Stallman On the State of Free Software 25 Years On 367
TRNick writes "What's the state of free software, 25 years after GNU's birth? TechRadar has an interview with Richard Stallman to find out. Stallman thinks free software is making good progress: 'Nowadays hardware developers are also increasingly likely to publish the interface specs so that we can develop free software that works with the hardware. Perhaps we are turning the corner, but we still have a big fight on our hands before all computer users have freedom.' But how many of us actually run an operating system that Richard Stallman would consider free? Many of the more popular GNU/Linux distributions, including Mandriva and Ubuntu, bundle proprietary code with their free software packages. Perhaps free software has reached a large enough install base that companies are happy to use it for their own gain, but aren't quite so willing to make their own commitments to free software development. How important this is to the success of free software depends on how strong your stance is on freedom is."
The problem with Stallman's approach (Score:5, Insightful)
What Stallman needs to do is catch up with the biggest development in the computing world of the past 25 years: the growth of computer users who do not know anything about their computers, and do not care to know. Most people do not care about the legal or technical issues surrounding their software, they just want to get online and do stuff. Stallman insists that when somebody sends you a
Disclaimer: I am a big supporter of free software, and I do wish that more people would learn more about their computers so they could at least understand that they have a choice.
Re:Free NOT EQUAL TO freedom (Score:5, Insightful)
Fortunately, the concept of 'Free Software' has nothing to do with 'being able to have a thing or service for free'.
(btw, it says so on the second sentence of the second paragraph of the FA)
Compromise (Score:3, Insightful)
Whilst I respect Stallman enormously, I still believe that absolutes and extreme ideals are damaging to any cause. For example, how many of us can say with hand on heart that we don't use an MP3 decoder? A nVidia graphics card? Firmware for the Intel wireless cards? In RMS's eyes we've tainted our freedom, but in reality these compromises allow us MORE freedom of choice, not less.
I'm a great believer in the BSD way of doing things: Here's some code, it's free, use it however you like as long as you don't claim it's yours and we're not going to treat you like a second-class citizen if you install Flash because, quite frankly, you need to make compromises such as this these days. Idealism is all well and good in the abstract, but when you need a piece of information that's hiding inside a Flash-covered web site, freedom should really be the last thing on your mind; making your life more difficult for an ideal is not going to change anyone's minds whilst the majority are accepting the status quo. It just makes you look ridiculous and you end up with rather less freedom, realistically speaking, than you started out with.
Re:Free NOT EQUAL TO freedom (Score:5, Insightful)
if I give you the ability to do *anything* with my code and you turn around and tell your end users *you can't do all that much* who exactly is the one that is free here?
it's voluntary, no one's holding a gun to your head telling you that you must use the code, the only thing is that if you choose to use that code and distribute it to others, you can't turn around and weaken their ability to do the same as you. keeping the code in house without distributing it O.T.O.H you can do whatever you like with it.
Stallman is a zealot (Score:4, Insightful)
Sorry, but it's true. As such it is no surprise that few people use things he'd consider free. He has a very rigid definition of it, one that many people might disagree with. For example the BSD crowd might say his definition is messed up since it doesn't include the freedom to take something and make it not free.
Regardless, because of his stance on it, most people don't use software that's Stallman Free(tm). We live in a real world, and imperfect world. Most people have to be a bit pragmatic with things. If that means using software that isn't Stallman Free, well then so be it. Ubuntu is concerned with being easily usable and widely adopted, not with idealism.
Also there is still the large unanswered question of how everyone can make money in a free software world. Some software it's not a problem for. For example:
--Software that runs hardware. You are buying the hardware, the software is just something that helps make it go. Thus it isn't a problem to have anyone able to copy and redistribute it. Heck, might even be to your benefit as maybe they make it better. Your money is in the device, so the software needn't be restricted. Embedded devices would be an example.
--Software that needs support. You aren't selling the software here, what you are selling is service on it. The software is complex, and/or is used in a complex nature. Thus people are going to have difficulty doing it without professional help. That's what you sell, is the expertise to make it all work as they want. The software is free, the service isn't. Enterprise Linux would be an example.
--Software for a service. You offer a service, like hosting or something. You have software to make that possible and to interact with it. This works as free because people aren't paying you for it, people are paying for your service.
There are probably more too. However there are some major categories that don't work like that. The biggest would be a lot of consumer applications, like games and such. If you design the app well, with good tutorials and intuitive interfaces, people don't need anything else to make it work. Thus if you make it free software, where they are free to simply give it away, then they've no need to pay you for it.
