3 ms·

I have been saying this for a while. Fanatics are bad news, regardless of how noble the cause.

by dsl 14y ago

pekk 14y ago
I'm not sure that it makes sense to compare RMS to (say) suicide bombers. Not all "fanaticism" is equivalent.
- stephenr 14y ago
  The OP called him a fanatic not a suicide bomber. Just because some fanatics make themselves into bombs doesn't mean it's the definition.
- peteforde 14y ago
  I'm pretty sure that you can be a fanatic without being a suicide bomber, and that he didn't imply "RMS is like a suicide bomber". I am prepared to acknowledge that he might well be right in his positions on freedom, but he comes across as a lunatic in most of his talks. I have a problem with this; if what he's saying is important, could we not advance a more charismatic, tactful and effective ambassador?
  - Executor 14y ago
    Or get rid of your expectations on what an ideal leader is? Either way we already have a community of people sharing similar values of open source - I don't think we need a hierarchical leader/follower structure.
jesstaa 14y ago
Reasonable people make progress but we always need fanatics. Fanatics keep the reasonable people in check and on track. RMS is great at reminding the reasonable people of the importance of freedom in their software. Go to linuxconf and notice all the reasonable people slowly transitioning away from Linux and toward MacOS. Someone who will continually remind you that your current convenience has a future cost is useful.
Zigurd 14y ago
Stallman is no fanatic. He favored a different business model from licensing proprietary closed-source software, and in many area his views are not only correct but essential. Don't mistake consistency for fanaticism. In crypto software, for example, you can't be "a little proprietary" and be trusted. Sometimes there are no shades of grey.
- smsm42 14y ago
  But there's no "sometimes" for RMS. I have yet to see one piece of proprietary software - or one with license that is not approved by RMS - that he does not consider and call evil. If you say "certain kind of software needs to be open source or it can not be trusted" - it's a reasonable approach, if you can support it with good argument about which kind of software and why. If you say "any proprietary software is evil and any non-GPL one is a candidate to be evil" - that's way too far for me.
  - dalke 14y ago
    Once the hypothesis is assumed - that user access to their software source is a human right, equivalent to the inalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness - the logic itself is unassailable. Under that hypothesis, you are like someone saying that slavery is sometimes okay talking to an ardent abolitionist. You might have an economic argument for why someone deserves to be enslaved, but that doesn't sway the other person's sense of morality. I, like you, happen to not believe that hypothesis, but I think you can see why your utilitarian logic may not be persuasive.
    - smsm42 14y ago
      This is a weird assumption. I certainly can see why you would want access to the source code - it has many practical and theoretical benefits. However, the fact that you want something does not mean you have right to have it - and I see no reason to accept the premise that access to the source code of a program created by somebody else is comparable to my right to life. I can not see where this right comes from - do I have the right to see all the source code in the world? Or just for the code I would like to use? Or maybe just for the code that does something deemed useful by the government? Or maybe just the code that was already seen by certain amount of other people? What about source code that contains private data - do I have the right to see that too? What if the code contains access key to your bank account and you never intended for anybody but you to see it - do I have the right to see that? What if you gave that code to your family (i.e. "distributed" it) - do I get the right to see it now? I think the whole concept of declaring it to be "human right" is misguided, and, even more, harmful for actual human rights - as it gives one the impression that "human rights" is something like "if I want something really bad, I must have it". Human rights is a very different concept, and saying that demanding from Microsoft to reveal their trade secrets is like fighting slavery is, IMHO, a bit offensive to people that suffered and fought the actual slavery. We may say Microsoft keeping the source secret makes their product worse but it's not the same as slavery, not by a long shot.

I have been saying this for a while. Fanatics are bad news, regardless of how noble the cause.

by dsl 14y ago

I have been saying this for a while. Fanatics are bad news, regardless of how noble the cause.

pekk 14y ago

I'm not sure that it makes sense to compare RMS to (say) suicide bombers. Not all "fanaticism" is equivalent.

stephenr 14y ago
The OP called him a fanatic not a suicide bomber. Just because some fanatics make themselves into bombs doesn't mean it's the definition.
peteforde 14y ago
I'm pretty sure that you can be a fanatic without being a suicide bomber, and that he didn't imply "RMS is like a suicide bomber". I am prepared to acknowledge that he might well be right in his positions on freedom, but he comes across as a lunatic in most of his talks. I have a problem with this; if what he's saying is important, could we not advance a more charismatic, tactful and effective ambassador?
- Executor 14y ago
  Or get rid of your expectations on what an ideal leader is? Either way we already have a community of people sharing similar values of open source - I don't think we need a hierarchical leader/follower structure.

jesstaa 14y ago

Reasonable people make progress but we always need fanatics. Fanatics keep the reasonable people in check and on track. RMS is great at reminding the reasonable people of the importance of freedom in their software. Go to linuxconf and notice all the reasonable people slowly transitioning away from Linux and toward MacOS. Someone who will continually remind you that your current convenience has a future cost is useful.

Zigurd 14y ago

Stallman is no fanatic. He favored a different business model from licensing proprietary closed-source software, and in many area his views are not only correct but essential. Don't mistake consistency for fanaticism. In crypto software, for example, you can't be "a little proprietary" and be trusted. Sometimes there are no shades of grey.

smsm42 14y ago
But there's no "sometimes" for RMS. I have yet to see one piece of proprietary software - or one with license that is not approved by RMS - that he does not consider and call evil. If you say "certain kind of software needs to be open source or it can not be trusted" - it's a reasonable approach, if you can support it with good argument about which kind of software and why. If you say "any proprietary software is evil and any non-GPL one is a candidate to be evil" - that's way too far for me.
- dalke 14y ago
  Once the hypothesis is assumed - that user access to their software source is a human right, equivalent to the inalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness - the logic itself is unassailable. Under that hypothesis, you are like someone saying that slavery is sometimes okay talking to an ardent abolitionist. You might have an economic argument for why someone deserves to be enslaved, but that doesn't sway the other person's sense of morality. I, like you, happen to not believe that hypothesis, but I think you can see why your utilitarian logic may not be persuasive.
  - smsm42 14y ago
    This is a weird assumption. I certainly can see why you would want access to the source code - it has many practical and theoretical benefits. However, the fact that you want something does not mean you have right to have it - and I see no reason to accept the premise that access to the source code of a program created by somebody else is comparable to my right to life. I can not see where this right comes from - do I have the right to see all the source code in the world? Or just for the code I would like to use? Or maybe just for the code that does something deemed useful by the government? Or maybe just the code that was already seen by certain amount of other people? What about source code that contains private data - do I have the right to see that too? What if the code contains access key to your bank account and you never intended for anybody but you to see it - do I have the right to see that? What if you gave that code to your family (i.e. "distributed" it) - do I get the right to see it now? I think the whole concept of declaring it to be "human right" is misguided, and, even more, harmful for actual human rights - as it gives one the impression that "human rights" is something like "if I want something really bad, I must have it". Human rights is a very different concept, and saying that demanding from Microsoft to reveal their trade secrets is like fighting slavery is, IMHO, a bit offensive to people that suffered and fought the actual slavery. We may say Microsoft keeping the source secret makes their product worse but it's not the same as slavery, not by a long shot.