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GNU is Not Unix

Why the FSF is Structured the Way It Is (fsf.org) 69

Posted by EditorDavid from the you'll-be-free-hackers dept.
Richard Stallman founded the Free Software Foundation as a nonprofit in 1985 with four other directors (including MIT computer science professor Gerald Jay Sussman). Sussman remains on the Board of directors, along with EFF co-founder John Gilmore and five others.

Friday the eight directors published a new article explaining how their goal and principles are protected by the nonprofit's governance structure: An obvious option, used by many organizations, was to let supporters sign up as members and have the members' votes control everything about the organization. We rejected that approach because it would have made the organization vulnerable to being taken over by people who disagreed with its mission... [A]ctivist organizations should be steady in their mission. Already in 1985, we could see that many of the people who appreciated the GNU Project's work (developing useful GNU software packages) did not support our goal and values. To look at software issues in terms of freedom was radical and many were reluctant to consider it... So we chose a structure whereby the FSF's governing body would appoint new people to itself... [T]he FSF voting members consist of all the present board members and some past board members. We have found that having some former board members remain as voting members helps stabilize the base of FSF governance.

The divergence between our values and those of most users was expressed differently after 1998, when the term "open source" was coined. It referred to a class of programs which were free/libre or pretty close, but it stood for the same old values of convenience and success, not the goal of freedom for the users of those programs. For them, "scratching your own itch" replaced liberating the community around us. People could become supporters of "open source" without any change in their ideas of right and wrong... It would have been almost inevitable for supporters of "open source" to join the FSF, then vote to convert it into an "open source" organization, if its structure allowed such a course. Fortunately, we had made sure it did not. So we were able to continue spreading the idea that software freedom is a freedom that everyone needs and everyone is entitled to, just like freedom of speech.

In recent years, several influential "open source" organizations have come to be dominated by large companies. Large companies are accustomed to seeking indirect political power, and astroturf campaigns are one of their usual methods. It would be easy for companies to pay thousands of people to join the FSF if by doing so they could alter its goals and values. Once again, our defensive structure has protected us...

A recent source of disagreement with the free software movement's philosophy comes from those who would like to make software licenses forbid the use of programs for various practices they consider harmful. Such license restrictions would not achieve the goal of ending those practices and each restriction would split the free software community. Use restrictions are inimical to the free software community; whatever we think of the practices they try to forbid, we must oppose making software licenses restrict them. Software developers should not have the power to control what jobs people do with their computers by attaching license restrictions. And when some acts that can be done by using computing call for systematic prohibition, we must not allow companies that offer software or online services to decide which ones. Such restrictions, when they are necessary, must be laws, adopted democratically by legislatures...

What new political disagreements will exist in the free software community ten, twenty or thirty years from now? People may try to disconnect the FSF from its values for reasons we have not anticipated, but we can be confident that our structure will give us a base for standing firm. We recently asked our associate members to help us evaluate the current members of the FSF board of directors through a process that will help us preserve the basic structure that protects the FSF from pressure to change its values. A year ago we used this process to select new board members, and it worked very well.

Sincerely,

The Free Software Foundation Board of Directors
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Why the FSF is Structured the Way It Is More

Why the FSF is Structured the Way It Is

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  • Interesting problems (Score:4, Interesting)

    by RightwingNutjob ( 1302813 ) on Saturday January 11, 2025 @06:14PM (#65081673)

    Jerry Sussman is, to put it delicately, near the end of his career. So are Stallman and a lot of the rest of bunch.

    While their influence has been vast, it has been incomplete, as evidenced by the philosophical reality that the new generation doesn't seem to grok freedom in software the way they do, but also in more practical disconnects. If you read The Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs, or The Structure and Interpretation of Classical Mechanics, you will find a near-impenetrable jumble of Scheme. Lisp and Scheme have obviously has some influence over the CS sphere, but no one uses them.

    This means the disconnect is bidirectional. Sussman and co couldn't get the rest of the world to do it their way, nor have they fully adapted their language and practice to keep up with the world.

