6 ms·

"My guess is that the direct good effect will be bigger than the direct harm." Did rms just admit that proprietary software can theoretically have benefits? W

by dsrguru 14y ago

"My guess is that the direct good effect will be bigger than the direct harm." Did rms just admit that proprietary software can theoretically have benefits? What's this world coming to lol

Mizza 14y ago
RMS is pretty reasonable! He gets a bad rap, I think. It's like people watch his every move like, "Oh man, what's that craaaazzyyy old man going to do next?" Of course, he's actually right 4 times out of 5. I thought the point he made in this article was a balanced one.
- dsrguru 14y ago
  I agree that he was pretty reasonable in the case of this article, but he is a bit crazy by most people's standards. A friend of mine has worked for the FSF and told me that Stallman won't even use the World Wide Web! Anything he needs looked up he has coworkers do for him because they're foolish enough to trust that nonfree web sites aren't malicious.
  - koeselitz 14y ago
    It's not strictly true that he only has other people do it for him: http://article.gmane.org/gmane.os.openbsd.misc/134979 http://article.gmane.org/gmane.os.openbsd.misc/134979 As far as the internet, though, as I told a friend long ago - Richard Stallman doesn't need the internet. The internet needs Richard Stallman.
    - dsrguru 14y ago
      He posted that to a newsgroup, not the Web. I'm sure he wasn't using the Web to do that, especially given the content of that post!
jiggy2011 14y ago
That surprised me as well, I'm sure I've heard him say before that nonfree software is 100% unethical even on a free platform. Perhaps he realises that having steam + valve games would be a huge net win for desktop linux use. Even if you had mainly nonfree software , in theory desktop linux would still be quite a free system in the sense that there would be a level playing field amongst software devs.
- dsrguru 14y ago
  Actually, that does seem to fit with the rational behind the LGPL. If you're going to write free software that replicates a proprietary program or library's functionality without adding anything new, rms believes you should make it available to the widest possible audience with the hope that more contributions will trickle back. However, I'm also sure I've heard him say that nonfree software is unequivocally unethical even on a free platform. Hell, didn't he say recently something about not being able to justify using proprietary medical equipment to save his life unless he immediately would embark on a quest to produce a free equivalent? Maybe he makes a distinction between trying to free future adopters from total proprietariness (i.e. in the case of games and LGPL'd libraries) versus trying to make people who have already taken the red pill 100% free.
- nknight 14y ago
  Even the most zealous are rarely devoid of all nuance. Note he actually says "Nonfree games (like other nonfree programs) are unethical". That one believes an act is unethical is different from believing it will have a net negative effect vs not performing the act, and there's often a lot of nuance to be had when something is ethically questionable. Consider the periodically-raised question of taking control of a botnet in order to shut it down. Opinions on this range from "totally ethical" to "totally unethical", even as much of the "totally unethical" crowd would probably admit that shutting down the botnet is a net good vs not doing so. Sometimes, "X is unethical" doesn't mean "no good will come of X", it means "we need a third option". RMS believes non-free software is unethical, almost surely believes the existence of software in general is a net good, and that Free Software is the "third option".
  - 14y ago
pippy 14y ago
Programmers have to eat, and free software needs a supporting paradigm to be sustainable. With Firefox it's the search engine, with Apache it's support, only smaller projects can be made from pure passion. Any large company porting software to a platform will be good, as more people (and thus support) will come to Linux. >Nonfree games (like other nonfree programs) are unethical because they deny freedom to their users I get the feeling he lives in a fantasy world. Unethical is hitting a baby in the face, not allowing people to see how you wrote a computer programme.
- jiggy2011 14y ago
  Just because you are not doing something directly and obviously "evil" like hitting a baby does not mean something cannot be unethical. As more of our world is software and we rely on it to do things like store our personal information and trust it to respect our privacy etc, how is the availability and ability to understand and inspect that software not a potentially very ethical issue?
  - pippy 14y ago
    Yes you're right. I was trying to frame ethics in its popular definition. I personally love and support open source projects, as they are better from a moral standpoint. Proprietary software isn't a really bad thing, comparing it to say murder or thievery. If you had to choose between doing the wrong thing (which isn't that bad) and not eating, most people would do the wrong thing.
- dsrguru 14y ago
  Well, I'm certainly grateful that his views are this strong, or else there wouldn't have been a free software movement for the open source movement to arise out of. If you think about it, the world as we know it would be completely different without Stallman. However, I'm not quite sure I agree with his belief that the existence of proprietary software licenses that tell you not to share with your neighbor create a double bind in which you either comply with the license and contribute to the destruction of social cohesion or you help your neighbor but incur psychosocial harm in the form of guilt that shouldn't be. :)

by dsrguru 14y ago

"My guess is that the direct good effect will be bigger than the direct harm." Did rms just admit that proprietary software can theoretically have benefits? What's this world coming to lol