Well this doesn't work if you want software to be made as anything more than a hobby. For someone to do something professionally, as in to devote most of their time to it, that thing has to pay. People have to eat, they have to pay rent, they have to buy things they need. That means they need a job that pays. So if there's no way to make money off their software, well then they can't have a job making it. It can be a hobby, but not a job.
For example I have a hobby redoing soundtrack from old games. It amuses me, and others seem to enjoy it. However it isn't my job, and can't be. For legal and practical reasons, I can't make money on it, certainly not near enough to support myself. Thus it gets relegated to hobby status. I work on it when I like, when I've free time. Ends up taking a long time for that reason. What takes me a year I could easily do in a couple weeks if I were being paid to do it and directing all my efforts at that. However I'm not, so it happens on my terms. I do only projects I like, only when I like to do them.
So unless we want to see large classes of software relegated to that sort of status, we either have to allow for non-free software, or to figure out a way that people can make money on all free software. Also please not by "make money" I don't mean "make a token amount of cash through a few donations." I mean "Make enough money to support themselves and their family in a manner befitting of their skill and education." A hobby can't become a job just because people toss you a couple hundred dollars now and again. It's got to be something you can support yourself on.
Thus far, I've heard no solutions and can't come up with any myself. So we have to deal with the reality that not all software can be free software.
Re:Free NOT EQUAL TO freedom (Score:5, Insightful)
It's the code that is free, not the user.
I assume you're contrasting BSD or similarly permissive licenses with the GPL. BSD makes the end user free. GPL makes the code free. You can't really have it both ways (because there will always be end users who want to make the code non-free).
Re:Free NOT EQUAL TO freedom (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, yes. But the third part, even if voluntary and completely in the libertarian sense, is what brings government involvement to any degree. It's the entity that enforces contracts (a product of some voluntary associations) and also via copyright and patents which are abstract concepts in the Constition.
So, even by that definition, Stallman's concept is giving you more freedom by a) having less or no EULAs and b) less copyright concerns. I believe in this sense, the term "Freedom" is in context of being unencumbered of restrictive obligations of running code. I know when I install Ubuntu without seeing 100 Eulas pop up or asking me for my CD key plus various other nag screen I feel a little more unencumbered by BS. For the developer, it frees them from, well, developing the wheel over and over again. Seeing that all sides of the Open Source equation is a completely voluntary system, and not some communist dictatorship giving property to the masses, it works perfectly fine within the term freedom.
Freedom also allows you sell yourself into indentured servitude (perhaps called car/home/student loans today). However, if a spiritual philosophy came along, shunning pure materialism, converting people voluntarily to its way of thinking and they ended up happier: wouldn't it, too, fit into the freedom paradigm. Couldn't we judge one way of life in some ways ultimately freer than the other?
Anyway, fortunately for us and FTA, Stallman, as always, defined his freedom specifically:
1. To run the program as you wish.
2. To study the source code, and change it so the program does what you wish.
3. To redistribute exact copies when you wish.
4. To distribute copies of your modified versions, when you wish.
I will grant the GNU license isn't free in itself, but one is free to take it (or not).
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The problem with Stallman's approach (Score:5, Insightful)
That's exactly right, and that's why the biggest things to happen in free software -- in promoting Stallman's cause -- in the past decade have been the very things he cries out against.
Dell putting Linux on PCs, preinstalled! Fantastic. It works out of the box, and your average user *just might* stumble upon it without having to go out of their way to learn about it. (But that's not cool, according to RMS, because it has some non-free software).
Ubuntu happened! Fantastic. Linux for human beings. For the first time, we can give Ubuntu CDs to our grandmas and get some degree of success. It's a Linux distro that's tuned for normal users. It looks great. It can play DVDs and do 3D graphics. (But that's not cool, according to RMS, because there are binary blobs).
I'm sure there are more examples. My point is that we aren't going to "win" by mouthing off every Linux-based OS or computer with non-free code in it, or, as you say, by refusing to open Word documents. That's just being stubborn. We're going to win by piece-by-piece showing the world what free or almost-free software can do.
Re:The problem with Stallman's approach (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The problem with Stallman's approach (Score:4, Insightful)
The BSD license has nothing to do with users at all. It's not an EULA, it's a copyright license. It allows developers to make copies of the source code, under certain conditions, and it restricts the times when that's allowed. That's not freedom, that's "digital rights management" in its worst sense.
