1 |
<!--#include virtual="/server/header.html" --> |
2 |
<!-- Parent-Version: 1.96 --> |
3 |
<!-- This page is derived from /server/standards/boilerplate.html --> |
4 |
<!--#set var="TAGS" value="speeches" --> |
5 |
<!--#set var="DISABLE_TOP_ADDENDUM" value="yes" --> |
6 |
<title>GNU & The Free Software Foundation (Engineering Tech Talk at Google) |
7 |
- GNU Project - Free Software Foundation</title> |
8 |
<style type="text/css" media="screen"><!-- |
9 |
@media (min-width: 55em) { .toc li { display: inline-block; width: 95%; }} |
10 |
--></style> |
11 |
<!--#include virtual="/philosophy/po/google-engineering-talk.translist" --> |
12 |
<!--#include virtual="/server/banner.html" --> |
13 |
<!--#include virtual="/philosophy/ph-breadcrumb.html" --> |
14 |
<!--GNUN: OUT-OF-DATE NOTICE--> |
15 |
<!--#include virtual="/server/top-addendum.html" --> |
16 |
<div class="article reduced-width"> |
17 |
<h2>GNU & The Free Software Foundation</h2> |
18 |
|
19 |
<address class="byline">by Richard Stallman</address> |
20 |
|
21 |
<div class="infobox"> |
22 |
<p>Engineering Tech Talk at Google, June 11, 2004</p> |
23 |
</div> |
24 |
|
25 |
<div class="toc"> |
26 |
<hr class="no-display" /> |
27 |
<h3 class="no-display">Table of Contents</h3> |
28 |
<ul class="columns no-bullet"> |
29 |
<li><a href="#introduction">1. Introduction</a></li> |
30 |
<li><a href="#how-it-started">2. How it started</a></li> |
31 |
<li><a href="#gnu-operating-system">3. GNU operating system</a></li> |
32 |
<li><a href="#gnu-emacs">4. GNU Emacs</a></li> |
33 |
<li><a href="#expensive-habits">5. Expensive habits</a></li> |
34 |
<li><a href="#definition-of-free-software">6. Definition of free software</a></li> |
35 |
<li><a href="#freedom-2-moral-dilemma">7. Freedom 2 moral dilemma</a></li> |
36 |
<li><a href="#freedom-2-spirit-of-good-will">8. Freedom 2 spirit of good will</a></li> |
37 |
<li><a href="#freedom-0-to-run-a-program-freedom-1-to-modify-it">9. |
38 |
Freedom 0 to run a program, Freedom 1 to modify it</a></li> |
39 |
<li><a href="#drm-back-doors-bugs">10. DRM, back doors, bugs</a></li> |
40 |
<li><a href="#freedom-3-having-no-master">11. Freedom 3 having no master</a></li> |
41 |
<li><a href="#copyleft-forbidding-is-forbidden">12. Copyleft forbidding |
42 |
is forbidden</a></li> |
43 |
<li><a href="#general-public-license">13. General Public License</a></li> |
44 |
<li><a href="#developing-gnu">13a. Developing GNU</a></li> |
45 |
<li><a href="#making-money-off-free-software">14. Making money off free |
46 |
software</a></li> |
47 |
<li><a href="#why-write-free-software">15. Why write free software</a></li> |
48 |
<li><a href="#linux-kernel">16. Linux kernel</a></li> |
49 |
<li><a href="#gnu-vs-linux-confusion-problem-freedom">17. GNU vs. Linux |
50 |
confusion problem freedom</a></li> |
51 |
<li><a href="#enemies-of-free-software">18. Enemies of free software</a></li> |
52 |
<li><a href="#treacherous-computing">19. Treacherous computing</a></li> |
53 |
<li><a href="#help-gnu">20. Help GNU</a></li> |
54 |
<li><a href="#saint-ignucius">21. Saint Ignucius</a></li> |
55 |
<li><a href="#about-anonymity-credit-cards-cell-phones">22. About anonymity, credit cards, cell phones</a></li> |
56 |
<li><a href="#free-formats-copyright-microsoft">23. Free formats, |
57 |
copyright, Microsoft</a></li> |
58 |
<li><a href="#dangers-of-webmail-loss-of-freedom">24. Dangers of webmail loss of freedom</a></li> |
59 |
<li><a href="#copyright-art-vs-software">25. Copyright art vs. software</a></li> |
60 |
<li><a href="#malicious-free-software">26. Malicious free software</a></li> |
61 |
<li><a href="#patented-file-formats">27. Patented file formats</a></li> |
62 |
<li><a href="#games-as-free-software">28. Games as free software</a></li> |
63 |
<li><a href="#gpl-freedoms-for-cars-saving-seeds">29. GPL freedoms for |
64 |
cars, saving seeds</a></li> |
65 |
<li><a href="#no-software-is-better-than-non-free-software">30. No software is better than nonfree software</a></li> |
66 |
<li><a href="#portability-of-free-software">31. Portability of free |
67 |
software</a></li> |
68 |
<li><a href="#is-some-free-software-obfuscated-on-purpose">32. Is some |
69 |
free software obfuscated on purpose?</a></li> |
70 |
<li><a href="#proprietary-keeping-an-edge">33. Proprietary keeping an |
71 |
edge</a></li> |
72 |
<li><a href="#forbidding-is-forbidden-how-is-this-freedom">34. |
73 |
Forbidding is forbidden how is this freedom?</a></li> |
74 |
<li><a href="#can-google-help-free-software">35. Can Google help free |
75 |
software</a></li> |
76 |
<li><a href="#free-software-on-windows-good-or-bad">36. Free software on |
77 |
windows, good or bad</a></li> |
78 |
<li><a href="#scos-suit">37. SCO's suit</a></li> |
79 |
<li><a href="#stallmans-problem-typing">38. Stallman's problem typing</a></li> |
80 |
<li><a href="#open-source-good-or-bad-pat-riot-act">39. Open source, |
81 |
good or bad Pat-riot Act</a></li> |
82 |
<li><a href="#the-end">40. The end</a></li> |
83 |
</ul> |
84 |
<hr class="no-display" /> |
85 |
</div> |
86 |
|
87 |
<h3 id="introduction">1. Introduction</h3> |
88 |
|
89 |
<p><b>ED:</b> Well, thank you everybody for making it. I'm Ed Falk and |
90 |
this man needs very little introduction; if you don't know what the |
91 |
letters RMS stand for, you probably don't belong in this room.</p> |
92 |
|
93 |
<p>Richard was the founder of the Free Software Foundation, in 1984 I |
94 |
believe it was, and as such could be considered the father of free |
95 |
software and, of course, Google's infrastructure is based on free |
96 |
software. So we owe the free software movement quite a great deal of |
97 |
thanks. [And my mic is dying on this microphone so I won't talk too |
98 |
long.] This is Richard Stallman and we thank him for being here on short |
99 |
notice and we thank our mutual friend Lile Elam who arranged all of this |
100 |
and I think with no further ado, I give you Richard!</p> |
