RMS Protest Song On Gitmo

An anonymous reader tipped us to a protest song RMS has written and recorded (while visiting Cuba) and is hosting on stallman.org. It's a sort of parody, although it's too serious really to be called that, in Spanish of the song "Guantanamera," in which a Gitmo prisoner talks about his experiences and mourns his fate. RMS wrote the lyrics in 2006 after learning what "Guantanamera" actually means. The lyrics are moving, and the recording, in Ogg, is competent — RMS sings well and he's got some amateur musicians from Cuba backing him up. Here are the lyrics and an English translation.

RMS = Richard Stallman

[Umbrae]

I hate when people use acronyms that they assume everyone knows. Even though I knew it, I would not be surprised if many did not.

Re:Antics like this...

[Valar]

I wonder what you are talking about. Contrary to popular belief, it is totally legal to visit Cuba (up to X times per year, [IIRC X is one]). There are also controls on how much currency you can bring with you, but to a certain extent, it is perfectly legal to vacation in Cuba (this is, in fact, common for citizens of Cuban descent).

Re:Antics like this...

[eli pabst]

No it's not. Tourist travel to Cuba is prohibited and business travel is restricted. Even then you must be approved by the State Dept. You'd be wise not to get your Passport stamped by Cuban customs. Quote from the US state Dept:

Tourist travel is not possible under U.S. law. Business-related travel is restricted to persons engaging in or arranging for permitted export sales, such as the sale of medicines or medical equipment, or for food or agricultural goods to non-governmental entities.

http://www.state.gov/p/wha/rls/fs/2001/fsjulydec/4 835.htm [state.gov]

Re:Gee I'd like to listen

[QCompson]

With the proper http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=itunes+ogg&bt nG=Google+Search/ [google.com] plugin, it seems you can easily enable itunes to play ogg.

Re:Gee I'd like to listen

[Phroon]

From the Xiph page:

Xiph QuickTime Components (XiphQT) [xiph.org] is, in short, the solution for Mac and Windows users who want to use Xiph formats in any QuickTime-based application, e.g. playing Ogg Vorbis in iTunes or producing Ogg Theora with iMovie.

It lets you do exactly what you want to do, play Ogg in iTunes.

Re:Antics like this...

[spiritraveller]

I wonder how he managed to visit Cuba without violating the federal law that prohibits US citizens from trading with our enemies.

There are several exceptions [state.gov] to the restrictions on travel to Cuba.

I would imagine that RMS went there for a conference on free software. This would fall under an exception which doesn't require special permission from the State Department.

Re:How about a song for Castro's Victims?

[Anonymous Coward]

How about a song for the thousands of victims tortured and killed under Castro's regime?

As soon as you record one, I'll be here to complain that you didn't also make a song about the millions of victims of the United Stated/North Korea/China/Great Britain/France/whatever. Let's face it: Nearly every country has blood on its hands and all countries, including industrialized ones, still violate various human rights. For example, human rights include a right to work, "just and favourable" conditions at work, a right to an "standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services" etc. and not only what's usually touted, free press, free speech and so on which are of course, also human rights.

Re:How about a song for Castro's Victims?

[Anonymous Coward]

> ...imprisioned for involvement in terrorism,

How do you know? Because a politician lied and told you so?

These people have not been tried in a court of law. In the eyes of the law they are innocent. You statement is no different to a Klansman stringing up a Black person from a tree: a lynch mob.

Only one of these people (Hicks) has been found guilty, and that was a forced confession by a kangaroo court. He was put in the situation that if he pleaded guilty he would be released, or if he pleaded innocent he would be locked up for 20 years. He did what any rational person would and pleaded guilty.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Gee I'd like to listen

[AaronW]

Ogg is a completely open format. Ogg is the encapsulation format used for vorbis audio. Ogg is fully documented in RFC 3533 [xiph.org]. Similarly, the Vorbis specification is also readily available [xiph.org]. It is unencombered by patents and the source code to the reference libraries is available under a BSD-like license and is free to use in both commercial and open-source software. RFC's are about as official as you can get for an open standard.

Re:i actually...

[that this is not und]

O'Reilly published a pretty good book by Stallman: 'Free as in Freedom' if you're interested in learning more about the man.

Re:Gee I'd like to listen

[abigor]

"The Ogg Vorbis specification is in the public domain. It is completely free for commercial or noncommercial use. That means that commercial developers may independently write Ogg Vorbis software which is compatible with the specification for no charge and without restrictions of any kind."
.
.
.
"Again, there are no licensing fees for any use of the Ogg Vorbis specification. As a commercial developer, you are free to create and sell (or give away) open or closed source implementations of Vorbis encoders, decoders, or other tools. However, if you use our software rather than writing an independent implementation, you must respect the terms of the license. Our libraries are available under our BSD-like license and can be used whole or in part by closed source applications."

Took me around five seconds to find this. There's no excuse for such laziness. Ogg Vorbis is anything but proprietary - it is the exact opposite of proprietary.

Both aac and mp3 are patent encumbered.

Re:Antics like this...

[Anonymous Coward]

The "land of the free" (USA) also has over 2 million of it's population in prison, vs a figure of 1 million for China.

