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posted by scubacuda
on Saturday January 10, @12:10PM
from the gratis,-not-libre dept.
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In this editorial, Stallman asks what it means to "use free software"?Does that mean escaping from proprietary software, or merely installing free programs alongside it? Are we aiming to lead people to freedom, or just introduce them to our work? In other words, are we working for freedom, or have we replaced that goal with the shallow goal of popularity? John Carroll responds:[P]roprietary software is a limitation on your freedom only if you believe that to be the case. This is why Richard Stallman spent a lot of time calling proprietary software "ugly," "nasty," and "enslavement." In most cases, consumers wouldn’t view the lack of the blueprints for a particular product as a problem. If they have been instilled with a faith in the fundamental unfairness of proprietary software, however, they will demand "blueprints," as it were. Similarly, developers will be motivated to donate their time to open source development efforts. Richard Stallman is peddling a new faith, and it’s the fact that others share his faith that makes his world view a reality, not some fundamental unfairness in proprietary software.
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Stallman's Editorial
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The Fine Print:
The following comments are owned by whoever posted them.
We are not responsible for them in any way.
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by
Anonymous Coward
on Saturday January 10, @02:56PM (#1434)
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Limitations on your freedom are bad only if you misatkenly believe that to be the case. In most cases, people wouldn’t view a lack of freedom as a problem. And so, it is only when people have been instilled with a desire for freedom that they will, unfortunately, demand it. Richard Stallman is peddling a new faith, and it’s the fact that others share his faith that makes his view a danger to the world.
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[P]roprietary software is a limitation on your freedom only if you believe that to be the case.
I suppose Carroll thinks that we can be free in a locked prison cell so long as we don't want to leave. This is the same sort of dangerous nonsense that has been used to justify totalitarianism in the past. Proprietary software is a limitation on your freedom whether you want to do the things that it prevents you from doing or not. Even happy slaves are still slaves.
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by
Anonymous Coward
on Monday January 12, @09:15AM (#1437)
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I think the choice between "freedom" and "slavery" re proprietary software is the wrong analogy.
Instead, it is really a choice between whether consumers are treated under common law as participants in a free market, or whether we are in essence regressing to an electronic feudal law system where proprietary systems set, by contract, onerous and enforceable rules from which consumers have no recourse.
You have a choice of feudal lords under which to serve, but no choice or freedom of contract amongst them.
And if you go to the commons, like Linux, prepare for a number of "Enclosure Acts," whether by patent, copyright, or international trade agreement, that might slowly erode that commons away.
-Doogieh
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Humanity has the stars in its future, and that future is too important to be
lost under the burden of juvenile folly and ignorant superstition.
- Isaac Asimov
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