Re: Truth Social as an example of the limits of free software
Is it possible to remove posts on Truth Social? I am a X account owner, and not in a target group of Truth Social (U.S. Citizens who vote Trump). Is self-correction based on new facts a value or a bad idea in Mastodon? Is it possible to bring a criticism of the platform Truth Social based on the fact that self-correction is not possible after publishing? Best, Ole Aamot On Thu, Sep 7, 2023 at 4:23 PM Abe Indoria <[1]indo...@aindoria.com> wrote: I'm going to ignore the points about Truth Social for a bit since I do not wish to get into a political spat (and have no love for different parties in general). I understand the limits of free software. One problem I identify is that some people use free software not because they value freedom, but simply because it is economical to do so. Why is this a 'problem?' People who exploit the "cheapness" do nothing to promote free software and its philosophy; they do not say: "This product is possible thanks to the free software packages X, Y, Z and many more. We are grateful to all the develpers who worked on them while making this available to the public on gracious terms." I'm sorry, but this is quite a weird take to me. I hope you're able to see it from my POV: Not everyone can afford expensive software. People aren't 'exploiting' free software (or -f-OSS in general) just because they use something that's free. Also I'm not sure if we should confuse free software with free *and* open source software. Anecdotally, when I buy 'expensive' software (Such as Apple or in a recent case for me, Scrivener, or what have you - sometimes you don't have that much of a choice), does that mean I automatically go "This great expensive product is possible thanks to x, y or z?" I don't. I don't even know who wrote that software. When I see and like a free software (or in most cases, a FOSS), I usually check out the dev's profile to see if they've written anything else, but that's pretty much it - aside from donations for software that I use on an everyday basis and so on. But as is, even if I (or other developers of such things) weren't getting donations, someone using your own software instead of the x alternative is quite gratifying. *If* I like a piece of software greatly, I would obviously praise whoever wrote it and recommend it to other like minded people, but that goes for both free and proprietary software. But that doesn't mean I am going to do that for every free software, nor does it mean I do it regularly - everyday people often have other priorities. ___ libreplanet-discuss mailing list [2]libreplanet-discuss@libreplanet.org [3]https://lists.libreplanet.org/mailman/listinfo/libreplanet-discus s References 1. mailto:indo...@aindoria.com 2. mailto:libreplanet-discuss@libreplanet.org 3. https://lists.libreplanet.org/mailman/listinfo/libreplanet-discuss ___ libreplanet-discuss mailing list libreplanet-discuss@libreplanet.org https://lists.libreplanet.org/mailman/listinfo/libreplanet-discuss
Re: Truth Social as an example of the limits of free software
I'm going to ignore the points about Truth Social for a bit since I do not wish to get into a political spat (and have no love for different parties in general). I understand the limits of free software. One problem I identify is that some people use free software not because they value freedom, but simply because it is economical to do so. Why is this a 'problem?' People who exploit the "cheapness" do nothing to promote free software and its philosophy; they do not say: "This product is possible thanks to the free software packages X, Y, Z and many more. We are grateful to all the develpers who worked on them while making this available to the public on gracious terms." I'm sorry, but this is quite a weird take to me. I hope you're able to see it from my POV: Not everyone can afford expensive software. People aren't 'exploiting' free software (or -f-OSS in general) just because they use something that's free. Also I'm not sure if we should confuse free software with free *and* open source software. Anecdotally, when I buy 'expensive' software (Such as Apple or in a recent case for me, Scrivener, or what have you - sometimes you don't have that much of a choice), does that mean I automatically go "This great expensive product is possible thanks to x, y or z?" I don't. I don't even know who wrote that software. When I see and like a free software (or in most cases, a FOSS), I usually check out the dev's profile to see if they've written anything else, but that's pretty much it - aside from donations for software that I use on an everyday basis and so on. But as is, even if I (or other developers of such things) weren't getting donations, someone using your own software instead of the x alternative is quite gratifying. *If* I like a piece of software greatly, I would obviously praise whoever wrote it and recommend it to other like minded people, but that goes for both free and proprietary software. But that doesn't mean I am going to do that for every free software, nor does it mean I do it regularly - everyday people often have other priorities. ___ libreplanet-discuss mailing list libreplanet-discuss@libreplanet.org https://lists.libreplanet.org/mailman/listinfo/libreplanet-discuss
Re: Truth Social as an example of the limits of free software
