5 ms·

The web is the least free of all platforms from the users point of view* so I find it bizarre that Berners-Lee would use the 'freedom for users' angle to try an

The web is the least free of all platforms from the users point of view* so I find it bizarre that Berners-Lee would use the 'freedom for users' angle to try and convince people to switch to web technologies. I fully support the idea that we should have root on devices we own, it's just a shame he had to dilute that point by pushing his own platform. * nearly always closed source, in the rare cases where you have the source you can't modify the code that actually runs when you use the service, usually no control or even ownership of your data, it runs on a machine you don't control which can make your data subject to mining by foreign governments or advertisers

deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
brudgers 14y ago
I understand your point. It struggles a bit due to the nature of Javascript and the user's direct access to source code. But "freedom" is a cluster concept [e.g. "game" - see Wittgenstein], and Berner's Lee is pointing to another aspect of what we mean by "free". Again JavaScript is a useful example - the user has the ability to turn it off in their browser if they deem that to be in their interest. Or rather, the user has traditionally had that ability. Smartphones and other appliances increasingly are curtailing or eliminating the user's freedom to do so. And a user might want to do so based on the concerns about data you raise. The FOSS idea of freedom is important. But the problem it solves is of another era when those accessing computers rather than terminals tended to be programmers. Stallman's concern arose at MIT AI lab, not among owners of Atari 2600's or Commodore Vic 20's. Berner's Lee is addressing a world where our game consoles and computers are collecting and transmitting detailed data about what we are doing, and we are not given permission to turn the collection off.
- jerf 14y ago
  "Stallman's concern arose at MIT AI lab, not among owners of Atari 2600's or Commodore Vic 20's." While I do not deny the unsavory side of Stallman exists, I am intrigued at how smoothly we've moved from his detractors mocking his "The Right to Read" [1], to his detractors ignoring it, to us standing on the precipice of living in it, even as the mockery continues unabated and even the HN zeitgeist seems to be that he's some sort of whacko who should be ignored... some sort of whacko who, I might add, appears to have been a great deal more correct about the future than the people labeling him such. [1]: http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
  - brudgers 14y ago
    I respect and admire Stallman personally. Likewise, I respect and admire his contribution to the world. The problem he set out to tackle was and is very real. I question whether it remains a primary issue in regard to the future impact of computing on the world. In no small part this is because Stallman's principles have achieved so much. The threats to GNU and Linux do not appear to be existential. I am a bit troubled by the tribalism of the larger FOSS community and the times at which it focuses on ideology over problem solving and its tendency toward a tribalism which casts so many as as unthinking malevolent "others." Stallman's principles are valuable analytical tools but they are not a hammer which also saws wood and turns screws. Some problems are better solved by trying wrenches first.
    - jerf 14y ago
      'a tribalism which casts so many as as unthinking malevolent "others."' I'm actually not worried about people cackling about how they can finally enslave the masses. Generally they do such a bad job when that is a primary goal that they end up failing. (Remember DivX, the time-limited DVDs, for instance?) I'm worried about people incrementally making a small choice here and a small choice there and before you know it, we've still pretty much ended up in the same place. Yes, FOSS as a community has done a lot of stuff but it worries me to see so many people declaring the job done and that we don't have to worry any more. Using the FOSS community as the freedom backstop doesn't work if the FOSS community no longer thinks it has to worry about freedom because of past successes.
      - brudgers 14y ago
        I don't think the job is done. I don't think it can be - FOSS is a tool which for some problems can remain in the box without lessening the benefits which come when a particular problem is solved. The problem of appliances locked down with spyware is an example. I believe it is a problem whose first order implications are more serious than those which FOSS (and even GNUism) are intended to address. The implications include threats to physical safety and political liberty. I understand that there are different opinions. I acknowledge that it might be the case that the best possible solution adheres to GNUist principles. I just think that an unwavering GNUist approach is likely to an impediment to achieving a good and practical solution I use "GNUist" because FOSS doesn't prevent lockdown - and "Stallmanist" sounds too much like "Stalinist". And like "pragmaticism" is too ugly to be co-opted for other purposes. My Symbian Phone would load open source code written in Java, but only after it was signed. I was granted the means of self-signing, but only by Nokia's grace. And that turtle goes all the way down. The OS could have been FOSS and the device still constructed so as to require code signing for the OS.