101 |
|
102 |
<p>[Richard bows]</p> |
103 |
|
104 |
<h3 id="how-it-started">2. How it started</h3> |
105 |
|
106 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> Please raise your hands if you cannot hear me. |
107 |
[Laughter] Yes, somebody raised his hand.</p> |
108 |
|
109 |
<p>So, the topic of my speech is free software. I didn't begin free |
110 |
software; there was free software going back to the early days of |
111 |
computing. As soon as there were a couple of computers of the same |
112 |
model, people could try sharing software. And they did.</p> |
113 |
|
114 |
<p>{This is not… This has a problem. How do we stop the feedback? Can |
115 |
someone do anything? I'm willing to get some feedback, but only from |
116 |
you, not from the PA system.</p> |
117 |
|
118 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> [unintelligible]</p> |
119 |
|
120 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> Well, that doesn't matter; I'm not an advocate of |
121 |
open source and never was and never will be.}</p> |
122 |
|
123 |
<p>So free software existed before I started programming and I had the |
124 |
good fortune, in the 1970s, of being part of a community of programmers |
125 |
who shared software. So I learned about free software as a way of life, |
126 |
by living it. And I came to appreciate what it meant to be free to share |
127 |
with people, not divided from the rest of the world by attitudes of |
128 |
secrecy and hostility.</p> |
129 |
|
130 |
<p>But that community died in the early '80s and I found myself |
131 |
confronted by the prospect of spending the rest of my life in a world of |
132 |
proprietary software. And, worst of all, confronted by the prospect of |
133 |
signing a non-disclosure agreement {which I}. And I had concluded that |
134 |
it is unethical to sign a non-disclosure agreement for generally useful |
135 |
technical information, such as software. To promise not to share with |
136 |
one's fellows is a violation of human solidarity. So when I saw that the |
137 |
machine downstairs was asking me to sign an NDA, I just said, “I can't |
138 |
sign an NDA.” Well, fortunately, there was an option; they let me come |
139 |
in here and speak without signing it, otherwise you would have had to go |
140 |
outside to listen. [Laughter]</p> |
141 |
|
142 |
<p>(They asked a couple of other interesting questions; they asked about |
143 |
company, so I said I'm available tonight. [Looking at name |
144 |
tag][Laughter] And they asked for my host, so I put down |
145 |
fencepost.gnu.org. But that's just the hacker spirit.)</p> |
146 |
|
147 |
<p>So I found myself in a situation where the only way you could get a |
148 |
modern computer and start to use it was to sign a non-disclosure |
149 |
agreement for some proprietary operating system. Because all the |
150 |
operating systems for modern computers in 1983 were proprietary, and |
151 |
there was no lawful way to get a copy of those operating systems without |
152 |
signing a non-disclosure agreement, which was unethical. So I decided to |
153 |
try to do something about it, to try to change that situation. And the |
154 |
only way I could think of to change it was to write another operating |
155 |
system, and then say as the author “this system is free; you can have it |
156 |
without a non-disclosure agreement and you're welcome to redistribute it |
157 |
to other people. You're welcome to study how it works. You're welcome to |
158 |
change it.” <span class="gnun-split"></span>So, instead of being divided |
159 |
and helpless, the users of this system would live in freedom. Ordinary |
160 |
proprietary software is part of a scheme where users are deliberately |
161 |
kept divided and helpless. The program comes with a license that says |
162 |
you're forbidden to share it, and in most cases you can't get the source |
163 |
code, so you can't study it or change it. It may even have malicious |
164 |
features and you can't tell. With free software, we respect the user's |
165 |
freedom, and that's the whole point. The reason for the free software |
166 |
movement is so that the people of cyberspace can have freedom, so that |
167 |
there is a way to live in freedom and still use a computer, to avoid |
168 |
being kept divided and helpless.</p> |
169 |
|
170 |
<h3 id="gnu-operating-system">3. GNU operating system</h3> |
171 |
|
172 |
<p>You can't use a computer without an operating system, so a free |
173 |
software operating system was absolutely essential. And in 1983 I |
174 |
announced my plan to develop one: an operating system called GNU.</p> |
175 |
|
176 |
<p>I had decided to make the system UNIX-like so that it would be |
177 |
portable. The operating system that we had used for many years at the |
178 |
Artificial Intelligence Lab was the Incompatible Timesharing System, or |
179 |
ITS. It had been written in assembler language for the PDP-10, so when |
180 |
Digital discontinued the PDP-10, our many years of work turned into dust |
181 |
and blew away. I didn't want to write another system and have the same |
182 |
thing happen, so I decided this system had better be portable. But there |
183 |
was only one successful portable operating system I knew of, and that |
184 |
was UNIX. So I decided to follow the design of UNIX, figuring that way |
185 |
I'd have a good chance of succeeding in making a system that was useful |
186 |
and portable. And then I decided to make the system upward-compatible |
187 |
with the interfaces of UNIX, and the reason for this was so that users |
188 |
could switch to it without an incompatible change.</p> |
189 |
|
190 |
<p>I realized that I could take the best ideas from the various systems |
191 |
I had helped develop or use and add my pet ideas and make my dream |
192 |
operating system. But this would have been incompatible, and the users |
