[Gllug] amongst the maddness

[sean at uncertainty.org.uk]

On Sat, Sep 15, 2001 at 02:19:02PM +0100, Bruce Richardson wrote:
> On Sat, Sep 15, 2001 at 01:26:24PM +0100, sean at uncertainty.org.uk wrote:
> > in  the UK most people who might describe themselves as libertarians
> > would probably say that carrying guns reduces the liberty of those who
> > get shot more than it increases the liberty of those who carry guns
> 
> Then they shouldn't call themselves libertarians, the definition is
> quite clear.  Such libertarian movements in the UK as I am aware of
> (tiny that they are) are pretty close to the US ones in attitude.

surely even libertarians believe in laws against murder etc...

to be a libertarian (or any *ian) doesn't have to mean that you take the
basic principles of belief to the extreme 

one can, I believe, be a moderate libertarian and believe in gun control


> > 
> > as far as RMS is concerned I see him as a bit of a mad genius
> 
> Ah, suddenly this goes right back on topic;)
> 
> RMS isn't a libertarian - ESR is but RMS definitely isn't.  You often
> see US geeks of a libertarian bent calling RMS a communist, not that
> political tags map at all well onto the arena of technology.
> 

people shouldn't use TLA's as names - it's confusing (now I can't
remeber who I was talking about in my last mail)

> > - I think he has started something incredible but I feel he no longer
> > helps further the aims of open source that I care most about - he is
> > far to fundamentalist for my taste and certainly seems to scare of a
> > lot of techies who are curios about open source.
> 
> He's always been as he is - over the top, taking everything personally
> and retaliating in kind.  And yet the Free Software/Open Source movement
> grew, with a very large debt to RMS and GNU.

absolutely - and yet it often takes very different skills to maintain a
movement than to found it.

All the articles I have  seen on RMS in the ,mainstream media (and much
geek media) have been largely alienating - especially to the uninitiated
(IMO)


> 
> Many balk at the way RMS treats Free Software as an issue of basic
> rights.  Yet licensing, copyright and intellectual property are hot
> topics in my area of work (International Development).  We work with
> people in developing nations who are (for example) trying to obtain
> cheap generic drugs to treat HIV/Aids or struggling to prevent global
> pharmacuetical companies from patenting their long-used herbal remedies.
> Intellectual property issues are about more than one-click shopping on
> Amazon.  Sometimes they kill.
> 
> In that context, the concept of CopyLeft is of great interest since it
> offers a way to work within established intellectual property laws
> without further disadvantaging those who start out with few resources.

I think RMS goes deap into zealot territory - but that doesn't stop me
agreeing with a lot of what he says

like I said he is a genius -and in many ways he is _still_ way ahead of
his time, it's not just vaccines that are life and death - operating
systems can be too - just because so much of our day to day life now
depends on computers. The last fuel protest really scared people becasue
it showed how short a time a city can survive without lorries bringing
food - that transport id probably scheduled by software running on
windows.

> 
> RMS is just part of a broader movement: you can always play with the
> Open Source Initiative if you don't like FSF (mind you, ESR is himself a
> card-carrying fruitcake).
> 

one of the things I love about (whatever the most generic term is for
free software / open source) is that there is such diverstity of
licenses most of which are less restrictive than the GPL.



> But if RMS and the FSF are so destructive, perhaps you could tell me
> what is wrong with this:
> 
> http://www.fsf.org/philosophy/rtlinux-patent.html
> 

not much wrong with it but ...

 Software patents are a harmful government policy of creating monopolies
 that restrict computer users.

as i understand it ...

The patent system was created at a time when people had largely given up
on reasearch - as soon as they developed new technology somebody copyied
it and you had no way to regain your costs

I don't see any reason why the same principles shouldn't apply to
software - what is the conceptual difference between a machine and a
program.

That said - the current system of granting patents for obvious things is
stupid and harmful.

But I am not so sure that there is never a good reason to grant software
patents.

-- 

Sean

I retain an open mind about all the above !



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