trotsky 14y ago
Tim has never really been a free software guy really (not against it, just not his issue) and here he was at linuxconf.au where pretty much the whole audience will be FOSS diehards and probably at his talk just to check out that guy who started it all. At the end of the day almost anyone will try to present some common ground there, even if its not super strong. I don't disagree with your assessment of the general concerns web apps, but from a practical perspective its a lot easier to provide FOSS web apps that temper some of these concerns (self hosting, etc.) while still operating within a well tested security framework. To end up in the same position with most current native mobile apps usually requires a device configured for developers with all the security relaxations, difficulties with redistribution and often program fees. Neither one is very awesome, but its not like many ios and android apps dont wall away your data while mining it on remote servers.
npsimons 14y ago
I don't think that really holds - how hard is it to actually run your own server these days? Hosting is dirt cheap. While I'll grant that the learning curve is a bit much, and the software is not quite there yet (and even then, I would say that the software exists, it just hasn't been integrated properly), but that doesn't even compare to the situation with phones where it is flat out illegal for you to do whatever you want with them, and you definitely don't have source code or control over your data. That is to say, all the exact same complaints you have against web services, and more, apply to smart phones.
- brudgers 14y ago
  "Hosting is dirt cheap." When the hardware is shared, Yes. On the metal, perhaps not so much. "the learning curve is a bit much, and the software is not quite there yet," answers the question about how hard it is to run a server.
  - npsimons 14y ago
    Thanks for quoting me out of context by cutting off the really relevant part; full quote: While I'll grant that the learning curve is a bit much, and the software is not quite there yet (and even then, I would say that the software exists, it just hasn't been integrated properly) Setting up your own web server isn't much harder (I'd actually argue it's easier) than rooting or jailbreaking a phone. On top of that, it's legal. And once you've rooted/jailbroken your phone, how many services will you continue to use that are hosted on someone else's hardware, using closed source software? The software to host yourself is available, it's just not well integrated yet. Also, the lockin to things like FB is a not insurmountable, but difficult problem.
    - brudgers 14y ago
      "yet" summarizes the parenthetical remark. I apologize if I have taken you out of context.
nathan_long 14y ago
>> the web is the least free of all platforms from the users point of view You're confusing "the web" with "networked software". When you use the web, you have no control of the server but full control of your client (if your browser is open source). When you use a networked app, you have no control of the server AND no control of the client. "Do I want control of the software I run on my machine?" is a separate question from "do I want that software communicating with other computers that I don't control?"
- anon1385 14y ago
  There is no confusion here: I want control of my data. Currently the number of web apps (by which I mean something with a html/css/js interface that runs in a web browser) that I can run locally with my own data that I store locally (or not, my choice) is tiny. The number of native apps that give me full control of my data is huge, because native platforms make that easy to do. Local file access APIs are relatively new in the browser. You are correct that there are plenty of tasks that are inherently about communicating with another computer, but that is not what we are talking about here. Writing a document needn't involve communicating with another computer. Editing an image needn't involve communicating with another computer. Maintaining my todo list, calculating how much time to bill a client; these needn't involve communication with another computer that I don't control.
  - brudgers 14y ago
    "I want control of my data." One might even argue the idea of individual control is somewhat at odds with the logical structure of FOSS, particularly in it's GNUist form - i.e. for a Lisper (and Stallman was/is one), there's no semantic distinction between code and data. Your position requires distinguishing bits from bits. Solutions which distinguish bits from bits are political, not computational.
    - philwelch 14y ago
      This entire question is political, not computational.
trhtrsh 14y ago
The web is more free than a locked smartphone -- at least the web as open competition with no gatekeeper.
- hexagonc 14y ago
  Tell that to the people in Iran.
api 14y ago
That's quite true. The consumer currently faces three choices: (1) Dangerous insecure apps-can-trash-my-machine desktop OSes with complicated or confusing install / uninstall semantics and "OS rot" due to installs/uninstalls actually modifying things outside the app. (2) Jailed devices, where you control very little outside the app world and someone else has root. (3) The cloud, where you don't control anything.