193 |
would mostly have rejected it, saying “it would be too much work to |
194 |
switch, so we're just not going to.” So, by making the system |
195 |
upward-compatible with UNIX, I could spare the users that obstacle and |
196 |
make more of a chance that users would actually use the system.</p> |
197 |
|
198 |
<p>If the users had rejected it, I would have had a perfect excuse. I |
199 |
could have said “I offered them freedom and they rejected it; it's their |
200 |
fault.” But I wanted to make more than just an excuse. I wanted to |
201 |
build a community where people would actually live in freedom, which |
202 |
meant I had to develop a system people would actually use. So I decided |
203 |
to make the system upward-compatible with UNIX.</p> |
204 |
|
205 |
<p>Now, UNIX consists of many components that communicate through |
206 |
interfaces that are more or less documented. And the users use those |
207 |
interfaces. So to be compatible with UNIX required using the same |
208 |
interfaces, which meant that the initial design decisions were already |
209 |
made, except one: what range of target machines to support. UNIX had |
210 |
been designed to support 16-bit machines, which was a lot of extra work, |
211 |
because programs had to be kept small; so I decided to save that extra |
212 |
work by not supporting anything less than a 32-bit machine. I figured it |
213 |
would take many years to get the system done and by then people would |
214 |
normally be using 32-bit machines anyway, and that turned out to be |
215 |
true.</p> |
216 |
|
217 |
<p>So then the only thing that I needed before I could start work was a |
218 |
name. Now, to be a hacker means to enjoy playful cleverness—in |
219 |
programming, and in other areas of life, any area of life [where] you |
220 |
could be playfully clever. And there was a hacker tradition that when |
221 |
you were writing a program that was similar to some existing program, |
222 |
you could give your new program a name that's a recursive acronym, |
223 |
saying it is not the other program.</p> |
224 |
|
225 |
<p>For instance, in the '60s and '70s there were many TECO text editors, |
226 |
more or less similar; typically each system would have a TECO and it |
227 |
would be called something-or-other-TECO. But one clever hacker called |
228 |
his program TINT, for “TINT Is Not TECO”—the first recursive acronym. |
229 |
And we thought that was very funny. So after I developed the first |
230 |
Emacs extensible text editor in 1975, there were many imitations, and |
231 |
some were called this-or-that-Emacs. But one was called FINE for “FINE |
232 |
Is Not Emacs” and there was SINE for “SINE Is Not Emacs,” and EINE for |
233 |
“EINE Is Not Emacs,” and MINCE for “MINCE Is Not Complete Emacs.” Then |
234 |
EINE was mostly rewritten, and version two was called ZWEI for “ZWEI Was |
235 |
EINE Initially.” [Laughter]</p> |
236 |
|
237 |
<p>So I looked for a recursive acronym for “Something is not UNIX,” but |
238 |
the usual four-letter method was no good, because none of those was a |
239 |
word. And if it doesn't have some other meaning, it's not funny. So I |
240 |
thought, “what else can I do, hmm?” Nothing came to me, so I thought, |
241 |
“I'll make a contraction, then I could get a three-letter recursive |
242 |
acronym.” I started substituting all 26 letters: ANU, BNU, CNU, DNU, |
243 |
ENU, FNU, GNU! Well, “gnu” is the funniest word in the English language, |
244 |
so that had to be the choice. If you can call something “GNU,” it makes |
245 |
no sense to pick anything else.</p> |
246 |
|
247 |
<p>So, of course, the reason why the word “gnu” is used for so much |
248 |
word-play is that, according to the dictionary, it's pronounced “new.” |
249 |
So people started asking each other, “hey, what's g-nu,” as a joke, long |
250 |
before you could answer “GNU's Not UNIX.” But now you can give that |
251 |
answer and the best part is, it sounds like you're obnoxiously telling |
252 |
the person what it isn't, instead of answering his question. But the |
253 |
fact is, you're giving the exact meaning of GNU; so you are, in fact, |
254 |
answering the question in the most exact possible way, but it gives the |
255 |
appearance that you're refusing to.</p> |
256 |
|
257 |
<p>In any case, when it's the name of our operating system, please |
258 |
pronounce a hard G; don't follow the dictionary. If you talk about the |
259 |
“new” operating system, you'll get people very confused. We've been |
260 |
working on it for 20 years now, so it's not new anymore. But it still |
261 |
is, and always will be, GNU, no matter how many people call it Linux by |
262 |
mistake.</p> |
263 |
|
264 |
<p>{[<b>AUDIENCE:</b> unintelligible] |
265 |
[<b>RICHARD:</b> Thank you!]}</p> |
266 |
|
267 |
<p>So, having the name I could start work. I quit my job at MIT to begin |
268 |
writing pieces of the GNU operating system, in January 1984. I had to |
269 |
quit my job because, had I remained an MIT employee, that would have |
270 |
enabled MIT to claim to own all the code I was writing, and MIT could |
271 |
have turned it into proprietary software products. And since MIT had |
272 |
already done that kind of thing, I certainly couldn't trust them not to |
273 |
do so here. And I didn't want to have to argue with the MIT |
274 |
administration about all the details of the license I was going to use. |
275 |
So, by quitting my job, I took them out of the equation, and I have |
276 |
never had a job since then. However, the head of the AI Lab was nice |
277 |
enough to let me keep using the facilities, so I began using a UNIX |
278 |
machine at the AI Lab to start bootstrapping pieces of the GNU |
279 |
system.</p> |
280 |
|
281 |
<p>I had never used UNIX before that time. I was never a UNIX wizard and |
282 |
I chose to follow the design of UNIX for the exact reason that I've told |
283 |
