Re: Truth matters when writing software and selecting leaders
* Jacob Bachmeyer [2021-03-25 05:58]: > Akira Urushibata wrote: > > Richard Stallman recently announced at LibrePlanet that he would > > return to the FSF board. Soon after this announcement, many articles > > appeared online stating strong objection to his return. > > Does there appear to be some form of hidden coordination behind these > articles? Any larger media organizations works by using keywords. They keep files and have directions on how to write about the specific keyword. Direction may say when keyword ABC appears, you have to mention XYZ and GHJ keywords. They know how to sell their stuff. They repeat what makes flames. If I remember well blood is somewhere on first place, then comes sex, but I forgot the major 4 subjects that "sell". Directions are political more or less. Journalists in a specific organization are not free to say what they really want, they comply to directions of an organization. It is not a single employed journalist that has full freedom of speech, it is the organization. Directions can be political and could be orchestrated and coordinated by their source or origin, not necessarily by the organizational's director. The source or origin may be well planned so that future coordination appears random. When keyword like RMS appears anywhere in media, they just do their drill. > As I understand, RMS always thought that proprietary software companies > would make some kind of large legal attack on the GNU project, so he was > very particular about setting up the FSF and arranging for copyrights on > many GNU packages to be held by the FSF. Exactly, and those attacks are taking place from time to time, including GPL violations. It is just that respons is mild and friendly with purpose to create more free software. My opinion is that focus for FSF is mainly on their well established purposes, on what really matters and focus to defend or resolve various public opinions is of low priority.
Re: Truth matters when writing software and selecting leaders
* Akira Urushibata [2021-03-25 05:14]: > Richard Stallman recently announced at LibrePlanet that he would > return to the FSF board. Soon after this announcement, many articles > appeared online stating strong objection to his return. > > I have read several of them and I do not like what I see. Repeatedly > I encounter the false claim that RMS "defended" Jeffrey Epstein. > I also see voices which criticize RMS employing vague terms such as > "bad behavior" which those not properly informed would interpret as > being fond of Epstein and antagonistic toward women who fall victim to > sexual exploitation. Many websites earn from their visitors, sales of advertising, and any famous names are quickly picked up and replicated with intention to draw few more dollars. Some websites are politically oriented, and may support causes that are opposite to free software movement. And then we have some websites run by people who never look into any facts and support their own whatever view points on the world. > In response to the storm of criticism, the FSF Board has decided to > vote to determine whether RMS should return to the board. I observe > that both sides have initiated petition drives: > > https://github.com/KenjiBrown/rms-open-letter.github.io/blob/main/index.md Nice. I just don't get it why that has to be published on Github, people don't know any more how to open up their own websites? > In my opinion the FSF leaders are not doing things in the right order. > First they should make an official statement saying that there are > serious errors in recent news articles. One has to understand the nature of a friendly foundation that supports control of users over their data. Regardless of the money available, do they want to use money on correcting numerous statements online or forwarding their cause? There is freedom of expression, too many times FSF and GNU, RMS and related parties do not make much of a reaction on online reactions, but just keep forwarding their cause. Putting focus on what really matters, not on what were reactions is a virtue. > They should also consider legal action. The decision whether RMS > belongs on the FSF Board should wait until those who are spreading > misinformation are brought to justice. What you describe is possible, legal actions are possible, but as I said forwarding their cause to promote free software, helping distributions spread free software is what really matters. Each party has to put priorities in their activities. Another issue can be that FSF does not know nothing about those articles, and that they maybe don't read this mailing list, so if you think they should know about it, just write directly to FSF or RMS and notify them.
