5 ms·

Interview with Richard Stallman, Founder of Free Software Foundation

59 points by elayabharath 15y ago

Teapot 15y ago
Now we need another clever thing. A GPL-ish set of Rules for for-profit business. Think about it, if for example Google had a 'We're Legally bound to never be evil' eithical rule. Does such a thing already exist perhaps? Or is there some wierdness that prevent it from happening?
- riffraff 15y ago
  defining "evil" would be a good start, though we seem to have failed to do it for the last ten thousand years :) More seriously: there are plenty of "ethical certification" thingies, and lots of finance entities who only work with "ethical" products. This things just don't seem to have trickled down from (arguably) major evils businesses (child exploitation, war profits, environmental disruption etc) to lesser ones (predatory pricing, patent trolling, exclusive dealing etc). Possibly a matter of time, but a long one IMVHO.
  - For_Iconoclasm 15y ago
    > defining "evil" would be a good start I think the best way to tackle this would be defining specific tenets the way that the FSF does with freedoms 0-4. They don't just say "You have to be free!" ... there is the legally-binding license itself, containing some light legalese, as well as the 4 freedoms specifying the idea to the common man, despite clearly. So, a license that comprises "We won't be evil. We promise!" wouldn't be good enough, but the some clear rules could be set. The non-evil most people would care about would probably be related to privacy. I agree that specifying all of the business practices which many people believe are evil would be a non-trivial task dependent on the nature of the company.
- trotsky 15y ago
  http://californiabusinesslaw.blogspot.com/2012/01/california-flexible-purpose-benefit.html http://californiabusinesslaw.blogspot.com/2012/01/california... California Flexible Purpose and Benefit Corporations Enacted in October 2011 and effective today, January 1, 2012, Corporations Code Section 2500 et seq. and Section 14600 et seq. create two new types of business entities, the flexible purpose corporation and the benefit corporation. Both allow the organization of corporations which are, while not non-profit, encompass both economic profit, as well as social welfare, objectives. In short, these are hybrids between traditional for-profit corporations, and traditional nonprofits. Or, if you prefer, socially conscious stock corporations. [...]
GNUAerospace 15y ago
GNU Aerospace our GPL rules for a for-profit business. http://forum.avsim.net/topic/367152-a-new-crowdfunding-based-business-model/ http://forum.avsim.net/topic/367152-a-new-crowdfunding-based...
- Kliment 15y ago
  That idea is pretty awesome, but why limit employee compensation in such an unflexible way?
  - GNUAerospace 15y ago
    The idea is to empower worldwide collaborative software development. People get too hung up on what other employees are being paid, which is used as the benchmark for the valuation of their contribution to the project. This tension blows projects apart, and explains why there are no prior GPL based business models (either the code is contributed gratis by individual contributors, or a non GPL based corporation releases code in support of their primary revenue stream in the sale of services, consulting, ustome development, sale of hardware). By focusing on reasonable expenses, this levels the global playing field, and disables the compensation friction. In the end, it is the consumer which must feel satisfied, that they are getting value for money spent. And it should therefore be left to the consumer to decide which persons to award higher compensation in a bonus.
    - Kliment 15y ago
      I don't think this will work. This is not how it works in any of the open source based companies I know, and I know a few.
ozzzy 15y ago
He says there are malicious features on mobile phones which enable the state to listen to you at any time. Is there any reality in this statement?
- mseebach 15y ago
  Even if there is, the vast majority of phone calls passes through government controlled telephone exchanges, so it wouldn't matter.
  - ozzzy 15y ago
    But he implies that you can be listened even when you are not talking on the phone.
    - crististm 15y ago
      Yes - and he is right. The phone is in permanent connection with the network anyway - it's some code away from opening the audio to listen to your room conversation.
      - pre 15y ago
        My name begins with the letter A, so I get quite a few accidental calls when someone leaves their phone unlocked in their pocket. Mostly you just hear an incomprehensible garbled rustling noise. Spying on someone by remotely turning on the phone in their pocket isn't usually going to work.
        crististm 15y ago
        Although you are correct about the pocket thing, the point is that you don't know when someone may be listening to you.
        ldh 15y ago
        Sometimes it's not. But if you're determined enough to spy on somebody via the audio on their phone, you will likely be persistent and eventually overhear something the person would prefer you didn't. If I were concerned about being spied on I wouldn't dismiss it so easily.
spwmoni 15y ago
"We apologize for the inconvenience caused with watching the video of the interview. Richard did not want to upload this interview in youtube as it is not free ('free' as in free speech/freedom, not price). He also wanted us to use a non proprietary video format like ogg theora and not the patented formats like mp4. When we chose to use dropbox to stream the video, dropbox suspended our accounts for generating excessive traffic. Kindly download the video from the icon below." How fitting that an interview with RMS should be preceded by this. I wonder if he realizes that he's already got a youtube presence? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I25UeVXrEHQ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I25UeVXrEHQ