you, not because UNIX was my favorite system or anything. Sometimes |
284 |
people write that it was changes in UNIX's licensing policy that |
285 |
inspired GNU. Well, this is not true; in fact, UNIX was never free |
286 |
software. They were more or less restrictive and more or less nasty |
287 |
about enforcing the requirements, but it was never free software, so |
288 |
those changes actually made no difference and, in any case, they took |
289 |
place long before I ever saw an actual UNIX machine.</p> |
290 |
|
291 |
<h3 id="gnu-emacs">4. GNU Emacs</h3> |
292 |
|
293 |
<p>So, at the time, I thought that I and the other people I was |
294 |
recruiting to try to help would develop all these pieces and make a |
295 |
complete system and then we'd say, “come and get it.” But that's not how |
296 |
it happened. In September '84, I started developing GNU Emacs, which was |
297 |
my second implementation of the extensible programmable text editor. And |
298 |
by early '85, it was suitable for me to do all my editing with it. Now, |
299 |
that was a big relief. You see, I had absolutely no intention of |
300 |
learning to use Vi. [Laughter, applause] So, until that point, I did my |
301 |
editing on other machines where there was an Emacs and copied the files |
302 |
through the net, in order to test them on the UNIX machine. Once GNU |
303 |
Emacs was running, I could do my editing on the UNIX machine.</p> |
304 |
|
305 |
<p>But other people wanted to get copies of GNU Emacs to use it for |
306 |
their editing, to use it on their UNIX systems. There was no GNU system |
307 |
yet, there were just a few pieces. But this one piece turned out to be |
308 |
interesting by itself. People asked me for copies, so I had to work out |
309 |
the details of how to distribute it. Of course, I put a copy in the |
310 |
anonymous FTP server, and that was good for people on the net, but in |
311 |
1985, most programmers were not on the Internet. So they asked me for |
312 |
copies; what was I going to say? I could have said, “I want to spend my |
313 |
time writing more pieces of the GNU system, not writing mag tapes, so |
314 |
please find a friend who can download it and put it on tape for you,” |
315 |
and they would have found people sooner or later, because programmers |
316 |
generally know other programmers.</p> |
317 |
|
318 |
<h3 id="expensive-habits">5. Expensive habits</h3> |
319 |
|
320 |
<p>But I had no job, and I was looking for some way to make some money |
321 |
through my work on free software. So I announced, “send me $150 and I'll |
322 |
mail you a tape of GNU Emacs.” And the orders began dribbling in. By the |
323 |
middle of the year, they were trickling in, eight to ten orders a month, |
324 |
which, if necessary, I could have lived on.</p> |
325 |
|
326 |
<p>That's because I make efforts to resist expensive habits. An |
327 |
expensive habit is like a trap; it's dangerous. Now most Americans have |
328 |
the exact opposite attitude: if they make this much money, they look for |
329 |
how to spend this much, [makes ample gesture] which is completely |
330 |
imprudent. So they start buying houses and cars and boats and planes and |
331 |
rare stamps and artwork and adventure travel and children, [laughter] |
332 |
all sorts of expensive luxuries that use up a lot of the world's |
333 |
resources, especially the children. <span class="gnun-split"></span>And |
334 |
then, the next thing they know, they've got to desperately struggle all |
335 |
day long to get money to pay for these things, so they have no time even |
336 |
to enjoy them, which is especially sad when it's a matter of children. |
337 |
The other things, I guess, can get repossessed. So then they become |
338 |
puppets of money, unable to decide what they're going to do with their |
339 |
lives. If you don't want to be a puppet of money, then resist the |
340 |
expensive habits, so that the less you need to spend to live on, the |
341 |
more flexibility you've got and the less of your life you're forced to |
342 |
spend to make that money.</p> |
343 |
|
344 |
<p>So I still live, basically, like a student, and I want it to be that |
345 |
way.</p> |
346 |
|
347 |
<h3 id="definition-of-free-software">6. Definition of free software</h3> |
348 |
|
349 |
<p>But people sometimes used to say to me, “what do you mean, it's free |
350 |
software, if it costs $150?” Well, the English word “free” has multiple |
351 |
meanings and they were confused by that. It even took me a few years to |
352 |
realize that I needed to clarify this. One meaning, you see, refers to |
353 |
price, and another meaning refers to freedom. When we speak of free |
354 |
software, we're talking about freedom, not price. So think of “free |
355 |
speech,” not “free beer.”</p> |
356 |
|
357 |
<p>Some users got their copies of GNU Emacs from me through the net, and |
358 |
did not pay. Some users got their copies from me on a tape, and did pay. |
359 |
And some got their copies from someone else, not from me, because |
360 |
everyone who had a copy was free to redistribute it. And did they pay |
361 |
that somebody else? Well, I don't know; that was between them. They |
362 |
didn't have to tell me. So GNU Emacs was gratis for some users and paid |
363 |
for for other users, but it was free software for all of them, because |
364 |
all of them had certain essential freedoms, which are the definition of |
365 |
free software.</p> |
366 |
|
367 |
<p>So let me now give you the definition of free software. You see, it's |
368 |
very easy to say “I'm in favor of freedom.” I mean, even Bush can say |
369 |
that. [Laughter] I don't think he knows what it means. But the point is, |
370 |
unless you make a person get more specific, it's just cheap talk. So let |
371 |
me give you—let me get more specific now, and give you the definition |
372 |
of free software.</p> |
373 |
|
374 |
