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GNU is Not Unix Open Source Programming

RMS Talks Net Neutrality, Patents, and More 165

Posted by samzenpus from the straight-from-the-man dept.
alphadogg writes "According to Richard Stallman, godfather of the free software movement, Facebook is a "monstrous surveillance engine," tech companies working for patent reform aren't going nearly far enough, and parents must lobby their children's schools to keep data private and provide free software alternatives. The free software guru touched on a host of topics in his keynote Saturday at the LibrePlanet conference, a Free Software Foundation gathering at the Scala Center at MIT.
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RMS Talks Net Neutrality, Patents, and More More

RMS Talks Net Neutrality, Patents, and More

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  • link would be nice (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Weird

  • The link? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Any link? Who are these "editors"? What a piece of shit this website has become :-)

  • What kind of bullshit submission is this? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    I mean, seriously? No link to the keynote or to any article discussing it?
    This place is really turning into a crapfest thanks to the silly editors...

  • This is just a headline. Is there a link to an actual story?

  • Where's the article? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Crazy Taco ( 1083423 ) on Monday March 23, 2015 @12:19PM (#49321735)
    This seems like a new low for slashdot. I mean, I know we all aren't going to read the article or anything, but a link to it should still be there so that we can feel like we read it!

  • RMS Should Try Google+! (Score:4, Funny)

    by Greyfox ( 87712 ) on Monday March 23, 2015 @12:20PM (#49321753) Homepage Journal
    It's like an anti-social network! If you had some data you wanted to make sure no one would ever see, you could post it to Google+!

    I saw some (i'm assuming) teenager post some angsty thing on a social page the other day and it occurred to me that we built this huge network that lets you reach out and speak to basically any other human being on the planet and people seem lonelier than ever. Odd, how that works...

    • It's like an anti-social network! If you had some data you wanted to make sure no one would ever see, you could post it to Google+!

      I saw some (i'm assuming) teenager post some angsty thing on a social page the other day and it occurred to me that we built this huge network that lets you reach out and speak to basically any other human being on the planet and people seem lonelier than ever. Odd, how that works...

      Getting a message out that can reach many, applies to few, and will be enjoyed by fewer is not the same thing as being truly understood and appreciated by someone who is willing to invest in a meaningful relationship. It's been framed into your standard quantity vs. quality affair.

  • Where's the link to the article? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Crazy Taco ( 1083423 ) on Monday March 23, 2015 @12:21PM (#49321771)
    This seems like a new low for Slashdot. I mean, I know none of us read the articles, but still, the link should at least be there so we can feel like we read it!
  • Where's the TFA?

  • Is this where a helpful /.-er is supposed to post a link to TFA?

  • Is there an actual story here? Like anything with a link?

    Or do we just get a one line snippet that says "RMS says Facebook evil 'n Stuff".

    Come on guys ... two sentences and no links. That's not an actual "story".

  • And the link to his speech is where??? Please provide the link(s) to a video or text copy of his speech.

    Thank you!

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Don't worry, they're saving you a lot of unneeded grief. RMS is a troll.

  • You keep on fighting the good fight, grandpa.

  • Facebook solved the problem of contact management very nicely. I remember the days of sending mass emails to all your contacts with new contact information... unless you manually updated your contact database then it was over and you didn't have great control over who's emails you would see and you couldn't discover old friends online...

    To retain some small semblance of our privacy though we really need a set of Internet communications protocols for updating and managing address books and some sort of open

    • Oh, come on, if you could replace FB with an alternate service, it would be like DOTA being as popular as WoW ... um. Err.

    • So then how do you propose that people find/identify the people you know, since so many people have the same first and last name? Oh, right, by their friends ... oops :-)

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by bigpat ( 158134 )
        Finding people is what directories are for. Pictures, Location, affiliations... whatever people want to put out there. And what is to prevent a standard protocol for people to share their friends lists with their friends?

        • Finding people is what directories are for. Pictures, Location, affiliations... whatever people want to put out there. And what is to prevent a standard protocol for people to share their friends lists with their friends?

          If you want to get rid of Facebook (have it go the way of MySpace -- remember them?) without replacing it with the next centralized panopticon, what you need is a completely standardized, completely open, secure, encrypted, cross-platform, peer-to-peer method of implementing the same features. Nothing less will do. Until then, when Facebook finally diminishes it will simply be replaced by the next Facebook-wannabe.

          • And who is going to pay to set this up and fund the day-to-day running of this operation?

            • And who is going to pay to set this up and fund the day-to-day running of this operation?