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

brudgers 14y ago

I understand your point. It struggles a bit due to the nature of Javascript and the user's direct access to source code. But "freedom" is a cluster concept [e.g. "game" - see Wittgenstein], and Berner's Lee is pointing to another aspect of what we mean by "free". Again JavaScript is a useful example - the user has the ability to turn it off in their browser if they deem that to be in their interest. Or rather, the user has traditionally had that ability. Smartphones and other appliances increasingly are curtailing or eliminating the user's freedom to do so. And a user might want to do so based on the concerns about data you raise. The FOSS idea of freedom is important. But the problem it solves is of another era when those accessing computers rather than terminals tended to be programmers. Stallman's concern arose at MIT AI lab, not among owners of Atari 2600's or Commodore Vic 20's. Berner's Lee is addressing a world where our game consoles and computers are collecting and transmitting detailed data about what we are doing, and we are not given permission to turn the collection off.

jerf 14y ago
"Stallman's concern arose at MIT AI lab, not among owners of Atari 2600's or Commodore Vic 20's." While I do not deny the unsavory side of Stallman exists, I am intrigued at how smoothly we've moved from his detractors mocking his "The Right to Read" [1], to his detractors ignoring it, to us standing on the precipice of living in it, even as the mockery continues unabated and even the HN zeitgeist seems to be that he's some sort of whacko who should be ignored... some sort of whacko who, I might add, appears to have been a great deal more correct about the future than the people labeling him such. [1]: http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
- brudgers 14y ago
  I respect and admire Stallman personally. Likewise, I respect and admire his contribution to the world. The problem he set out to tackle was and is very real. I question whether it remains a primary issue in regard to the future impact of computing on the world. In no small part this is because Stallman's principles have achieved so much. The threats to GNU and Linux do not appear to be existential. I am a bit troubled by the tribalism of the larger FOSS community and the times at which it focuses on ideology over problem solving and its tendency toward a tribalism which casts so many as as unthinking malevolent "others." Stallman's principles are valuable analytical tools but they are not a hammer which also saws wood and turns screws. Some problems are better solved by trying wrenches first.
  - jerf 14y ago
    'a tribalism which casts so many as as unthinking malevolent "others."' I'm actually not worried about people cackling about how they can finally enslave the masses. Generally they do such a bad job when that is a primary goal that they end up failing. (Remember DivX, the time-limited DVDs, for instance?) I'm worried about people incrementally making a small choice here and a small choice there and before you know it, we've still pretty much ended up in the same place. Yes, FOSS as a community has done a lot of stuff but it worries me to see so many people declaring the job done and that we don't have to worry any more. Using the FOSS community as the freedom backstop doesn't work if the FOSS community no longer thinks it has to worry about freedom because of past successes.
    - brudgers 14y ago
      I don't think the job is done. I don't think it can be - FOSS is a tool which for some problems can remain in the box without lessening the benefits which come when a particular problem is solved. The problem of appliances locked down with spyware is an example. I believe it is a problem whose first order implications are more serious than those which FOSS (and even GNUism) are intended to address. The implications include threats to physical safety and political liberty. I understand that there are different opinions. I acknowledge that it might be the case that the best possible solution adheres to GNUist principles. I just think that an unwavering GNUist approach is likely to an impediment to achieving a good and practical solution I use "GNUist" because FOSS doesn't prevent lockdown - and "Stallmanist" sounds too much like "Stalinist". And like "pragmaticism" is too ugly to be co-opted for other purposes. My Symbian Phone would load open source code written in Java, but only after it was signed. I was granted the means of self-signing, but only by Nokia's grace. And that turtle goes all the way down. The OS could have been FOSS and the device still constructed so as to require code signing for the OS.