Truth Social is a success story for free software. People who could have been subjected to some proprietary software due to their interest in one certain celebrity are now using a (largely/mostly) free software service, thanks to Mastodon and the AGPL. They can benefit from years of development focused on community rather than advertisers. They can also benefit from external analysis of what we know about their variant of the code, which might be little but it's more than nothing. You might discount those benefits as minimal, but they're not trivial and they're multiplied by the millions of people receiving them right now. We don't know what's going to happen in the future, but thanks to free software (and open standards) the people have multiple possibilities. If some conflict arises, subcommunities might splinter and move to their own instances with lesser disruption. If the company fails and decides to discontinue the service, another service provider might take it over and make it better; users could even take matters in their hands with limited capital, thanks to lower costs. You might consider this a distant possibility, or something you don't care about because you'd prefer the community to just vanish, but it has a non-zero probability. That reduces the centralised power of the current owners, even if just by a little, and that's certainly a good thing. Federico ___ libreplanet-discuss mailing list libreplanet-discuss@libreplanet.org https://lists.libreplanet.org/mailman/listinfo/libreplanet-discuss
Re: Truth Social as an example of the limits of free software
Those are not limits of free software. The only way this is even connected to software freedom is that Trump had the freedom to use the software for this purpose. This, however, would have likely been true for most proprietary alternatives he could possibly have used. Proprietary software licenses don't give the user full freedom, but they are still permissive enough for the program itself to be useful, or at least appear to be useful. You could argue that the fact that Trump did what he did is still a consequence of software freedom, and in some way you'd be right, but that isn't a "limit", nor is it accidental. That is the exact intention of software freedom. Free software authors yield control in advance, to the user, so that the user can do things the author disagrees with, without having to ask permission or approval. That isn't a side effect of software freedom, it's the exact core. While I'm personally no fun of Truth Social (although, I have to admit, I'm also not a user, so I can't comment much on it) and I don't have a good opinion of Trump, I still disagree with some of your criticism of Truth Social. You talk a lot about "freedom", but, really, multiple different freedoms exist and one person doesn't have to hold the same stance about them all. For example, one could support freedom of speech, as I do, but also taxation (as I also do) so that the state can operate. Taxation, in a way, decreases certain kinds of economic freedom. You might think I am wrong, but I am not *inconsistent*, having two different opinions on two different things. The fact that somebody supports software freedom says very little about their political stances in general. Free software has supporters that disagree politically on other issues. They probably do tend to be somewhat liberal (or at least not authoritarian) and in favor of freedom of speech as well, but there are plenty of topics, even freedom-related, to disagree about. > The name "Truth Social" suggests that they care about truth and society. No, it only suggests they care about truth, not society. "Social" clearly means "social media", in context and doesn't refer to any other aspect of society. > We know that incorrect information is bad for freedom. We also "know" that censorship is much worse than misinformation. If Truth Social actually did allow all expression equally without discrimination, I would support that. > However, Truth Social members value the freedom to pursue their personal pleasure and comfort above all else. > […] > A critical problem Truth Social faces is that the extreme opinions make many people uncomfortable. You criticize Truth Social because its users seek their own comfort. Then, right after that, you criticize it because it makes many people uncomfortable. Who cares if people feel uncomfortable? Why are the potential users that are made to feel uncomfortable (which apparently is bad) more important than the actual users that are made to feel comfortable (which apparently is also bad)? Maybe the rest is a bigger audience. It probably is. It doesn't mean that pandering to the majority is necessarily the best choice, however. > Advertisers feel the same way. If, besides software freedom, there is one absolutely gigantic issue with social media is that they pander to advertisers to the extent that they do. The idea that, as a society (and, in this, I am including online services, including of course social media) we should pander to the self-interests and feelings of the greedy capitalists that have the economical power to have an effect is rather bizarre to me. Fuck advertisers, fuck whatever they want, fuck whatever makes them feel comfortable. Looking at what advertisers want, of all people, is one of the worst possible ways we could filter what we write and what we read. > As a result the platform is financialy insecure. It is estimated