Transcript: Richard Stallman at Porto Alegre

[Posted May 10, 2006 by corbet]

Ciaran O'Riordan has posted a transcript of Richard Stallman's GPLv3 talk at Porto Alegre last month. "So IBM has patent licences for loads of things that they don't know. So the result is that they could have a patent license that makes them safe and they don't know it. So, we said that it's not fair to put them in a worse position than you would be in just because they have a blanket cross-licence and somebody else is explicitly negotiating a licence, so we said, alright, it will only apply if you knowingly rely on a patent licence. So if IBM has a patent licence as part of a blanket cross-licence and doesn't know, then this doesn't apply to them, but if they find out that this problem is happening and they have a patent licence, then they have to do something. IBM doesn't seem to like this very much."

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Transcript: Richard Stallman at Porto Alegre

Posted May 10, 2006 19:20 UTC (Wed) by kirkengaard (guest, #15022) [Link] (3 responses)

You know, maybe it's just me, but he sounds more reasonable all the time.

By that standard, the GPLv3 draft process is proving successful. Everybody freaks out, the explanations clarify, the text improves (or stays), and fewer people have legitimate freedom-reasons to freak out.

Again, could be me.

Transcript: Richard Stallman at Porto Alegre

Posted May 11, 2006 11:24 UTC (Thu) by drag (guest, #31333) [Link] (2 responses)

I think the problem that RMS has is that there are a lot of people that enjoy making a living producing propriatory software.

And not only that they appreciate and use open source software in their lives and in their own work.

So when RMS goes around saying that this or that is morally reprehensible then the knee jerk reaction is to say that he is a extremist or freak or whatever. If I make a living using and writing propriatory software and RMS comes along and tells me that software is immoral, then it's easy to call him names.

That and people don't like strong language. People like shades of gray, they find it comfortable. In programming terms he talks in a strongly and staticly typed language when everybody is used to and prefers a weak and dynamic typed language. He is always going around defining what he is talking about. It makes people uncomfortable.

Transcript: Richard Stallman at Porto Alegre

Posted May 11, 2006 12:55 UTC (Thu) by zotz (guest, #26117) [Link]

if x (is more or less equal to) 1 then
....do something
endif

Sounds good, how can we implement it?

~;-)

Transcript: Richard Stallman at Porto Alegre

Posted May 11, 2006 16:28 UTC (Thu) by mmarq (guest, #2332) [Link]

"" So when RMS goes around saying that this or that is morally reprehensible then the knee jerk reaction is to say that he is a extremist or freak or whatever ""

Actually i think RMS is being very moderate, concise with caution, and very strict on point.

From the arrogant ignorance, the anti-american anti-capitalist label on the GPL nature, the "your code insnt professinal and soon will be on a museum", the (SCO/MS) "you are copyright pirates", all the tremendous FUD campaigns, the infiltrations on FOSS side to the point of getting the most active anti-FOSS elements to panel on Desktop events, "products" they surely never use...

... to mention also payed vacations of prominent FOSS engineers with Microsoft, and most probabily and army of paid chills and astroturfers from whom an immense flow of hogwash and insult cames to every "internet" place FOSS is taking root...

I belive Linux/FOSS is not easly stopable, and being it obvious from a long time ago, i belive DRM is the last measure to make it stop; period.

Polemic and haply with some discussion so far, i belive DRM its not about digital media piracy, its not about security, its about an instrument of war against an idea.

Calling it "Tivoisation" is pretty much moderate in my opinion...

well,... maybe is just me, but everything can only get clear if an understanding of the strategic implications of "what" a "party" is facing against, is taked from the whole and not from a particular implementation.

Transcript: Richard Stallman at Porto Alegre

Posted May 10, 2006 20:15 UTC (Wed) by s_cargo (guest, #10473) [Link] (2 responses)

So, I wish he didn't start every sentence with "so". :-)

Transcript: Richard Stallman at Porto Alegre

Posted May 10, 2006 20:51 UTC (Wed) by halla (subscriber, #14185) [Link]

I so wish...

Transcript: Richard Stallman at Porto Alegre

Posted May 10, 2006 22:44 UTC (Wed) by stevenj (guest, #421) [Link]

The "loose" vs. "lose" spelling in the transcript bothers me more. Grr.

a welcome detente

Posted May 10, 2006 22:50 UTC (Wed) by stevenj (guest, #421) [Link] (3 responses)

I found these comments refreshing:

Q5, by Michael Tiemann, President of Open Source Initiative: About a question you were asked earlier about Eric Raymond, I want to point out a fact which is that while Eric Raymond was formerly the president of OSI, he no longer is.
Eric, does speak for himself, but less and less for the OSI. I would also like to clarify that as president of OSI, I have always supported the GPL as the model licence for developers. The licence is the only licence I have released work under aside from the LGPL for my own programming.
I recognise your position, which is to say that if I am not talking about freedom, first and foremost, then I am burying it, but I think of it myself differently...
Richard Stallman: Well, you might be doing something in between. There are things in between. When Eric Raymond was president of OSI, I could perceive his intention to bury talk of freedom very clearly. And there are others who talk about "open source" who clearly are trying to bury software freedom. That doesn't imply that everyone who uses the term... what is true about their use of the term is that it generally doesn't call attention to freedom very much.

Q5b, Michael Tiemann: Well, at this conference I do want to support that what you are doing is incredibly valuable and I respect that, and thanks.
Richard Stallman: Thank you.

(Emphasis added.)

a welcome detente

Posted May 10, 2006 22:58 UTC (Wed) by kirkengaard (guest, #15022) [Link]

Yes. Conciliation on both sides, mutual respect, recognizing that they're about the same things, albeit from different angles -- that's quite a refreshing change.

Perhaps. But this is a different time

Posted May 11, 2006 6:23 UTC (Thu) by AnswerGuy (guest, #1256) [Link] (1 responses)

Keep in mind that ESR's openly stated desire to promote "open source" in business friendly terms started in a time when Linux was far less firmly established in the hearts, minds, and data centers of the business community at large.

So, regardless of your personal opinions of his tactics or approach it's wise to consider that it might have been part of what got us here, now.

JimD

Perhaps. But this is a different time

Posted May 11, 2006 20:46 UTC (Thu) by drag (guest, #31333) [Link]

ESR did do a good service for 'FLOSS'. I mean I like what he had to say about a bunch of stuff and what he wrote inspired a lot of people. Also business support is very critical to the goals of Free software, even if it's Open Source software.

Basicly that if a person uses free software at home, but in their professional lives (which most people spend the most time on a computer nowadays) they are stuck with nothing but closed source software, and people running businesses only have the choice of closed source software then how could the goals of all these free software people ever succeed?

Unfortunately I think he probably smokes too much pot and so he has since stopped making much sense to most people. :-P