4 ms·

> LLVM as a serious competitor to GCC Sure, but then that should be used as the argument for removal and the argument should have been made 10 years ago and no

> LLVM as a serious competitor to GCC Sure, but then that should be used as the argument for removal and the argument should have been made 10 years ago and not now when it is very convenient.

geofft 6y ago
I firmly agree with that. Unfortunately it's hard to question a cult of personality. If you look in the linked threads, RMS himself acknowledged in 2015 that not accepting LLVM was a mistake - https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2015-02/msg00594.html https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2015-02/msg00... (and he says he didn't even know about the offer, but he doesn't address why he didn't know about the offer). In a functioning organization that cared about its mission, that ought to have triggered, at the least, a "blameless postmortem" about what failed, because allowing a non-free-software-friendly tech company to develop a serious free software competitor to GCC is just about the biggest strategic mistake the FSF (let alone GCC) could have made. (The HURD does work now, but it lost to Linux long ago. So that leaves GNU's flagship projects as just glibc - which is under the LGPL - and emacs, which is hardly core and which many hackers don't even use. The GNU System is at existential risk.) Why didn't it happen? Why did RMS just say, literally, "Oh well," and that was the end of it? Who - if anyone - is responsible for making sure that GNU is not extinguished because the world has changed since 1988 and a then-excellent plan did not survive contact with reality? Is it RMS, and why does it seem like asking that question is equivalent to questioning RMS as a person? There's a really good thread by Luis Villa on the general subject of the FSF's organizational failures here, and typing it to the "founder effect": https://twitter.com/luis_in_brief/status/1374038577059827714 https://twitter.com/luis_in_brief/status/1374038577059827714 Anyway, you ask about arguments from ten years ago. Ten years ago, as someone new to the free software community who attended in-person events and got drinks with people, I absolutely heard people deeply involved with the movement question particular facets of RMS's leadership (and not just his personal habits) in private. But they didn't say anything publicly, because they knew that criticizing RMS in public would make people see them as no better than a Microsoft shill or an "open source" sellout. If you dared to question whether RMS's leadership of the free software movement or even of any individual GNU project was effective, you'd be the person trying to compromise RMS's uncompromising views. So that leaves the current argument - that RMS's attitude is harming the project, as opposed to his specific technical or political decisions. Were it not for his attitude, those decisions could have been corrected by people better-equipped to analyze the specific situation than RMS. And were those decisions corrected, there would be no need to remove him. The need to remove him is the inability to safely criticize his decisions, i.e., his attitude and leadership style, which is what's at issue now.
- salawat 6y ago
  Everything you pointed out, if those were used as grounds for dismissal, would be acceptable, and to be frank I could even get on board with. That's not why everyone wants him gone right now, and whether the eventual outcome would be the same, reasons matter, and the precedents we as a civilization set through processes and outcomes we allow to be seen as a legitimate way to do things matters. https://sterling-archermedes.github.io/ https://sterling-archermedes.github.io/ None of the issues brought up in connection with the controversy that came to a head with Minsky were grounded in truth, at all. The FSF would lose massive credibility by abandoning a visionary founder who did nothing wrong. For heaven sake, if you've already have a slam dunk case, you don't need to descend to the level of making up excuses or slandering someone to get them out. Speak up to authority, but be truthful, honest, and right. Don't wait until the backstabbing is good, and turn them into pincushions. Doing that taints the movement, because no one wants to work with a group of people who get rid of someone like that. It's cowardly, and wrong, in every way imaginable.
  - geofft 6y ago
    I don't understand how that link you provide refutes any of the claims in the email. It seems to address other claims, made by other people. The email does not discuss Minsky or Stallman's comments about him at all. I think precedents matter, and being truthful, honest, and right is important. That's why I think that the GCC Steering Committee should evaluate this request on its own merits, and not by saying, well, some journalists wanted to cancel Stallman for other reasons, and they're wrong, so we will refuse any argument about Stallman. Each argument should stand or fall on its own.