<p>A program is free software for you, a particular user, if you have |
375 |
the following four freedoms:</p> |
376 |
|
377 |
<p>Freedom 0 is the freedom to run the program however you like; |
378 |
Freedom 1 is the freedom to help yourself by studying the source code to |
379 |
see what the program really does and then changing it to do what you |
380 |
want; |
381 |
Freedom 2 is the freedom to help your neighbor by distributing copies to |
382 |
others; and |
383 |
Freedom 3 is the freedom to help build your community, that is the |
384 |
freedom to publish a modified version so others can benefit from your |
385 |
changes;</p> |
386 |
|
387 |
<p>All four of these freedoms are essential. They are not levels of |
388 |
freedom, they are four freedoms, all of which you must have in order for |
389 |
the program to qualify as free software. All of these are freedoms that |
390 |
no computer user should ever be denied.</p> |
391 |
|
392 |
<p>[<a href="/philosophy/free-sw.html">gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html</a>]</p> |
393 |
|
394 |
<h3 id="freedom-2-moral-dilemma">7. Freedom 2 moral dilemma</h3> |
395 |
|
396 |
<p>Why these particular freedoms? Why should we define it this way?</p> |
397 |
|
398 |
<p>Freedom 2 is necessary so that you can live an upright life, so that |
399 |
you can be ethical, be a good member of society. If you use a program |
400 |
that does not give you Freedom 2, the freedom to help your neighbor, the |
401 |
freedom to distribute copies to others, then you are facing a potential |
402 |
moral dilemma that could happen at any moment, when somebody comes up |
403 |
and says, “could I have a copy of that program?” At that point, what are |
404 |
you going to do? You're forced to choose between two evils. One evil is |
405 |
to make a copy of the program for that person and violate the license. |
406 |
The other evil is to comply with the license, but be a bad neighbor. So |
407 |
you've got to choose the lesser evil, which is to make a copy for that |
408 |
person and violate the license. [Laughter, applause]</p> |
409 |
|
410 |
<p>You see, in this case, this evil is lesser because it's directed at |
411 |
somebody who intentionally tried to divide you from the rest of society, |
412 |
and thus did something extremely wrong to you; and therefore deserves |
413 |
it. However, it's not good to live your life by lying to people. When |
414 |
somebody {asks you to promise that} says, “I'll let you have a copy of |
415 |
this, but you'll have to promise not to share it with anyone,” the right |
416 |
thing to do is say no. Once you have thought about this moral dilemma, |
417 |
you should anticipate that when you start using that program it's going |
418 |
to lead you to choose between two evils, and therefore you should refuse |
419 |
to use that program. You should just say “no, thanks” to it, and that's |
420 |
the principle that I believe in. If someone offers me a program that I'm |
421 |
not free to share with you, I'm going to say no, on principle.</p> |
422 |
|
423 |
<p>In fact, I was once in the audience when John Perry Barlow was giving |
424 |
a speech and he said, “raise your hands if you have no unauthorized |
425 |
copies of software.” And he was surprised to see someone raise his hand, |
426 |
until he saw it was me. And then he said, “oh, of course, you,” because |
427 |
he knew why I have no unauthorized copies; that's because all my copies |
428 |
of software are free software, and everybody's authorized to make |
429 |
copies. That's the whole point.</p> |
430 |
|
431 |
<h3 id="freedom-2-spirit-of-good-will">8. Freedom 2 spirit of good |
432 |
will</h3> |
433 |
|
434 |
<p>The most essential resource of any society is the spirit of good |
435 |
will, the willingness to help your neighbor; not necessarily every time |
436 |
you're asked, but fairly often. This is what makes the difference |
437 |
between a livable society and a dog-eat-dog jungle. This spirit is not |
438 |
going to be 100% and it's not going to be zero, but it's going to be |
439 |
somewhere in between—and cultural actions can influence it, can raise |
440 |
it or lower it. And it's essential to work to raise it some, because |
441 |
that makes life easier for everyone. So it's no accident that the |
442 |
world's major religions have been encouraging this spirit of good will |
443 |
for thousands of years.</p> |
444 |
|
445 |
<p>So what does it mean when powerful social institutions say that it's |
446 |
wrong to share? They're poisoning this vital resource, something no |
447 |
society can afford. Now what does it mean when they say that if you |
448 |
share with your neighbor, you're a pirate? They're saying that helping |
449 |
your neighbor is the moral equivalent of attacking a ship. Well, nothing |
450 |
could be more wrong than that. Attacking ships is very, very bad; |
451 |
helping your neighbor is good.</p> |
452 |
|
453 |
<p>And what does it mean when they establish harsh punishments for |
454 |
anyone caught sharing? How much fear do you think it's going to take |
455 |
before everyone's too scared to help his neighbor? And do you want that |
456 |
terror campaign to go on in our society? I hope that the answer is no. |
457 |
We need to abolish the war on copying that is being imposed on our |
458 |
society. We need to say, loud and clear, “copying and sharing with your |
459 |
neighbor is good, it's legitimate, and laws that prohibit this are |
460 |
wrong.”</p> |
461 |
|
462 |
<h3 id="freedom-0-to-run-a-program-freedom-1-to-modify-it">9. Freedom 0 |
463 |
to run a program, Freedom 1 to modify it</h3> |
464 |
|
465 |
<p>So that's the reason for Freedom 2; it's essentially an ethical |
466 |
reason. You can't live an ethical life if you don't have Freedom 2.</p> |
467 |
|
468 |
<p>Freedom 0 is needed for a completely different reason: so you can |
469 |
