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If there is one area where the FSF has failed it's "user data". They focus only on the software side of things, which given their name and history is understand
by grumbel 4y ago
If there is one area where the FSF has failed it's "user data". They focus only on the software side of things, which given their name and history is understandable, but more and more irrelevant in the modern cloud driven world.
Having a web browser under an Free Software license is nice to have, but everything that matters is stored on the server side, which you have no access or control over.
The FSF, as far as I can tell, never did anything to address that. Even the AGPL, which didn't even originate from the FSF, still just addresses the source code side of things, not the data side of things. I am not even talking here about actual licenses here, but just a philosophical framework about how to deal with data that is on computers that aren't yours.
Somewhat surprising, politics got there first. The GDPR is actual law that tells you what you are and aren't allowed with user data. So we did get a bit of a happy end, but it feels like that would have been a fight in which the FSF could have played a more active role.
The FSF is still stuck in a model where you own and control your computer and data. But that's simply no longer the case, neither with cloud nor with smartphones.
- vkou 4y agoFSF's job is dealing with software, EFF's job is dealing with the consequences of that software.
- grumbel 4y agoEFF is concerned with actual law and legal defense in court, they don't write licensees. They don't have their equivalent of a GPL. Nobody really does as far as I know. If you wanted to make the next Youtube or Twitter, but be "Free as in Freedom", what rules would you follow? As far as I can tell, there is nobody dealing with whatever the "Free Software" analog would be in a cloud world where you don't own the computer. And that's kind of sad given how important and dominant that area has gotten over the last decade. GDPR is the best we have, but that only applies in a few selected countries, we don't even have a license version of that that you could slap on your cloud software.
- vkou 4y agoThere are free as in speech non-software licenses for copyrighted works like CC. As for you telling me what software I can run on my server, that sounds like the opposite of freedom. You can tell me what I can do with your data, and that's entirely in the EFF's wheelhouse of advocacy.