Re:Compromise (Score:2, Insightful)
I forget where I read it, but someone once pointed out that if you need a new computer at work you should go in asking for $10,000,000 - then when you get laughed out of the office and come back asking for a ridiculous gaming rig that costs $5000 you might just get it.
It's the same theory, in my view. Realistically he's never going to get what he wants, but just the act of having him there campaigning for it makes 'middle of the road' suggestions more reasonable by comparison.
Except that's not what really happens is it? The guy who asks for the $10,000,000 computer might get the $5000 system in the end or he might get shown the door or otherwise told to shut up and get back to work. Even if he gets it, everyone who had to deal with that guy has silently written him off as a total asshole to be avoided and skipped over for promotions in future.
And so it is with Stallman. If (one of) the most vocal advocates of free software is a ranting loony who has no concept of the real world then a lot of people will write off free software and its supporters as ridiculous zealots who live in a fantasy world. People and software to be avoided.
I'm afraid the reasoning doesn't work in the anecdote or the real world scenario. Act like a dick and people will think you're a dick. Talk sense (for long enough) and people will listen. It's that simple.
Re:The problem with Stallman's approach (Score:2, Insightful)
His mission is "free software". You say that true free software "wouldn't be restricted to only people who carry on making it free". Well there you go -- you said it yourself -- free software is, by definition restricted to the set of software which people continue to make free. Otherwise, it stops being free software.
Not at all. I can license something under the BSD, and allow anyone to do what they like with my code (as long as they cite me). They are free to extend it and make their extensions closed source, they're free to extend it and make their extensions open, they're free to do anything they like, in the truest sense of free. What they can't do, is make my original closed source, because you know... I'm still distributing it under BSD, and they can't put that cat back in its bag.
The freedom to improve the program, and release your improvements (and modified versions in general) to the public, so that the whole community benefits (freedom 3). Access to the source code is a precondition for this.
And this is exactly where the GPL fails. It does *not* give the freedom to improve the program, and release your improvements. It only grants that freedom when you promise to carry on releasing said improvements in an open way.
Re:Free NOT EQUAL TO freedom (Score:4, Insightful)
You can have it both ways. That's why the CDDL and MPL exist. "Return your changes to our code, but you can use it with anything you like under any license.
They are, as far as I'm concerned, the best OSS licenses out there.
Re:The problem with Stallman's approach (Score:3, Insightful)
And what exactly does the GPL do for users that the MPL or CDDL does not in a more elegant and developer-respecting way?
Re:Cardware (Score:5, Insightful)
Too bad you can't eat postcards or deposit them in your bank account.
Re:The problem with Stallman's approach (Score:3, Insightful)
This is exactly the point. Why should people care if they don't need or want to modify code? The only thing most people care about is if the tool does the job it is intended to do. If it can't, they will find a tool that will. If you as a programmer want to cripple your code by not allowing other programs to link to your libraries, no matter what the reason (including license issues like the GPL), and if that impacts usability, then expect the end user to look elsewhere to find a tool that elegantly and completely does the job they need it to do. Don't expect them to modify the code to do the job. They just want to use the tool. And that is all a computer program is; a tool.
The GPL has to learn to get along with other licenses, or programs licensed under it will always find itself on the fringes in terms of users. Yes, Linux is a major player in the server market. But in terms of the number of total installs regardless of purpose (desktop or server), it is a fringe player. As the GPL becomes more stringent in its restrictions (e.g. GPL2 to GPL3), this will only increase. Thank goodness for the LGPL.
Personally, I use a computer as a tool. I am O/S agnostic. I use MS desktops (and occasionally Linux/Gnome/KDE), and am a former C/Unix programmer who can still code Perl and ksh scripts with the best of them. Better than many Java developers I see now-a-days whose target platform for deployment is on Unix or Linux (it puzzles me why so many know so little about their target deployment platform). I work in a company that uses Linux servers and open source databases. So don't think I am coming off as a MS troll. My bottom line is the best tool for the job. But I am sick of seeing the GPL shooting Linux and its associated programs in the foot.
Re:Thanks (Score:5, Insightful)
"You've managed to eloquently summarize what has been bouncing around in my brain for a while"
To bad because he is wrong.
Here's my reply to his post.
"s/end\ users/distributors/g
The end user can do whatever it wants to the code the GPL does not restrict usage or modification by the end user in anyway. It applies to the distribution of the software. So the code and the user are free, the distributor has restrictions."