    Whether that's good or bad isn't my point. My point is, their ability to advocate for their original political objectives is hampered by the disconnect in ability to communicate.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by evanh ( 627108 )

      Always a good idea to clarify an organisation's principles before attempting to pass the batten on.

  • "Working well"? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Cyberax ( 705495 ) on Saturday January 11, 2025 @06:32PM (#65081703)
    "Working well" is a strange description. The FSF, through its efforts, became totally irrelevant. They are still fighting irrelevant fights against TPMs: https://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/7... [dreamwidth.org] , and they totally lost it by still insisting on "GNU/Linux".

    Meanwhile, no new FSF-backed projects are gaining popularity or prominence. Their "high priority" ideas are at least a decade obsolete: https://www.fsf.org/campaigns/... [fsf.org]

    • Re:"Working well"? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by ffkom ( 3519199 ) on Saturday January 11, 2025 @07:32PM (#65081807)

      The FSF, through its efforts, became totally irrelevant.

      Even if that opinion was shared by 99% of the population (and I certainly disagree), making an organization "relevant" by changing its goals to something else (that happens to be "more popular") would contradict the organization's purpose.

      Maybe the next generation, who happened to never experience freedom in so many forms like we older ones did, cannot see the value of software freedom (and many other kinds of freedom), and maybe that means that at some point the organization dissolves. But "modernizing" it by pursuing different goals... no thanks, start your own organization for those.

      • Re:"Working well"? (Score:4, Interesting)

        by Cyberax ( 705495 ) on Saturday January 11, 2025 @08:21PM (#65081879)

        making an organization "relevant" by changing its goals to something else (that happens to be "more popular") would contradict the organization's purpose.

        I'm not talking about changing the overall goals. I'm talking about staying relevant by advocating and supporting the issues that are more current.

        E.g. "play OGG" is completely irrelevant. Patents on MP3 have expired, this fight is irrelevant. A more modern relevant idea would be support for VP9/AV1 over x265.

        Instead of the useless RYF ("respects your freedom") hardware certification, they can support and highlight the emerging RISC-V open ecosystem.

        There's also a whole new emerging "self hosting" ecosystem of small projects (often under AGPL!) created and supported by enthusiasts. For example, I'm using Calibre, Immich, DaWarIch, FreshRSS and others to self-host my "digital life". Yet this amazing infrastructure receives no support or recognition from the FSF.

        • Join them and start such campaigns.

          But also, they do cover such things in their newsletter, and they do support them. They do not drive campaigns about them though. Campaigns are not just web pages of support created by FSF management. They're efforts to do something driven by those who want that done.

          You know, like in a volunteer organization which has members, and those members decide what they want to do.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Cyberax ( 705495 )

            They're efforts to do something driven by those who want that done.

            Well, duh. So the FSF doesn't do campaigns, it doesn't really do any new software.

            So what _do_ they do?

            • They do what their members do. You want to see something done, join them and drive the issue. Issues will not drive themselves.

        • Thanks for your interesting comments here and especially the list of FOSS tech you use. I've been looking for a good RSS feed aggregator to run it the background given Slashdot's RSS feed lasts less than a day, so I may give FreshRSS a try at some point.

          On the broader topic, I probably could pontificate for quite a while on this or that (including how Mozilla blew billions they could have put in a trust fund to indefinitely support free software development while FSF runs on a comparable shoestring), but I'

          • TLDR the entire thing, but skimmed it. It's the only comment in the discussion that mentions money or economics, which is how I found it.

            The discussion is almost expired (which also contributed to my decision not to read your comment more closely) so I'm not going to say much in reply, but confusion about freedom and free money is the root of the problem--and I just went a couple of rounds with the Mozilla Foundation people on the same topic.

            Without a viable economic model FOSS will never matter. I used to

      • Even if that opinion was shared by 99% of the population (and I certainly disagree), making an organization "relevant" by changing its goals to something else (that happens to be "more popular") would contradict the organization's purpose.

        That is false... potentially. Society evolves and changes. The question is: does an organisation exist to focus on a highly narrowly defined singular purpose? If so you'd be right, and the organisation would become irrelevant by nature of societal change. If on the other hand an organisation has a generalised goal e.g. the betterment or promotion of general freedom for software, then they by definition need to change what they focus on at any given time to adapt to society's understanding of that goal.

