probably just need to be pushed forward.

8877workgold 16y ago

Over 20 years ago, I attained the PROFESSIONAL ENGINEER's License and have volunteered in many VOLUNTEER ORGANIZATIONS. These include 'open source' and the A.S.M.E. Which DIRECTLY AFFECTS YOU. How? The Supreme Court Case - called Hydrolevel showed that the voluntary organization was 'corrupt' and 'friendly relations' and even 'cult of PERSONALITY' played a part. every time your car or plane does NOT crash and you are not forced to flee from the nuclear plant, think of an engineer. warning: controversial. 1.)Mother Theresa doubted GOD!, yet she is a saint! without her, supposedly the organization (church) will endure. 2.)Warren Buffet, richest man on earth FIRED his successor, with no clear successor in sight. Both have NOT repeat NOT been charged with Insider Trading/collusion. 3.)President George Washington knew some or (many) of his officers were suspect like General Benedict Arnold. Our pledge is to the trust of 'open source' and the 'rule of law' above 'rule of man.' The man is NOT the organization. It is my sad and unfortunate duty to request Dr. Stallman immediately designate at least three potential successors. His position will be like Guido, founder of Python, BENEVOLENT DICTATOR of the 'ADVISORY COMMITTEE.' This committee has NO formal powers. Such successors will give most of THE POWER to the ORGANIZATION, not the person. Warning: highly controversial. Stallman's committee will be forming alliances with WOMEN GROUPS (yes, he is single) - that's STRATEGIC alliances, not personal ones. Stallman's committee has NO RIGHT to SPEAK for all of us. Stallman's committee shall have PERMANENT FUNDING, including a small stipend for the 'leader.' After all he has not had a career working for MAJOR CORPORATIONS and saved HUGE amounts of money. The only other choice is to ask for ABOLISHMENT OF THE FSF! I am against this choice. Dear Alexeymk.com: Thank you for speaking up. Thank you for showing your IGNORANCE of history. Why do such GREAT DISASTERS like Hurricane Katrina and drowning of New Orleans, GREAT Dust Bowl (overfarming), BP Oil Volcano Spill, Japan Nuclear Meltdown (not presently, the U.S. has MANY MORE OLD Reactor/Fuel Waste Pools) and the presence of closed source Microsoft/Adobe software at the nuclear and critical infrastructure? History of 'Open Source' in World War II: The AXIS and GERMANS were winning! So, the ALLIES (that's including the U.S.A.) broke their codes/secrets. Now, most of the leading research is OUT OF THE U.S.A. and the U.S.A. leads in areas like Windows botnets. Go, America! The movement of Dr. Stallman, EMERITUS shall be accompanied with CASH PRIZE, honors, awards, recognition from WORLDWIDE universities and other volutary/non-profit organization. GOOGLE, now that it has lost the lawsuit on Linux, will perhaps (repeat perhaps) KICK IN a very small amount of FIVE MILLION DOLLARS. I shall be one of those to congratulate (I don't know him personally) Dr. Stallman as to his GREAT PRIZE WINNING, promotion and forthcoming WEDDING. This 'crazy conspiracy' movie is pure FANTASY with 'no programming side effects', LOL http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_Matrix http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_Matrix Morpheus to Neo: The very minds of the people we are trying to save. But until we do, these people are still a part of that system, and that makes them our enemy. ...And many of them are so inured, so hopelessly dependent on the system, that they will fight to protect it. Maybe you have seen the movie and have been 'infected' by the CRAZY meme? PS: Dear Alexeymk.com: When you see a flock of birds, using Particle Swarm Optimization, does the flock CONSPIRE to travel together? Can DISTINCT PATTERNS be caused by a MATRIX of stupid birds, not speaking to one another?

Joeri 16y ago

"Whatever happened to relying on your own strengths, rather than caricaturizing the competition?" This is exactly what my issue with the FSF is. Their stated goal is to deliver freedom to software users, but in my opinion they've totally failed at this in recent years by sticking to the GPL, which at this point does more harm than good. First of all, the GPL creates an unhealthy incentives structure. In GPL software, there's little incentive to add the features that end-users need. Corporations can afford to pay developers to add features to GPL software, but end users don't stand a chance. Most developers will build the features they personally find most useful, and because of this there are very few GPL-licensed pieces of software that have superior usability for non-technical users when compared to proprietary alternatives. If a feature isn't necessary for the developers personally, it faces an uphill battle to get into the software. But let's discount that discussion and assume that it's true that an open license produces software whose fitness for purpose matches that of closed software, for all users. Even in that case the GPL isn't helping. Suppose facebook released their entire codebase under the GPL tomorrow. Would it actually make their users any more free? Would the risk of privacy intrusion be any less? Would it be easier to set up a competing platform? That's three times no in my book. The GPL's freedom, that you can build any software you want with it, is its biggest deficiency. By not including a standard of ethics in the license itself, developers are free to add user-hostile features. As long as you could fork the project to remove those features, this wasn't an issue, but what use would it be to fork facebook's code? The FSF's only recourse at this point to achieve their long-term goal of user freedom is to go back to the drawing board and develop a new GPL-incompatible license that enforces a code of conduct on the part of the users _and_ developers of the software (not just a license but a contract). Basically they need to three-laws-ify software licenses. You can only exercise your freedom to adapt the software in so far that you don't hurt the freedom of others. I don't know if someone like stallman has the mental agility to make this strategy shift though, so I suspect the FSF will remain largely irrelevant to the future battle between free and closed.