that it loses 1.7 million dollar each month. It started out with 37 million dollars in late 2021 - early 2022. Without additional funds, it won't be able to continue for long. The issue here is ever relying on advertisers and ever being for profit. A truly content-neutral platform, if well studied technically, could be rather efficient and would likely be able to operate as a non-profit (with freedom of speech as a mission). Bending to what the greedy capitalists with enough money to spend in advertising want is a disgrace. > In the above I have shown that free software can be used in a product which spreads falsehood, encourages ignorance and irrationality and endorses greed, selfishness and lack of gratitude. I hope I don't sound rude saying this, but this is very unsurprising. I don't know of anyone who ever remotely suspected that free software
Re: Truth Social as an example of the limits of free software
Good post, however the decision to use free software is taken by humans,and the decision to respect or acknowledge the license is also a human decision. So is the problem with people rather than the software. Another problem seems to be the media, obsessed with headlines and generating income from in some cases poor, lazy and sloppy journalism, it sells ads so who cares, but people want 'instant' updates this is very difficult with fast developing stories. It takes time to investigate, fact check and write. Truth.social only made headlines because Trump was behind it. Mastodon made the headlines briefly as there was a big exodus from Twitter, but the media don't want to give these smaller players equal air time and given how Mastodon is being reported as hard to use, perhaps that is a 'good' thing. Where does freedom to write and publish balance between earning enough money to live, one of the reasons facebook can't carry news is that they don't want to pay media outlets for that news as per recent laws, the downside of what this law has done, is that while it fixes payment in the case of the fires in Canada where people NEED the news, they didn't get the updates needed. I am not sure happened in Maui but it seems the warning was sent out via social media as the sirens failed, but we need to wait for the investigation to find out what actually happened there. All we can do is keep going and promote free software in the best light we can, listen to any criticism, and acknowledge this and address the issues / concerns raised. Paul On 04/09/2023 23:23, Akira Urushibata wrote: Last month I posted a message here on the problems of non-free software in voting machines. I was pointed out that free software does not completely solve the problems; even with free software there are numerous opportunities for bad actors to upset the process. I understand the limits of free software. One problem I identify is that some people use free software not because they value freedom, but simply because it is economical to do so. The great charm of free software is absence of charge. Often there are additional merits: quality is high, problems are few, documentation is reliable and there exists a community of engineers who understand the code. People who exploit the "cheapness" do nothing to promote free software and its philosophy; they do not say: "This product is possible thanks to the free software packages X, Y, Z and many more. We are grateful to all the develpers who worked on them while making this available to the public on gracious terms." The Truth Social social media service is an example of a product developed, owned and used by people who care little of the liberty which free software makes possible. Truth Social uses Mastadon as its back-end and Soapbox as its front-end. They released their derived work for public testing without making available the source code in violation of the license. (Mastodon and Soapbox are AGPL.) They eventually released the source code in .zip format. When Truth Social was launched, it proclaimed to be a "big tent" platform allowing for "free expression" without "discriminating on the basis of political ideology". The name "Truth Social" suggests that they care about truth and society. In reality Truth Social is a chamber where extreme opinions far from the truth circulate. It is for people who like to say and hear such things. We know that incorrect information is bad for freedom. However, Truth Social members value the freedom to pursue their personal pleasure and comfort above all else. For them what makes them feel good is "truth" and such good feeling is the foundation of "social" interaction. A critical problem Truth Social faces is that the extreme opinions make many people uncomfortable. They will never consider signing up to participate in the dialogue. Advertisers feel the same way. As a result the platform is financialy insecure. It is estimated that it loses 1.7 million dollar each month. It started out with 37 million dollars in late 2021 - early 2022. Without additional funds, it won't be able to continue for long. Elon Musk's X (foremerly Twitter) faces a similar fate. A little inspection reveals that under Musk's rule it has followed a course similar to that of Truth Social. I have taken a look into Truth Social here but my main objective is to bring attention to the limits of free software. It appears to me that freedom is good, but it can be combined with bad things. Literacy greatly enhances one's freedom but one can argue that efforts to eradicate illitearcy violate the illiterate man's freedom to remain so. In the above I have shown that free software can be used in a product which spreads falsehood, encourages ignorance and irrationality and endorses greed, selfishness and lack of gratitude. This makes me feel that we have much more to do than just call for freedom in software. In classical