> LLVM as a serious competitor to GCC Sure, but then that should be used as the argument for removal and the argument should have been made 10 years ago and not now when it is very convenient.

geofft 6y ago

I firmly agree with that. Unfortunately it's hard to question a cult of personality. If you look in the linked threads, RMS himself acknowledged in 2015 that not accepting LLVM was a mistake - https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2015-02/msg00594.html https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2015-02/msg00... (and he says he didn't even know about the offer, but he doesn't address why he didn't know about the offer). In a functioning organization that cared about its mission, that ought to have triggered, at the least, a "blameless postmortem" about what failed, because allowing a non-free-software-friendly tech company to develop a serious free software competitor to GCC is just about the biggest strategic mistake the FSF (let alone GCC) could have made. (The HURD does work now, but it lost to Linux long ago. So that leaves GNU's flagship projects as just glibc - which is under the LGPL - and emacs, which is hardly core and which many hackers don't even use. The GNU System is at existential risk.) Why didn't it happen? Why did RMS just say, literally, "Oh well," and that was the end of it? Who - if anyone - is responsible for making sure that GNU is not extinguished because the world has changed since 1988 and a then-excellent plan did not survive contact with reality? Is it RMS, and why does it seem like asking that question is equivalent to questioning RMS as a person? There's a really good thread by Luis Villa on the general subject of the FSF's organizational failures here, and typing it to the "founder effect": https://twitter.com/luis_in_brief/status/1374038577059827714 https://twitter.com/luis_in_brief/status/1374038577059827714 Anyway, you ask about arguments from ten years ago. Ten years ago, as someone new to the free software community who attended in-person events and got drinks with people, I absolutely heard people deeply involved with the movement question particular facets of RMS's leadership (and not just his personal habits) in private. But they didn't say anything publicly, because they knew that criticizing RMS in public would make people see them as no better than a Microsoft shill or an "open source" sellout. If you dared to question whether RMS's leadership of the free software movement or even of any individual GNU project was effective, you'd be the person trying to compromise RMS's uncompromising views. So that leaves the current argument - that RMS's attitude is harming the project, as opposed to his specific technical or political decisions. Were it not for his attitude, those decisions could have been corrected by people better-equipped to analyze the specific situation than RMS. And were those decisions corrected, there would be no need to remove him. The need to remove him is the inability to safely criticize his decisions, i.e., his attitude and leadership style, which is what's at issue now.

salawat 6y ago
Everything you pointed out, if those were used as grounds for dismissal, would be acceptable, and to be frank I could even get on board with. That's not why everyone wants him gone right now, and whether the eventual outcome would be the same, reasons matter, and the precedents we as a civilization set through processes and outcomes we allow to be seen as a legitimate way to do things matters. https://sterling-archermedes.github.io/ https://sterling-archermedes.github.io/ None of the issues brought up in connection with the controversy that came to a head with Minsky were grounded in truth, at all. The FSF would lose massive credibility by abandoning a visionary founder who did nothing wrong. For heaven sake, if you've already have a slam dunk case, you don't need to descend to the level of making up excuses or slandering someone to get them out. Speak up to authority, but be truthful, honest, and right. Don't wait until the backstabbing is good, and turn them into pincushions. Doing that taints the movement, because no one wants to work with a group of people who get rid of someone like that. It's cowardly, and wrong, in every way imaginable.
- geofft 6y ago
  I don't understand how that link you provide refutes any of the claims in the email. It seems to address other claims, made by other people. The email does not discuss Minsky or Stallman's comments about him at all. I think precedents matter, and being truthful, honest, and right is important. That's why I think that the GCC Steering Committee should evaluate this request on its own merits, and not by saying, well, some journalists wanted to cancel Stallman for other reasons, and they're wrong, so we will refuse any argument about Stallman. Each argument should stand or fall on its own.