              I assume it will be the same sort of people who paid (i.e. their time and expertise) to create and make freely available other software like BitTorrent, the Linux kernel, the Apache server, etc.

              There is ample reason to believe this is possible. There are numerous extant examples, far too many to enumerate here, in the form of just about every GPL'd project ever created. Perhaps you missed the part where I said it would need to be decentralized and peer-to-peer, so much like BitTorrent, the users themselve

        • So your recommendation is to give people less privacy than now by putting even more information about them out there for the whole world to see?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by jedidiah ( 1196 )

      > I remember the days of sending mass emails

      So Facebook solves the "problem" of spamming your friends. NICE.

      In other words, it doesn't solve any real problem at all and if anything just enables those that abuse the shared infastructure.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by bigpat ( 158134 )

        > I remember the days of sending mass emails

        So Facebook solves the "problem" of spamming your friends. NICE.

        In other words, it doesn't solve any real problem at all and if anything just enables those that abuse the shared infastructure.

        It isn't an abuse of shared infrastructure to send multiple people emails. Facebook is just a different type of social contract. You put something out there and you know it isn't certain anyone will see it, but there is feedback "like" when they do. With emails you expected people to read them, although with some possible delay. versus Texts or IMs which usually you expect an immediate read/response.

    • To retain some small semblance of our privacy

      If you want privacy then don't put your information on the public web.

  • After all, he says he doesn't use a web browser.

    • Actually, on 2015-03-16 he said he's been using a web browser and Tor. I don't know if the two are related and I don't know when he started using a common browser in a typical fashion.

      • So, is he continuing to rail against something he's never used, or has he tried it to get an informed view of the trade-offs?

    • Re:How would he know? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by JThundley ( 631154 ) on Monday March 23, 2015 @06:37PM (#49324109)

      RTFA:

      For one thing, he said, he now connects to websites from his own computer – via Tor and using a free software browser. Previously, he used a complicated workaround to more or less email webpages to himself. The announcement brought a surprised gasp and a round of applause from the 300-plus attendees./quote

  • If anyone is counting

  • Wouldn't it be nice... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anubis IV ( 1279820 ) on Monday March 23, 2015 @12:36PM (#49321951)

    Wouldn't it be nice if there were some way of linking us to additional information on the topic so that we could see his quotes in context? A shame that these things don't exist. They'd be hyper neat.

  • this is basically incitement to flamewar :)

  • Facebook == evil? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by serviscope_minor ( 664417 ) on Monday March 23, 2015 @12:39PM (#49321965) Journal

    From TFS: According to RMS, Facebook is a "monstrous surveillance engine,"

    Frankly, I think he's being excessively kind on Facebook there and that's the last thing I would have expected from him!

  • Has RTFA become so absent that we just don't bother with TFA anymore?

  • Stata Center (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Not Scala Center

    • He he. I wondered if MIT had done a deal with Martin Odersky's Typesafe or partnered with EPFL.

      Scala as a teaching language in the USA?

  • In the end, the fact that citizens of the EU and of Canada reside in the US and, under the separate US/Canada and US/EU Data Treaties can not have their privacy rights stolen without specific item by item agreement (not Click To Accept), will be what saves the US Internet from itself.

  • Slashdot Evolution (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    I've always thought we should just dismiss the pedantry of linking to the article as it's never read anyway.

  • Good to see that RMS is now backing libre hardware, I remember the last time Slashdot interviewed him he seemed completely unaware of it and thought that he was being asked about drivers.

    The data logger in my sports car is libre hardware & software B-)

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Hartree ( 191324 )

      A number of us brought that up in the questions session when he spoke at the University of Illinois back on March 16th. He hadn't mentioned it in his talk and didn't have much to say on it. Good that he's addressing it more now.

  • Unless you've been under a rock since 1983, you already know largely what position he's going to take when you go to his talk.

    Complaining about it is like going out of your way to attend a Baptist Tent Meeting and then complaining that they were evangelizing.

    I disagree with him on a number of areas (Surprise! Must be the first time someone has disagreed with RMS.), but he's worth listening to. Often there's a kernel of clue in what the more extreme types say.

  • Facebook and Google are far and away the best publicly available advertising tools you will find for a long time. The first place to put your business is on Facebook. And if you're selling really good shit, you cannot fail by putting all those little icons(Twitter, Linkedin, etc.) on your page. Trickle down technology, exploit it for all it's worth. Bring a friend!

  • http://www.ted.com/talks/thoma... [ted.com]

    There's perfectly acceptable alternatives out there for £3.95, but he's just got to build his own for £1200. Looks like shit and works for 5 seconds, but he built it himself and that's what's important.

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