        The O

        • Freedom becomes irrelevant when the mass of men have been convinced that they already have it by keeping the word and changing the definition completely. Freedom isn't something that any US Citizen has today. In a sense we never had it, but the definition today has changed in a remarkably Orwellian fashion: "We have freedom. We have always had freedom. Slavery is freedom. Those who are unwilling to be enslaved are the enemy of freedom! The enemies are the blacks. The enemies are the immigrants. We have a

  • FSF indeed avoided getting conquered (Score:5, Interesting)

    by ffkom ( 3519199 ) on Saturday January 11, 2025 @06:45PM (#65081727)
    Over the decades I have seen so many new political parties and other organizations getting conquered by people with agendas completely different from the founder's ideas that I can only congratulate the FSF for having avoided that fate. And it is not only commercially motivated astro-turfers or people with a different political agenda that endanger the integrity and relevance of any such organization, it is also "naive well meaning members allowing mission-creep", who might be totally fine with the original goal of the organization, but at some point adopt additional, rather unrelated goals they then want the organization to also pursue, not realizing that by doing so they will alienate and ultimately split off groups of members which agree on the original goals but not on those newly adopted "side missions".

    There is nothing wrong with becoming member of multiple organizations if one wants to advocate orthogonal topics, like let's say "free software" and "mandatory quotas for color blind employees" - but trying to make one or another organization adopt both will only weaken their chances to succeed.

  • radical (Score:1, Troll)

    by pulpo88 ( 6987500 )

    To look at software issues in terms of freedom was radical and many were reluctant to consider it

    My feeling then and now is that this is not necessarily radical, but Stallman's notion that any commercial development of non-free software, for any purpose, is inherently immoral is what was radical, and I understand why many good developers and good people have been reluctant to consider it.

    • Does Stallman approve of non-commercial development of non-free software?

      • Stallman does not approve of any non-free software, and it's not like he makes it hard to find his stance out.

    • Re:radical (Score:4, Interesting)

      by BadDreamer ( 196188 ) on Sunday January 12, 2025 @09:10AM (#65082647)

      It's radical in the same way that transparency of any kind is radical. And for the same reasons. Anyone reluctant to consider it should really take a long, hard look at why they hold that reluctance. I'm not saying it's inherently wrong, but I have found it surprisingly common that when people actually do examine their basis, they end up more for Stallman's view than against it.

  • It is weird to me that the FSF feels that they even have to justify this.

    • I can see why the FSF might want to explain their choice of being a "nonmembership" nonprofit somewhere, especially as the FSF encourages people to sign up donate as "members" (e.g. https://www.fsf.org/associate/ [fsf.org] ). But, yes, such nonmember nonprofits are fine and common depending on the situation

      See for example:
      "Difference Between Membership and Nonmembership Nonprofits: In a formal membership nonprofit, the members have control over the direction of the organization."
      https://www.nolo.com/legal-enc... [nolo.com]
      "Your

  • Agree, avoid New Speak and 1984! (Score:3, Interesting)

    by jmurtari ( 3898239 ) on Sunday January 12, 2025 @08:00AM (#65082563) Homepage

    I liked what the FREE Software Foundation board had to say and their rationale from corporate takeover or PC restrictions. I've worked for big corps: GE, Lockheed Martin, AT&T - they'll contribute when it's to their benefit (don't blame them for that), but they also like control and have the huge legal departments that play games with words (not a real fan of that)! Sorry, it seems many don't find "Fact Checking" of FREE speech as censorship! I can't agree more with what they say:

    We believe that software freedom should be accepted as a human right, meaning that everyone is entitled to it in all areas of life. If people who would let that go for the sake of some other goals, valid though those may be, got control of the FSF board, someone would surely call on them to subordinate software freedom to unrelated goals. We must make sure that they not place their supporters on the FSF board. A recent source of disagreement with the free software movement's philosophy comes from those who would like to make software licenses forbid the use of programs for various practices they consider harmful

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