Re:Free NOT EQUAL TO freedom (Score:2, Insightful)
Why not GIVE the English language a term for free-libre eg. "liber". Languages are fluid things... and "liber" fits :
liber
liberate
liberation
Yes, liber has some (uncommon) meanings in English already, but plenty of other words have multiple meanings eg. the word "free" itself! It's certainly not a step backwards, and there's a chance it could add something valuable to English in the longer term.
The term "Free Software" (Score:5, Insightful)
RMS is always so adamant that we call it "Free Software" and not "Open Source Software". Problem is, whether Free Software is a better name for it or not, it's got hideous problems. The main one being this (from TFA):
You just can't use the term "free software" around normal people - they don't get it. They use the term "free software" themselves all the time, to mean Internet Explorer and Stupid Window Theme Pack For Windows 30 Day Trial and other garbage. Like it or not, the term is overloaded, and RMS's definition is not the default.
I prefer the term "open source". It's far less ambiguous (the ambiguity between "open source" and RMS-free is a much more subtle distinction than the ambiguity between "free software" and RMS-free). People either know what it means, or don't know what it means (and I can explain). Much better than people assuming it means something it doesn't.
Re:Cardware (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Compromise (Score:1, Insightful)
So you're kinda thinking the way I do. Let the idealists on either end fight it out tooth and nail, and the rest of us in the middle get a balanced product as the end result. Every time people whine about idealists, I point out that without them we'd lack a lot of the cool stuff we have these days.
You've come a long way, baby. (Score:5, Insightful)
It's amazing that GNU is 25 years old now. In 1984 I was using a TRS-80, and the latest thing I knew about proprietary versus nonproprietary software was that Radio Shack had given up on the idea that customers would only be able to buy software from Radio Shack -- they had finally come around to the point of view that it was OK for third-party software houses to sell applications that would run on their OS. How many people are as far ahead of their time as Stallman was in 1984?
There are plenty of obstacles remaining, but I think it's impressive as hell how much you can do with free software today, and how easy it is to do it. My mother in law, who's in her 80s, installed Ubuntu on her computer this year, with just a little help from me over the phone. She actually had more trouble installing java (which she needed for her favorite online Scrabble app) than she did installing the OS. My neighbor came over for a beer yesterday and asked to see my Linux box. His main reaction to Gnome was, "Wow, I didn't expect anything so professional looking." When he contemplated the idea of using Linux in his home office, the main concern I couldn't answer satisfactorily was whether or not it would work with his multifunction fax machine/copier. So, okay, no, he probably won't run Linux in the foreseeable future. But it's amazing to me that the big obstacles are now confined to issues as peripheral as that. Heck, you'd probably have a lot of the same concerns if you were contemplating switching to MacOS from Windows.
Intellectually, I think Stallman was very clever with his invention of the GPL framework. No matter how many BSD-versus-GPL flamewars there are on slashdot, I think any impartial observer has to admit that the general approach (using copyright for a purpose diametrically opposed to most people's idea of the purpose of copyright) was pretty novel in 1984, and it's been wildly successful, even in other contexts. Wikipedia is a good example. The fact that WP is GFDL licensed is what makes people comfortable contributing to it.
Re:Compromise (Score:4, Insightful)
Dreaming is all well and good. Practically speaking however, in a world full of more than 3 people, some compromise is necessary if you hope to see any of that dream come to pass. Stallman can dream all he wants about of world of perfectly free software, but in the real world, those of us who wish to eat use the Windows box our company gives us at work. We deal with user that don't know the difference between floppies and CDs (alright, that was years ago, but not that many years), let alone the difference between free and closed OSes. There are three types of people that can afford to be zealots about open source: those who don't need to worry about money, those who never use a computer at work and are pure hobbyists, and FSF employees. As far as I can see everyone else has to make some sacrifices somewhere.
Re:The problem with Stallman's approach (Score:3, Insightful)
What Stallman needs to do is catch up with the biggest development in the computing world of the past 25 years.
Not going to happen. This is a man who, by his own admission [lwn.net], doesn't surf the web. He doesn't go into detail, but I feel it's pretty safe to assume he doesn't want to defile himself by viewing a website that might be hosted or created with non-free software.
The man is completely out of touch with today's computer users. Any why wouldn't he be? His legacy has been about holding onto the past. To maintain a world where people like him were the real power users. A lot of people give him far more credit than he truly deserves. There was free software before Stallman, it just didn't match his definition. His crusade is about trying to make his problem, our problem. No thanks.