Mizza 14y ago

RMS is pretty reasonable! He gets a bad rap, I think. It's like people watch his every move like, "Oh man, what's that craaaazzyyy old man going to do next?" Of course, he's actually right 4 times out of 5. I thought the point he made in this article was a balanced one.

dsrguru 14y ago
I agree that he was pretty reasonable in the case of this article, but he is a bit crazy by most people's standards. A friend of mine has worked for the FSF and told me that Stallman won't even use the World Wide Web! Anything he needs looked up he has coworkers do for him because they're foolish enough to trust that nonfree web sites aren't malicious.
- koeselitz 14y ago
  It's not strictly true that he only has other people do it for him: http://article.gmane.org/gmane.os.openbsd.misc/134979 http://article.gmane.org/gmane.os.openbsd.misc/134979 As far as the internet, though, as I told a friend long ago - Richard Stallman doesn't need the internet. The internet needs Richard Stallman.
  - dsrguru 14y ago
    He posted that to a newsgroup, not the Web. I'm sure he wasn't using the Web to do that, especially given the content of that post!

jiggy2011 14y ago

That surprised me as well, I'm sure I've heard him say before that nonfree software is 100% unethical even on a free platform. Perhaps he realises that having steam + valve games would be a huge net win for desktop linux use. Even if you had mainly nonfree software , in theory desktop linux would still be quite a free system in the sense that there would be a level playing field amongst software devs.

dsrguru 14y ago
Actually, that does seem to fit with the rational behind the LGPL. If you're going to write free software that replicates a proprietary program or library's functionality without adding anything new, rms believes you should make it available to the widest possible audience with the hope that more contributions will trickle back. However, I'm also sure I've heard him say that nonfree software is unequivocally unethical even on a free platform. Hell, didn't he say recently something about not being able to justify using proprietary medical equipment to save his life unless he immediately would embark on a quest to produce a free equivalent? Maybe he makes a distinction between trying to free future adopters from total proprietariness (i.e. in the case of games and LGPL'd libraries) versus trying to make people who have already taken the red pill 100% free.
nknight 14y ago
Even the most zealous are rarely devoid of all nuance. Note he actually says "Nonfree games (like other nonfree programs) are unethical". That one believes an act is unethical is different from believing it will have a net negative effect vs not performing the act, and there's often a lot of nuance to be had when something is ethically questionable. Consider the periodically-raised question of taking control of a botnet in order to shut it down. Opinions on this range from "totally ethical" to "totally unethical", even as much of the "totally unethical" crowd would probably admit that shutting down the botnet is a net good vs not doing so. Sometimes, "X is unethical" doesn't mean "no good will come of X", it means "we need a third option". RMS believes non-free software is unethical, almost surely believes the existence of software in general is a net good, and that Free Software is the "third option".
- 14y ago

pippy 14y ago

Programmers have to eat, and free software needs a supporting paradigm to be sustainable. With Firefox it's the search engine, with Apache it's support, only smaller projects can be made from pure passion. Any large company porting software to a platform will be good, as more people (and thus support) will come to Linux. >Nonfree games (like other nonfree programs) are unethical because they deny freedom to their users I get the feeling he lives in a fantasy world. Unethical is hitting a baby in the face, not allowing people to see how you wrote a computer programme.

jiggy2011 14y ago
Just because you are not doing something directly and obviously "evil" like hitting a baby does not mean something cannot be unethical. As more of our world is software and we rely on it to do things like store our personal information and trust it to respect our privacy etc, how is the availability and ability to understand and inspect that software not a potentially very ethical issue?
- pippy 14y ago
  Yes you're right. I was trying to frame ethics in its popular definition. I personally love and support open source projects, as they are better from a moral standpoint. Proprietary software isn't a really bad thing, comparing it to say murder or thievery. If you had to choose between doing the wrong thing (which isn't that bad) and not eating, most people would do the wrong thing.
dsrguru 14y ago
Well, I'm certainly grateful that his views are this strong, or else there wouldn't have been a free software movement for the open source movement to arise out of. If you think about it, the world as we know it would be completely different without Stallman. However, I'm not quite sure I agree with his belief that the existence of proprietary software licenses that tell you not to share with your neighbor create a double bind in which you either comply with the license and contribute to the destruction of social cohesion or you help your neighbor but incur psychosocial harm in the form of guilt that shouldn't be. :)