3 ms·

I think that FSF in a very romantic sense, is fighting a lost battle. The vast majority of people don't care much about their freedom and easily trade it away f

I think that FSF in a very romantic sense, is fighting a lost battle. The vast majority of people don't care much about their freedom and easily trade it away for convenience, that's just that.

nvy 3y ago
>The vast majority of people don't care much about their freedom and easily trade it away for convenience, that's just that. Perhaps if the FSF wasn't so abysmal at advocacy, more people would care about software freedom. It's very easy to throw one's hands up and say "nobody cares!" but I think the FSF, and many Free Software enthusiasts, are not ready for the required level of introspection to really examine their approach and why it's not working.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- tgma 3y ago
  FSF is not abysmal at advocacy. There was a fork in the road; the easy path was to jump in with the Open Source movement and abandon the core principles. Had RMS done that, he would have been the darling of Corporate Open Source by now, invited to Davos and speaking at TED every year, and not been cancelled by some rando college student who had never heard of or known him really. But then it would not have mattered one bit. There are hundreds of foundations doing that stuff, providing a lot of good things, but strictly speaking undermining Free Software. It actually is painfully obvious now that what Stallman/FSF did was correct for their mission, in the sense that they knew what they actually wanted, and that Open Source definitely was not it. Thus they alienated their closest would-be allies. FSF narrative was hijacked as Corporate Open Source is a much easier sell comparatively, especially when the primary business models of "tech" companies has become less about selling software over time. When people suggest FSF is bad at advocacy, what they really imagine usually is they could have been nicer and said some of the things that everyone else in Corporate Open Source world say. If they had done it, by now they would have had no originality, added a big banner in support of Ukraine to the top of their home page, had a big DEI statement, and five random flags like every other corporate non-profit. https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.en.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point....
  - nvy 3y ago
    > When people suggest FSF is bad at advocacy, what they really imagine usually is they could have been nicer and said some of the things that everyone else in Corporate Open Source world say. This is a straw man entirely of your own construction.
    - tgma 3y ago
      Please elaborate in a couple examples how you think one could have done better if suggesting it is straw man. It feels like an effective logical conclusion of what the critiques usually say.
      - dale_glass 3y ago
        One way would be not having Stallman do the advocacy. His ideals is just fine. His social manners not so much, and that highly limits the effectiveness.
        tgma 3y ago
        As someone else posted in the thread earlier, FSF has professional staff that work on PR etc. Please note that it is a small non-profit and they cannot afford a big marketing department, partially because their ideals hinder growth to a huge degree (e.g. even Linus is on record suggesting you should donate to EFF not FSF.) It is not surprising that big corporate donors will also avoid donating when they have pages undermining Netflix, Spotify, Google, FB, even Canonical/Ubuntu and pretty much everyone with deep pockets.
        dale_glass 3y ago
        There's no need for any corporate conspiracy. RMS does a good job of looking bad on his own, and the FSF barely shows up on Linux sites. I don't think the likes of Netflix even know the FSF exists at this point, let alone bother allocating any effort towards fighting back.
hutzlibu 3y ago
They are also a bunch of geeks terrible at communicating with normal people. "Knights for hot ladies", "eating skin parts of own feet on video", "..." And this is about the front face, so what do you expect?

I think that FSF in a very romantic sense, is fighting a lost battle. The vast majority of people don't care much about their freedom and easily trade it away for convenience, that's just that.

nvy 3y ago

>The vast majority of people don't care much about their freedom and easily trade it away for convenience, that's just that. Perhaps if the FSF wasn't so abysmal at advocacy, more people would care about software freedom. It's very easy to throw one's hands up and say "nobody cares!" but I think the FSF, and many Free Software enthusiasts, are not ready for the required level of introspection to really examine their approach and why it's not working.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
tgma 3y ago
FSF is not abysmal at advocacy. There was a fork in the road; the easy path was to jump in with the Open Source movement and abandon the core principles. Had RMS done that, he would have been the darling of Corporate Open Source by now, invited to Davos and speaking at TED every year, and not been cancelled by some rando college student who had never heard of or known him really. But then it would not have mattered one bit. There are hundreds of foundations doing that stuff, providing a lot of good things, but strictly speaking undermining Free Software. It actually is painfully obvious now that what Stallman/FSF did was correct for their mission, in the sense that they knew what they actually wanted, and that Open Source definitely was not it. Thus they alienated their closest would-be allies. FSF narrative was hijacked as Corporate Open Source is a much easier sell comparatively, especially when the primary business models of "tech" companies has become less about selling software over time. When people suggest FSF is bad at advocacy, what they really imagine usually is they could have been nicer and said some of the things that everyone else in Corporate Open Source world say. If they had done it, by now they would have had no originality, added a big banner in support of Ukraine to the top of their home page, had a big DEI statement, and five random flags like every other corporate non-profit. https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.en.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point....
- nvy 3y ago
  > When people suggest FSF is bad at advocacy, what they really imagine usually is they could have been nicer and said some of the things that everyone else in Corporate Open Source world say. This is a straw man entirely of your own construction.
  - tgma 3y ago
    Please elaborate in a couple examples how you think one could have done better if suggesting it is straw man. It feels like an effective logical conclusion of what the critiques usually say.
    - dale_glass 3y ago
      One way would be not having Stallman do the advocacy. His ideals is just fine. His social manners not so much, and that highly limits the effectiveness.
      - tgma 3y ago
        As someone else posted in the thread earlier, FSF has professional staff that work on PR etc. Please note that it is a small non-profit and they cannot afford a big marketing department, partially because their ideals hinder growth to a huge degree (e.g. even Linus is on record suggesting you should donate to EFF not FSF.) It is not surprising that big corporate donors will also avoid donating when they have pages undermining Netflix, Spotify, Google, FB, even Canonical/Ubuntu and pretty much everyone with deep pockets.
        dale_glass 3y ago
        There's no need for any corporate conspiracy. RMS does a good job of looking bad on his own, and the FSF barely shows up on Linux sites. I don't think the likes of Netflix even know the FSF exists at this point, let alone bother allocating any effort towards fighting back.

hutzlibu 3y ago

They are also a bunch of geeks terrible at communicating with normal people. "Knights for hot ladies", "eating skin parts of own feet on video", "..." And this is about the front face, so what do you expect?