control your own computer. If you are restricted in when or how much or |
470 |
how you can run the program, clearly you're not using your computer in |
471 |
freedom. So Freedom 0 is obvious, but freedom 0 is not enough, because |
472 |
with Freedom 0 all you can do is use the program the way it was |
473 |
programmed by its developer. You're free to do this [makes hand sign] or |
474 |
nothing. To really be free, you've got to be in control of what the |
475 |
program does, so you need Freedom 1, which is the freedom to help |
476 |
yourself, the freedom to study the source code and then change it to do |
477 |
what you want.</p> |
478 |
|
479 |
<p>If you don't have Freedom 1, you don't know what the program's doing. |
480 |
The developer is saying, “just trust me” and blind faith is the only way |
481 |
you can do it. And you have to be really blind, given that it's not |
482 |
unusual for proprietary programs to have malicious features, features |
483 |
that are put in not to serve the user, but rather to impose on, harm or |
484 |
restrict the user. For instance, spyware is quite common.</p> |
485 |
|
486 |
<p>[51 seconds of missing audio were filled in by RMS in Aug 2010]</p> |
487 |
|
488 |
<p>Microsoft Windows spies on the user; specific spy features have been |
489 |
found. Windows Media Player spies too; it reports to Microsoft |
490 |
whatever the user looks at.</p> |
491 |
|
492 |
<p>[End replacement for 51 seconds of missing audio]</p> |
493 |
|
494 |
<p>course do it. RealPlayer, for instance, spies on you. The TiVo spies |
495 |
on you. Some people were excited about the TiVo, enthusiastic about it, |
496 |
because it uses some free software inside. But it also has nonfree |
497 |
software in it and it spies on you. So this shows it's not enough. We |
498 |
shouldn't cheer when something uses some free software; we should cheer |
499 |
when it respects the user's freedom.</p> |
500 |
|
501 |
<h3 id="drm-back-doors-bugs">10. DRM, back doors, bugs</h3> |
502 |
|
503 |
<p>But spyware is not as bad as it gets. There are nonfree software |
504 |
packages that are deliberately designed to refuse to work. This is |
505 |
called DRM, Digital Restrictions Management, where the program says, “I |
506 |
won't let you look at that file; I won't let you copy this; I won't let |
507 |
you edit this.” Well, who the hell is this program to stop you? And |
508 |
sometimes nonfree programs will reconfigure your machine, for instance |
509 |
make it display advertisements, figuring that you won't know it's going |
510 |
to happen and you won't know how to undo it afterward.</p> |
511 |
|
512 |
<p>And sometimes they have actual back doors. For instance, Windows XP |
513 |
has a back door: when it asks for an upgrade, it tells Microsoft who you |
514 |
are, so Microsoft can give you an upgrade designed just for you. And |
515 |
this upgrade could have secret accounts, it could have special spy |
516 |
features, it could just refuse to work. And there's essentially nothing |
517 |
you can do. So that's the back door that Microsoft knows about and we |
518 |
know about.</p> |
519 |
|
520 |
<p>[Added in 2010: We later learned that Microsoft can force |
521 |
“upgrades”—a much nastier back door.]</p> |
522 |
|
523 |
<p>There might be other back doors that we don't know about and maybe |
524 |
even Microsoft doesn't know about. When I was in India in January, I was |
525 |
told some programmers in India had been arrested and accused of working |
526 |
for Al-Qaeda, trying to introduce back doors into Windows XP. So, |
527 |
apparently, that effort failed. But did some others succeed? There's no |
528 |
way we can tell.</p> |
529 |
|
530 |
<p>Now, I won't claim that all developers of nonfree software put in |
531 |
malicious features. There are some who try to put in features so that |
532 |
they will be convenient for the user and only for that. But they are |
533 |
humans, so they make mistakes. They can design features with all the |
534 |
best will that you don't like, or they can write bugs in their code. And |
535 |
when that happens, you're helpless too; you're the helpless prisoner of |
536 |
any decision that they make. Whether it's malicious or made with good |
537 |
will, if you don't like it, you're stuck.</p> |
538 |
|
539 |
<p>Now, we, the developers of free software, are also human, we also |
540 |
make mistakes. I have designed features that users didn't like. I have |
541 |
written code that had bugs in it. The difference is, {with our} you're |
542 |
not a prisoner of our decisions, because we don't keep you helpless. If |
543 |
you don't like my decisions, you can change them, because you have the |
544 |
freedom to change them. I won't blame the developers of nonfree, |
545 |
user-subjugating software for being human and making mistakes; I will |
546 |
blame them for keeping you helpless prisoner of their mistakes by |
547 |
denying you the freedom to correct those mistakes yourself.</p> |
548 |
|
549 |
<h3 id="freedom-3-having-no-master">11. Freedom 3 having no |
550 |
master</h3> |
551 |
|
552 |
<p>But Freedom 1 is not enough. Freedom 1 is the freedom personally to |
553 |
study and change the source code. Freedom 1 is not enough because there |
554 |
are millions of users who use computers, but don't know how to program, |
555 |
so they can't take advantage of Freedom 1, not personally. And Freedom 1 |
556 |
is not enough even for us programmers, because there's just so much |
557 |
software, even so much free software, that nobody has the time to study |
558 |
it all and master it all and make all the changes that she wants.</p> |
559 |
|
560 |
<p>So the only way we can really, fully have control over our own |
561 |
software is if we do so together. And that's what Freedom 3 is for. |
562 |
Freedom 3 is the freedom to publish a modified version, so others can |
563 |