Re: Truth matters when writing software and selecting leaders
Akira Urushibata wrote: Richard Stallman recently announced at LibrePlanet that he would return to the FSF board. Soon after this announcement, many articles appeared online stating strong objection to his return. Does there appear to be some form of hidden coordination behind these articles? As I understand, RMS always thought that proprietary software companies would make some kind of large legal attack on the GNU project, so he was very particular about setting up the FSF and arranging for copyrights on many GNU packages to be held by the FSF. If we interpret the SCO mess as that attack, the strategy seems to have worked: SCO did not attack GNU, but instead attempted to attack the Linux kernel project. Ultimately, they failed but I now wonder if we may be seeing a different angle of an attack on the GNU project that RMS did not anticipate. I have read several of them and I do not like what I see. Repeatedly I encounter the false claim that RMS "defended" Jeffrey Epstein. I also see voices which criticize RMS employing vague terms such as "bad behavior" which those not properly informed would interpret as being fond of Epstein and antagonistic toward women who fall victim to sexual exploitation. Do we have properly documented refutations of these claims? That is not to say that I believe a word of them, but can we actually prove that each one is false? As in refuting "RMS said X at ABC" with "no, RMS actually said Y at ABC; Y != X", ideally with video of RMS saying Y at ABC? In response to the storm of criticism, the FSF Board has decided to vote to determine whether RMS should return to the board. I observe that both sides have initiated petition drives: https://github.com/KenjiBrown/rms-open-letter.github.io/blob/main/index.md That one is interesting; the only minor quibble I have is that we really do need to have some kind of plan for "after RMS" because that will happen some day... ... and the part about using GitHub pull requests to sign the letter, which is a bit of a problem from a software freedom standpoint. At least it also provides an email address to send signatures to, unlike the other letter it mentions at https://github.com/rms-support-letter/rms-support-letter.github.io/blob/master/index.md>. https://itwire.com/open-source/foss-developers-launch-petition-to-push-out-stallman,-fsf-board.html According to that article, the whole thing started from a clearly true statement about sexual assault being a broad category? Wait... were those also the remarks that were taken out of context from an internal private mailing list? In my opinion the FSF leaders are not doing things in the right order. First they should make an official statement saying that there are serious errors in recent news articles. They should also consider legal action. The decision whether RMS belongs on the FSF Board should wait until those who are spreading misinformation are brought to justice. Unfortunately, freedom of speech here in USA protects even blatant lies to some extent. (If I remember correctly, it was Fox News that took a case all the way to our Supreme Court arguing that our First Amendment protects what we now call fake news... and Fox News won the case and the precedent is set.) I say this because I know from experience that I can't fix bugs in software I work on in the absence of accurate information. Any programmer that responds to unfounded claims about misbehaving programs will end up wasting time, or worse, breaking a program that works fine. That is why we write testsuites. :D (And *that* was how I got involved with DejaGnu development and ended up on a bunch of GNU mailing lists...) Truth is important if you want to write good software. Dishonesty invites poor quality. I cannot stress this too much. "Quoted For Truth." -- Jacob
Re: Truth matters when writing software and selecting leaders
Akira Urushibata writes: > In my opinion the FSF leaders are not doing things in the right order. People are quite able to do more than one thing at a time. > until those who are spreading misinformation are brought to justice. Beware - a lot of what you think is "misinformation", others think is "my opinion". The question of what speech is "actionable" is not one we can easily define (unless one is a judge, at least in the USA). Do not fall into the trap of saying "You should be punished unless I agree with what you say." > Truth is important The problem with Truth is that there's your Truth, and someone else's Truth. Don't confuse "truth" with "facts". Truth is often colored by one's own beliefs and opinions.
Truth matters when writing software and selecting leaders
Richard Stallman recently announced at LibrePlanet that he would return to the FSF board. Soon after this announcement, many articles appeared online stating strong objection to his return. I have read several of them and I do not like what I see. Repeatedly I encounter the false claim that RMS "defended" Jeffrey Epstein. I also see voices which criticize RMS employing vague terms such as "bad behavior" which those not properly informed would interpret as being fond of Epstein and antagonistic toward women who fall victim to sexual exploitation. In response to the storm of criticism, the FSF Board has decided to vote to determine whether RMS should return to the board. I observe that both sides have initiated petition drives: https://github.com/KenjiBrown/rms-open-letter.github.io/blob/main/index.md https://itwire.com/open-source/foss-developers-launch-petition-to-push-out-stallman,-fsf-board.html In my opinion the FSF leaders are not doing things in the right order. First they should make an official statement saying that there are serious errors in recent news articles. They should also consider legal action. The decision whether RMS belongs on the FSF Board should wait until those who are spreading misinformation are brought to justice. I say this because I know from experience that I can't fix bugs in software I work on in the absence of accurate information. Any programmer that responds to unfounded claims about misbehaving programs will end up wasting time, or worse, breaking a program that works fine. One well-known problem with non-free software is that advertised features often do not live up to promises. Vendors can get away with this because the source code is kept hidden. When source code is available there is much less opportunity to make exaggerated claims. Truth is important if you want to write good software. Dishonesty invites poor quality. I cannot stress this too much. If you want good people to lead your organization you must make sure you have the right information before you cast your vote.