The US also has the largest *percentage* of it's population in prison of any country in the world.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prison#Prison_populat ion_statistics [wikipedia.org]

Re:Gee I'd like to listen

[AaronW]

There are multiple implementations. There is a fixed-point implementation designed for use in hardware playback devices which is supported by some of them. Samsung, Rio, Neuros Technology, Cowon and iRiver support it natively in their digital audio players. Also, there is at least one other implementation [geocities.jp]. Given the free nature and high quality and ease of use of the reference libraries, most programs make use of those and there is little reason to rewrite the library since the original code is very portable and easy to use. It is widely used in a number of commercial software packages, notably games like Unreal Tournament, Grand Theft Auto and others, due to the lack of licensing costs. Many free software packages include support for Vorbis as well. According to Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] there are other independent implementations of Ogg used in Real Player and DirectShow.

Note that there are two formats in use. Ogg is the container format and Vorbis is the audio codec.

It is also used by some commercial Internet radio stations and supported by Shoutcast. As I said, it's about as open a standard as you can get.

Re:Score 1 for the Islamic extremists!

[QuickFox]

It's still far, far more free than, say, Cuba or China. Vastly more free. But it's trampling its own principles in stunning, alarming ways, reducing democratic rights and principles and rule of law and freedom, all of these essential things taking second stage in the holy war against terrorism, this war against a featureless monster that serves as an excuse for anything.

Re:Political Freedom

[mr_matticus]

The Justice Department is an *executive* agency. The firing of federal attorneys is well within the purview of the White House. The *Judicial Branch* is still just as separate as it has been in a century (more spineless maybe, but that's not an institutional function).

Executive appointments serve at the pleasure of the president. He can fire them whenever he wants. What's wrong here is that they tried to lie about WHY they were fired to avoid bad press and his already miserable cronyism. There's a mile-long list of reasons to impeach the son of a bitch, but this is about as back-burner as they get.

Re:Irony Much?

[Blakey Rat]

We signed a looong lease before the revolution. If we tried to buy land in Cuba now to build a base, Castro would say "no way." But he's bound to honor the old agreement.

Re:Antics like this...

[Anonymous Coward]

I hate to be anal retentive, but a critical element of a gulag is forced labor. The word gulag itself in an acronym for Main Camp Administration. A gulag can have good conditions or bad conditions, but it must be used for labor that contributes to the national GDP. The gulags have gone through many iterations. In the 1920s when they were created they were incredibly inefficient. Then in the 1930s with Stalin's urging they became more efficient but extraordinarily brutal. By the 1950s they became less brutal and more bureaucratic. They were finally closed down by Gorbachev in the 1980s.

While people like to use the word gulag for a harsh prison, that is completely false. The word only has meaning when you are talking about forced labor camps which could have good or bad conditions. And since the Guantanamo Bay Prison is not being used for forced labor, you cannot use the word 'gulag' to describe it.

The United States has forced labor with things like chain gangs, but since they do not contribute to a significant fraction of the GDP for any state they are not gulags. If there was a prison in the US that made a profit from the work of the inmates (enough to pay for their incarceration), then you'd have a gulag.

One of the reasons that gulags became so harsh in the 1930s is that Stalin set extreme limits with his 5 yr plans for industrialization of the Soviet Union. The camp administrators then decided that they would reward the workers who worked the hardest with the most food and the best conditions and punish those who lagged behind with little food and poor conditions. Not surprisingly, this created a downward spiral for many inmates which was responsible for millions of deaths.

Re:Antics like this...

[Anonymous Coward]

Seemingly ridiculous, indeed, save for one point: If ever they find you gave money to some "terrorist" group or were involved with some "communist" organization, they can deport you. Not because giving your money to some "terrorist" group or having "communist" friends is illegal (it may not be), but because you lied on your immigration forms, and entered the country thus on false pretenses. That's sufficient to deport you, without the hassle of formally accusing you of dubious crimes.

Re:Antics like this...

[Anonymous Coward]

1) I think the "have you been a member of the communist party" question is a mistake on your part. IIRC the correct question is "were you a memeber of the german nazi party during the war".
Communists can run, on the ballot, for president in the US, they aren't illegal. Harboring war criminals is.

2) these questions are to allow the government to quickly and efficiently revoke the visa and kick the person out if they are found to having lied on those questions. It is much easier to nullify a visa than to resind it.

And I think anyone who has visited both Soviet Russia & the most US constitution-blind America wouldn't have too much of a problem telling them appart once inside.

Re:Antics like this...

[LadyLucky]

The reason they put those questions on the form is so that should any of those things later turn out to be true (nazi war criminal, blah blah), they can kick you out of the country for lying on your immigration form.

Re:Score 1 for the Islamic extremists!

[wishmechaos]

When people criticize the actions of the US, I don't think you should ever assume that they're criticizing the American people. The distinction is very clear.

Although I agree with you, I think you're being overly positive. Many people don't make that distinction, and assume the current government is a reflexion of its citizens.
I know many people who, so to speak, have a strong prejudice against US citizens, even though they may know not everyone voted Bush.
One bad choice is excusable, but the US has earned its reputation over many, many years, and the image we have of your country influences the image we have of you. In Argentina, the term 'Yanqui' (Yankee) is used to refer to North Americans in a slightly derogative way. It's not terrible, but you hear the word 'Yanqui' much more often than 'North American'