use it too. And this is what enables us to work together, taking control |
564 |
of our software. Because I could make this change in a program and |
565 |
publish the modified version, and then you could make that change and |
566 |
publish the modified version, and someone else can make that change and |
567 |
publish the modified version. And now we've got a version with all three |
568 |
changes in it and everybody can switch to that if everybody likes |
569 |
it.</p> |
570 |
|
571 |
<p>With this freedom, any collectivity of users can take control |
572 |
together and make the software do what they together want. Suppose there |
573 |
are 1,000,000 users who would like a certain change. Well, by luck, some |
574 |
of them will be programmers; let's say there are 10,000 of them who know |
575 |
how to program. Well, sooner or later, a few of them will make the |
576 |
change and publish the modified version and then all of those million |
577 |
users can switch to it. You know, most of them don't know how to |
578 |
program, but they can still switch to it. So they all get what they |
579 |
want.</p> |
580 |
|
581 |
<p>Now let's suppose there are only 1,000 people who want some other |
582 |
change and none of them knows how to program. They can still make use of |
583 |
these freedoms. They can form an organization and each put in money, so |
584 |
if each puts in $100, that makes $100,000. And at that point they can go |
585 |
to a programming company and say, “will you make this change for |
586 |
$100,000 and when can you have it done?” And if they don't like the |
587 |
answer from there, they can go to another programming company and say, |
588 |
“will you make this change and when can you have it done?” Which shows |
589 |
us, first of all, that these 1,000 users who don't know how to program |
590 |
can, by using the four freedoms, get the change that they want. And |
591 |
second, it shows that free software means a free market for support.</p> |
592 |
|
593 |
<p>Proprietary software typically means a monopoly for support. Only the |
594 |
developer has the source code in most cases, so only the developer can |
595 |
offer any support. If you want a change, you've got to go to the |
596 |
developer and beg. Now, if you're very big and important, maybe the |
597 |
developer will pay attention. If you're not, the developer will say, “go |
598 |
away, don't bother me.” Or maybe the developer will say, “pay us and |
599 |
we'll let you report a bug.” And if you do that, the developer will say, |
600 |
“thank you. In six months there will be an upgrade. Buy the upgrade and |
601 |
you'll see if this bug was fixed and you will see what new bugs we have |
602 |
for you.”</p> |
603 |
|
604 |
<p>But with free software, you're dealing with a free market, so that |
605 |
those who really value support can, in general, get better support for |
606 |
their money by using free software. Now, one paradoxical consequence of |
607 |
this is, when you have a choice between several nonfree programs to do |
608 |
a job, this is actually a choice between monopolies. If you pick this |
609 |
program, the support for it afterwards will be a monopoly. If you pick |
610 |
this program, [points hand in different direction] the support for it |
611 |
will be a different monopoly, and if you pick this program, [points hand |
612 |
in different direction] the support for it will be yet another monopoly. |
613 |
So you're choosing one of these three monopolies.</p> |
614 |
|
615 |
<p>Now, what this shows is that merely having a choice between a |
616 |
discrete set of options is not freedom. Freedom is something much deeper |
617 |
and much broader than having a few choices you can make. Many people try |
618 |
to equate freedom with having some choice and they're missing the point |
619 |
completely. Freedom means that you get to make the decisions about how |
620 |
to live your life. {It doesn't mean, you know} Having three choices |
621 |
about being able to choose this master or this master or this master is |
622 |
just a choice of masters, and a choice of masters is not freedom. |
623 |
Freedom is having no master.</p> |
624 |
|
625 |
<h3 id="copyleft-forbidding-is-forbidden">12. Copyleft forbidding is |
626 |
forbidden</h3> |
627 |
|
628 |
<p>So I've explained the reasons for the four freedoms. And thus I've |
629 |
explained to you what free software means. A program is free software |
630 |
for you, a particular user, if you have all of these four freedoms. Why |
631 |
do I define it that way? The reason is that sometimes the same code can |
632 |
be free software for some users and nonfree for the rest. This might |
633 |
seem strange, so let me give you an example to show how it happens.</p> |
634 |
|
635 |
<p>The biggest example I know of is the X Window System. It was |
636 |
developed at MIT in the late '80s and released under a license that gave |
637 |
the user all four freedoms, so if you got X in source code under that |
638 |
license, it was free software for you. Among those who got it were |
639 |
various computer manufacturers that distributed UNIX systems. They got |
640 |
the source code for X, they changed it as necessary to run on their |
641 |
platform, they compiled it and they put the binaries into their UNIX |
642 |
system, and they distributed only the binaries to all of their customers |
643 |
under the same license as the rest of UNIX—the same non-disclosure |
644 |
agreement. <span class="gnun-split"></span>So, for those many users, |
645 |
the X Window System was no more free than the rest of UNIX. In this |
646 |
paradoxical situation, the answer to the question “is X free software or |
647 |
not?” depended on where you made the measurement. If you made the |
648 |
measurement coming out of the developer's group, you'd say, “I observe |
649 |
all four freedoms; it's free software.” If you made the measurement |