59 points by elayabharath 15y ago

Now we need another clever thing. A GPL-ish set of Rules for for-profit business. Think about it, if for example Google had a 'We're Legally bound to never be evil' eithical rule. Does such a thing already exist perhaps? Or is there some wierdness that prevent it from happening?

riffraff 15y ago
defining "evil" would be a good start, though we seem to have failed to do it for the last ten thousand years :) More seriously: there are plenty of "ethical certification" thingies, and lots of finance entities who only work with "ethical" products. This things just don't seem to have trickled down from (arguably) major evils businesses (child exploitation, war profits, environmental disruption etc) to lesser ones (predatory pricing, patent trolling, exclusive dealing etc). Possibly a matter of time, but a long one IMVHO.
- For_Iconoclasm 15y ago
  > defining "evil" would be a good start I think the best way to tackle this would be defining specific tenets the way that the FSF does with freedoms 0-4. They don't just say "You have to be free!" ... there is the legally-binding license itself, containing some light legalese, as well as the 4 freedoms specifying the idea to the common man, despite clearly. So, a license that comprises "We won't be evil. We promise!" wouldn't be good enough, but the some clear rules could be set. The non-evil most people would care about would probably be related to privacy. I agree that specifying all of the business practices which many people believe are evil would be a non-trivial task dependent on the nature of the company.
trotsky 15y ago
http://californiabusinesslaw.blogspot.com/2012/01/california-flexible-purpose-benefit.html http://californiabusinesslaw.blogspot.com/2012/01/california... California Flexible Purpose and Benefit Corporations Enacted in October 2011 and effective today, January 1, 2012, Corporations Code Section 2500 et seq. and Section 14600 et seq. create two new types of business entities, the flexible purpose corporation and the benefit corporation. Both allow the organization of corporations which are, while not non-profit, encompass both economic profit, as well as social welfare, objectives. In short, these are hybrids between traditional for-profit corporations, and traditional nonprofits. Or, if you prefer, socially conscious stock corporations. [...]

GNUAerospace 15y ago

GNU Aerospace our GPL rules for a for-profit business. http://forum.avsim.net/topic/367152-a-new-crowdfunding-based-business-model/ http://forum.avsim.net/topic/367152-a-new-crowdfunding-based...

Kliment 15y ago
That idea is pretty awesome, but why limit employee compensation in such an unflexible way?
- GNUAerospace 15y ago
  The idea is to empower worldwide collaborative software development. People get too hung up on what other employees are being paid, which is used as the benchmark for the valuation of their contribution to the project. This tension blows projects apart, and explains why there are no prior GPL based business models (either the code is contributed gratis by individual contributors, or a non GPL based corporation releases code in support of their primary revenue stream in the sale of services, consulting, ustome development, sale of hardware). By focusing on reasonable expenses, this levels the global playing field, and disables the compensation friction. In the end, it is the consumer which must feel satisfied, that they are getting value for money spent. And it should therefore be left to the consumer to decide which persons to award higher compensation in a bonus.
  - Kliment 15y ago
    I don't think this will work. This is not how it works in any of the open source based companies I know, and I know a few.

ozzzy 15y ago

He says there are malicious features on mobile phones which enable the state to listen to you at any time. Is there any reality in this statement?

mseebach 15y ago
Even if there is, the vast majority of phone calls passes through government controlled telephone exchanges, so it wouldn't matter.
- ozzzy 15y ago
  But he implies that you can be listened even when you are not talking on the phone.
  - crististm 15y ago
    Yes - and he is right. The phone is in permanent connection with the network anyway - it's some code away from opening the audio to listen to your room conversation.
    - pre 15y ago
      My name begins with the letter A, so I get quite a few accidental calls when someone leaves their phone unlocked in their pocket. Mostly you just hear an incomprehensible garbled rustling noise. Spying on someone by remotely turning on the phone in their pocket isn't usually going to work.
      - crististm 15y ago
        Although you are correct about the pocket thing, the point is that you don't know when someone may be listening to you.
      - ldh 15y ago
        Sometimes it's not. But if you're determined enough to spy on somebody via the audio on their phone, you will likely be persistent and eventually overhear something the person would prefer you didn't. If I were concerned about being spied on I wouldn't dismiss it so easily.

spwmoni 15y ago

"We apologize for the inconvenience caused with watching the video of the interview. Richard did not want to upload this interview in youtube as it is not free ('free' as in free speech/freedom, not price). He also wanted us to use a non proprietary video format like ogg theora and not the patented formats like mp4. When we chose to use dropbox to stream the video, dropbox suspended our accounts for generating excessive traffic. Kindly download the video from the icon below." How fitting that an interview with RMS should be preceded by this. I wonder if he realizes that he's already got a youtube presence? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I25UeVXrEHQ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I25UeVXrEHQ