Truth Social as an example of the limits of free software
Last month I posted a message here on the problems of non-free software in voting machines. I was pointed out that free software does not completely solve the problems; even with free software there are numerous opportunities for bad actors to upset the process. I understand the limits of free software. One problem I identify is that some people use free software not because they value freedom, but simply because it is economical to do so. The great charm of free software is absence of charge. Often there are additional merits: quality is high, problems are few, documentation is reliable and there exists a community of engineers who understand the code. People who exploit the "cheapness" do nothing to promote free software and its philosophy; they do not say: "This product is possible thanks to the free software packages X, Y, Z and many more. We are grateful to all the develpers who worked on them while making this available to the public on gracious terms." The Truth Social social media service is an example of a product developed, owned and used by people who care little of the liberty which free software makes possible. Truth Social uses Mastadon as its back-end and Soapbox as its front-end. They released their derived work for public testing without making available the source code in violation of the license. (Mastodon and Soapbox are AGPL.) They eventually released the source code in .zip format. When Truth Social was launched, it proclaimed to be a "big tent" platform allowing for "free expression" without "discriminating on the basis of political ideology". The name "Truth Social" suggests that they care about truth and society. In reality Truth Social is a chamber where extreme opinions far from the truth circulate. It is for people who like to say and hear such things. We know that incorrect information is bad for freedom. However, Truth Social members value the freedom to pursue their personal pleasure and comfort above all else. For them what makes them feel good is "truth" and such good feeling is the foundation of "social" interaction. A critical problem Truth Social faces is that the extreme opinions make many people uncomfortable. They will never consider signing up to participate in the dialogue. Advertisers feel the same way. As a result the platform is financialy insecure. It is estimated that it loses 1.7 million dollar each month. It started out with 37 million dollars in late 2021 - early 2022. Without additional funds, it won't be able to continue for long. Elon Musk's X (foremerly Twitter) faces a similar fate. A little inspection reveals that under Musk's rule it has followed a course similar to that of Truth Social. I have taken a look into Truth Social here but my main objective is to bring attention to the limits of free software. It appears to me that freedom is good, but it can be combined with bad things. Literacy greatly enhances one's freedom but one can argue that efforts to eradicate illitearcy violate the illiterate man's freedom to remain so. In the above I have shown that free software can be used in a product which spreads falsehood, encourages ignorance and irrationality and endorses greed, selfishness and lack of gratitude. This makes me feel that we have much more to do than just call for freedom in software. In classical Chinese philosophy, Lao Zi stresses freedom. Confucius preaches sound education, consideration toward others, gratitude and rituals. Lao Zi advocates small communities of people living simple lives. Confucius and his followers refined a body of thought which would later support imperial dynasties. Unfortunately it became excessively sophisticated. Combined with a writing system which employs more than a thousand characters this led to a stark class distinction between the literate and the illiterate. --- Truth Social - Wikipedia (See "Software") https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truth_Social Trump's Social Media Platform and the Affero General Public License (of Mastodon) - Conservancy Blog - Software Freedom Conservancy https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2021/oct/21/trump-group-agplv3/ The Trump Truth Social network removes the most freedom-friendly features of the Fediverse https://pocketnow.com/trump-truth-social-network-removes-most-freedom-friendly-features-fediverse/ On Trump's Truth Social: Ads for Miracle Cures, Scams and Fake Merchandise The New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/27/technology/trump-truth-social-ads.html Trump Media's proposed merger partner Digital World faces crucial vote The Washington Post https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/09/02/truth-social-trump-media-digital-world/ How to Lose Money: Buy Digital World Acquisition Corp. Morningstar https://www.morningstar.com/stocks/how-lose-money-buy-digital-world-acquisition-corp ___ libreplanet-discuss mailing list libreplanet-discuss@libreplanet.org