Re:The problem with Stallman's approach (Score:3, Insightful)
> most people are not even knowledgeable enough
> about their computers to even understand what
> free software is all about, why it matters, and
> why they should care.
To add to this, I think that there are many people who are familiar with free software, but who do not want to go to Stallman's extent of refusing to use or interact with non-free software.
Personally, I view software like I view any other tool in my workshop: I have some tools that I've made myself (on a lathe and all), I have some tools that I was given for free, and I have some tools that I went to Home Depot and bought outright. I use each of them, in different ways, for different tasks in order to maximize my overall efficiency and minimize my overhead.
In much the same way, I use free software for some tasks and commercial software for others. To blindly commit myself to using either free or non-free software would severely impact my productivity.
(I think that there are a lot of people who employ a similar, "moderate" philosophy.)
Where Have I Heard This Before? (Score:4, Insightful)
Stallman reminds me a lot of George Bush; if you disagree with his position on something, you're accused of being against freedom.
Re:Free NOT EQUAL TO freedom (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Free NOT EQUAL TO freedom (Score:5, Insightful)
Please provide an example of this happening. The end user is under no obligation to "accept the terms" of the GPL (despite the fact that many software distributors stupidly force users to do just that when installing GPL software). Freedom 0 specifically grants the user unlimited freedom to use the software as (s)he sees fit. Any restrictions placed on the use of GPL software is a direct violation of the GPL.
The GPL governs the distribution of software, and prevents developers and distributors from restricting the way a person uses the software. Claims that the GPL restricts use is the great straw man of the proprietary vendors' anti-free software FUD campaign.
The fact that your nVidea drivers might break the next time you do a kernel update is beyond the control of those who provide the free components of your system. If nVidea wants their hardware to work with anybody's hardware or software, they need to either release working drivers themselves, or release the specifications so others may develop them. I can't imagine how you arrived at the conclusion that the FSF is in some way placing "every possible roadblock in place to the end user making use of software that does not meet their standards of free."
That's what they've been doing for 25 years. Any lack of interoperability you've been experiencing is likely due to a lack of published specifications for that proprietary hardware and software you just referred to.
So you slag the people who provide free software and blame them of the lack of interoperability you experience when you mix it with closed-source propriety hardware and software, and you also don't pay for the proprietary stuff, violating the terms of their user agreements (which, unlike the GPL, do restrict your right to use the software).
Why are you complaining again?
Re:Stallman's vision (Score:3, Insightful)
Probably the biggest problem I see with open source is the lack of critical review. Without this someone that turns out garbage code will continue to do so forever.
Isn't this more a problem with closed source software? Quality of code seems more important for an open source project that wishes to attract volunteers than a closed source project where the developers are paid.
Re:The term "Free Software" (Score:3, Insightful)
RMS is always so adamant that we call it "Free Software" and not "Open Source Software".
You know, that's probably because those are very different things.
Re:Free NOT EQUAL TO freedom (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem is that he also has an implied:
5. You can't run anything EXCEPT Free Software.
rule, and that's the one everybody disagrees with
Well gee, the guy who's spent the last twenty-five years leading the Free Software movement has some politics that you disagree with.
It's not like anybody is actually forcing you to stop using proprietary software. The only person who might stop you from using Ubuntu because of binary blobs are the owners of said blobs. They could sue Ubuntu for massive statutory damages for wilful infringement.
Re:Compromise (Score:5, Insightful)
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man"
From "Maxims For Revolutionists" by George Bernard Shaw.
Re:Free NOT EQUAL TO freedom (Score:5, Insightful)
Linus seems like a strange choice to hold up as an example of someone limiting your rights in the name of free software. He always struck me as the ultimate pragmatist, someone who favours using the best tool for the job, regardless of whether it is proprietary or free software.
Never the less, do you have to apply every kernel patch? I can see security updates and bug fixes, but changes to the driver API? Especially if they break your nVidia drivers. Wouldn't you look at what the patch does, see that it is incompatible with your hardware and choose not to run it?
Really, it goes back to where the problem actually lies, and that is with the proprietary nVidia drivers. Complain to them. You gave them money for their graphics card. Have you ever given a penny to Linus or any of the other kernel developers?
They are doing nothing to curtail your freedom to use the software they so generously provided any way you see fit, and if it doesn't suit your exact needs, you can pay someone to change it.
That's freedom.
Re:The problem with Stallman's approach (Score:3, Insightful)
His crusade was piece by piece to lay the groundwork for a free OS, and then when that happened to piece by piece lay the groundwork for a free application stack.