5 ms·

I am gen-z and I am part of the foss community (I think) and one of the issues about new generations of FOSS tech leaders is that even if one tries to do so. S

I am gen-z and I am part of the foss community (I think) and one of the issues about new generations of FOSS tech leaders is that even if one tries to do so. Something about Richard stallman really is out of this world where he made people care about Open source in the first place. I genuinely don't know how people can relicate it. I had even tried and gone through such phase once but the comments weren't really helpful back then on hackernews https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45558430 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45558430 (Ask HN: Why are most people not interested in FOSS/OSS and can we change that)

teekert 10mo ago
As much as RMS meant for the world, he’s also a pretty petty person. He’s about freedom but mostly about user freedom, not creators freedom. I also went through such a phase but using words like “evil” is just too black and white. I don’t think he is a nice person to be around.l, judging from some podcasts and videos.
- trashb 10mo ago
  If there is one thing Stallman knows well is the way he uses words and I can assure you if he calls something "evil" that is exactly the word he meant to use. > user freedom, not creators freedom In his view users are the creators and creators are the users. The only freedom he asks you to give up is the freedom to limit the freedom of others.
  - teekert 10mo ago
    RMS asks you to give something up: Your right to share a thing you made, under your conditions (which may be conditions even the receiving party agree on), nobody is forced in this situation, and then he calls that evil. I think that is wrong. I love FOSS, don't get me wrong. But people should be able to say: I made this, if you want to use it, it's under these condition or I won't share it. Again, imho the GPL is a blessing for humanity, and bless the people that choose it freely.
    - teekert 10mo ago
      Oh and bless the people that won't use anything but GPL software. Don't bless the people that think you are evil for not applying the GPL to your creation.
    - sham1 10mo ago
      > RMS asks you to give something up: Your right to share a thing you made, under your conditions (which may be conditions even the receiving party agree on), nobody is forced in this situation, and then he calls that evil. I think that is wrong. This is not true, though. As a copyright holder, you are allowed to license your work however you wish, even if it's under for example GPL-3.0-or-later or whatever. You can license your code outside of the terms of the GPL to a particular user or group of users for example for payment. Really, it's only when the user agrees to abide by the license that you'd have to give access to source code when asked, for example. > I love FOSS, don't get me wrong. But people should be able to say: I made this, if you want to use it, it's under these condition or I won't share it. And they can. Whether that wins one any friends or not is another matter.
- oblio 10mo ago
  > user freedom, not creators freedom Creators are not creators, they're also users. There's a very solid chance that a better world for everyone would be achieved if freedoms for all users would be bullet proof. Every user should be able to modify and repair all their hardware and software without creator involvement.
  - teekert 10mo ago
    And we just don't think about all the software that is then not being created because people feel it's immediately everyone's property and so won't even bother? Sure, we can copy software, so it's not like they are taking your house. But "they" may be taking your livelihood. Ok, objectively perhaps the world would be better, but we can't know. And opinions don't mean anything. What matters is individuals and being fair to them, whatever society grows from that is just what we have. That said, if we ever go multi-planet, and there is a planet with no copyright and everything is GPL, I'd check it out and imagine I'd feel quite at home there.
    - oblio 10mo ago
      > Sure, we can copy software, so it's not like they are taking your house. But "they" may be taking your livelihood. With GenAI that's starting to happen with anyway.
      - teekert 10mo ago
        Which is why we perhaps need a GPLv4? With some provisions that force open sourcing model architecture + weights when using such code as training material?
        oblio 10mo ago
        And also provisions somehow handling hyper scalers. Hyper scalers are big enough that they can build everything from scratch and stop ripping off FOSS individual and small company contributors.

teekert 10mo ago

As much as RMS meant for the world, he’s also a pretty petty person. He’s about freedom but mostly about user freedom, not creators freedom. I also went through such a phase but using words like “evil” is just too black and white. I don’t think he is a nice person to be around.l, judging from some podcasts and videos.

trashb 10mo ago
If there is one thing Stallman knows well is the way he uses words and I can assure you if he calls something "evil" that is exactly the word he meant to use. > user freedom, not creators freedom In his view users are the creators and creators are the users. The only freedom he asks you to give up is the freedom to limit the freedom of others.
- teekert 10mo ago
  RMS asks you to give something up: Your right to share a thing you made, under your conditions (which may be conditions even the receiving party agree on), nobody is forced in this situation, and then he calls that evil. I think that is wrong. I love FOSS, don't get me wrong. But people should be able to say: I made this, if you want to use it, it's under these condition or I won't share it. Again, imho the GPL is a blessing for humanity, and bless the people that choose it freely.
  - teekert 10mo ago
    Oh and bless the people that won't use anything but GPL software. Don't bless the people that think you are evil for not applying the GPL to your creation.
  - sham1 10mo ago
    > RMS asks you to give something up: Your right to share a thing you made, under your conditions (which may be conditions even the receiving party agree on), nobody is forced in this situation, and then he calls that evil. I think that is wrong. This is not true, though. As a copyright holder, you are allowed to license your work however you wish, even if it's under for example GPL-3.0-or-later or whatever. You can license your code outside of the terms of the GPL to a particular user or group of users for example for payment. Really, it's only when the user agrees to abide by the license that you'd have to give access to source code when asked, for example. > I love FOSS, don't get me wrong. But people should be able to say: I made this, if you want to use it, it's under these condition or I won't share it. And they can. Whether that wins one any friends or not is another matter.
oblio 10mo ago
> user freedom, not creators freedom Creators are not creators, they're also users. There's a very solid chance that a better world for everyone would be achieved if freedoms for all users would be bullet proof. Every user should be able to modify and repair all their hardware and software without creator involvement.
- teekert 10mo ago
  And we just don't think about all the software that is then not being created because people feel it's immediately everyone's property and so won't even bother? Sure, we can copy software, so it's not like they are taking your house. But "they" may be taking your livelihood. Ok, objectively perhaps the world would be better, but we can't know. And opinions don't mean anything. What matters is individuals and being fair to them, whatever society grows from that is just what we have. That said, if we ever go multi-planet, and there is a planet with no copyright and everything is GPL, I'd check it out and imagine I'd feel quite at home there.
  - oblio 10mo ago
    > Sure, we can copy software, so it's not like they are taking your house. But "they" may be taking your livelihood. With GenAI that's starting to happen with anyway.
    - teekert 10mo ago
      Which is why we perhaps need a GPLv4? With some provisions that force open sourcing model architecture + weights when using such code as training material?
      - oblio 10mo ago
        And also provisions somehow handling hyper scalers. Hyper scalers are big enough that they can build everything from scratch and stop ripping off FOSS individual and small company contributors.