trotsky 14y ago

Tim has never really been a free software guy really (not against it, just not his issue) and here he was at linuxconf.au where pretty much the whole audience will be FOSS diehards and probably at his talk just to check out that guy who started it all. At the end of the day almost anyone will try to present some common ground there, even if its not super strong. I don't disagree with your assessment of the general concerns web apps, but from a practical perspective its a lot easier to provide FOSS web apps that temper some of these concerns (self hosting, etc.) while still operating within a well tested security framework. To end up in the same position with most current native mobile apps usually requires a device configured for developers with all the security relaxations, difficulties with redistribution and often program fees. Neither one is very awesome, but its not like many ios and android apps dont wall away your data while mining it on remote servers.

npsimons 14y ago

I don't think that really holds - how hard is it to actually run your own server these days? Hosting is dirt cheap. While I'll grant that the learning curve is a bit much, and the software is not quite there yet (and even then, I would say that the software exists, it just hasn't been integrated properly), but that doesn't even compare to the situation with phones where it is flat out illegal for you to do whatever you want with them, and you definitely don't have source code or control over your data. That is to say, all the exact same complaints you have against web services, and more, apply to smart phones.

brudgers 14y ago
"Hosting is dirt cheap." When the hardware is shared, Yes. On the metal, perhaps not so much. "the learning curve is a bit much, and the software is not quite there yet," answers the question about how hard it is to run a server.
- npsimons 14y ago
  Thanks for quoting me out of context by cutting off the really relevant part; full quote: While I'll grant that the learning curve is a bit much, and the software is not quite there yet (and even then, I would say that the software exists, it just hasn't been integrated properly) Setting up your own web server isn't much harder (I'd actually argue it's easier) than rooting or jailbreaking a phone. On top of that, it's legal. And once you've rooted/jailbroken your phone, how many services will you continue to use that are hosted on someone else's hardware, using closed source software? The software to host yourself is available, it's just not well integrated yet. Also, the lockin to things like FB is a not insurmountable, but difficult problem.
  - brudgers 14y ago
    "yet" summarizes the parenthetical remark. I apologize if I have taken you out of context.

nathan_long 14y ago

>> the web is the least free of all platforms from the users point of view You're confusing "the web" with "networked software". When you use the web, you have no control of the server but full control of your client (if your browser is open source). When you use a networked app, you have no control of the server AND no control of the client. "Do I want control of the software I run on my machine?" is a separate question from "do I want that software communicating with other computers that I don't control?"

anon1385 14y ago
There is no confusion here: I want control of my data. Currently the number of web apps (by which I mean something with a html/css/js interface that runs in a web browser) that I can run locally with my own data that I store locally (or not, my choice) is tiny. The number of native apps that give me full control of my data is huge, because native platforms make that easy to do. Local file access APIs are relatively new in the browser. You are correct that there are plenty of tasks that are inherently about communicating with another computer, but that is not what we are talking about here. Writing a document needn't involve communicating with another computer. Editing an image needn't involve communicating with another computer. Maintaining my todo list, calculating how much time to bill a client; these needn't involve communication with another computer that I don't control.
- brudgers 14y ago
  "I want control of my data." One might even argue the idea of individual control is somewhat at odds with the logical structure of FOSS, particularly in it's GNUist form - i.e. for a Lisper (and Stallman was/is one), there's no semantic distinction between code and data. Your position requires distinguishing bits from bits. Solutions which distinguish bits from bits are political, not computational.
  - philwelch 14y ago
    This entire question is political, not computational.

trhtrsh 14y ago

The web is more free than a locked smartphone -- at least the web as open competition with no gatekeeper.

hexagonc 14y ago
Tell that to the people in Iran.

api 14y ago

That's quite true. The consumer currently faces three choices: (1) Dangerous insecure apps-can-trash-my-machine desktop OSes with complicated or confusing install / uninstall semantics and "OS rot" due to installs/uninstalls actually modifying things outside the app. (2) Jailed devices, where you control very little outside the app world and someone else has root. (3) The cloud, where you don't control anything.