650 |
among the users, you'd say, “most of them don't have these freedoms; |
651 |
it's not free software.”</p> |
652 |
|
653 |
<p>The developers of X did not consider this a problem, because their |
654 |
goal was not to give users freedom, it was to have a big success, and as |
655 |
far as they were concerned, those many users who were using the X Window |
656 |
System without freedom were just a part of their big success. But, in |
657 |
the GNU Project, our goal specifically was to give the users freedom. If |
658 |
what happened to X had happened to GNU, GNU would be a failure.</p> |
659 |
|
660 |
<p>So I looked for a way to stop this from happening. And the method I |
661 |
came up with is called copyleft. Copyleft is based legally on copyright |
662 |
law, and you can think of it as taking copyright and flipping it over to |
663 |
get copyleft.</p> |
664 |
|
665 |
<p>Here's how it works: we start with a copyright notice which legally |
666 |
doesn't actually make a difference anymore, but it reminds people that |
667 |
the program is copyrighted, which means that, by default, it's |
668 |
prohibited to copy, distribute or modify this program. |
669 |
<span class="gnun-split"></span>But then we say, “you are authorized to |
670 |
make copies, you are authorized to distribute them, you are authorized |
671 |
to modify this program and you are authorized to publish modified or |
672 |
extended versions.” But there is a condition, and the condition says |
673 |
that any program you distribute that contains any substantial part of |
674 |
this must, as a whole, be distributed under these conditions, no more |
675 |
and no less. Which means that, no matter how many people modify the |
676 |
program or how much, as long as any substantial amount of our code is in |
677 |
there, that program must be free software in the same way. In effect, we |
678 |
guarantee that nobody can put himself between you and me and strip off |
679 |
the freedom and pass the code on to you missing the freedom. In other |
680 |
words, forbidding is forbidden.</p> |
681 |
|
682 |
<h3 id="general-public-license">13. GNU General Public License</h3> |
683 |
|
684 |
<p>Copyleft makes the four freedoms into inalienable rights for all |
685 |
users, so that wherever the code goes, the freedom goes with it. The |
686 |
specific license that we use to implement the general concept of |
687 |
copyleft is called the GNU General Public License, or GNU GPL for short. |
688 |
This license is used for around two thirds or three quarters of all free |
689 |
software packages. But that still leaves a substantial number that have |
690 |
other licenses. Some of those licenses are copyleft licenses, some are |
691 |
not. So we have copylefted free software and we have non-copylefted free |
692 |
software. <span class="gnun-split"></span>In both cases, the developers |
693 |
have respected your freedom; they have not tried to trample your |
694 |
freedom. The difference is, with copyleft we go further and we actively |
695 |
defend your freedom against anyone who would try to be a middleman and |
696 |
take it away from you, whereas the developers of non-copylefted free |
697 |
software don't do that. They have not tried to take away your freedom, |
698 |
but they don't actively protect your freedom from anyone else. So I |
699 |
think that they could do more for the sake of freedom. But they haven't |
700 |
done anything bad; insofar as they have done things, those things are |
701 |
good. So I won't say that they are wrong, I will just say that they |
702 |
could do more. I think that they're making a mistake.</p> |
703 |
|
704 |
<p>But their work is free software, so it does contribute to our |
705 |
community and, in fact, that software can be part of a free operating |
706 |
system such as GNU.</p> |
707 |
|
708 |
<h3 id="developing-gnu">13a. Developing GNU</h3> |
709 |
|
710 |
<p>During the 1980s, our work on the GNU Project was to develop or find |
711 |
all these pieces of GNU so that we could have a complete GNU system. In |
712 |
some cases, someone else wrote a program and made it free software and |
713 |
we were able to use it, and that was good because it shortened the work |
714 |
that we had to do. For instance, the X Window System is one of the |
715 |
programs that was developed by others for reasons of their own, but they |
716 |
did make it free software, so we could use it.</p> |
717 |
|
718 |
<p>Now, people were saying the job was so big, we'd never finish it. |
719 |
Well, I thought we would eventually get a free operating system but I |
720 |
agreed the job was big; we had to look for shortcuts. So, for instance, |
721 |
I always wanted to have windowing facilities in GNU. I had written a |
722 |
couple of window systems at the AI LAB before even starting GNU, so of |
723 |
course I wanted that in the system. But we never developed a GNU window |
724 |
system because someone else developed X first. I looked at it and I |
725 |
said, “well, it's not copylefted, but it is free, it's popular, it's |
726 |
powerful, so let's just use it.” And so we saved one big chunk of work. |
727 |
So we took it, X, and we put it into the GNU system and we started |
728 |
making other pieces of GNU work with X. Because the goal was to have a |
729 |
free operating system, not to have a free operating system every piece |
730 |
of which had been written purposely by us just for that.</p> |
731 |
|
732 |
<h3 id="making-money-off-free-software">14. Making money off free |
733 |
software</h3> |
734 |
|
735 |
<p>However, it only happened occasionally that someone else released |
736 |
some free software that was useful in GNU and when it happened, it was a |
737 |
coincidence, because they were not writing this software in order to |
738 |
have a free operating system. So when it happened, that was great, but |
739 |
there were lots of other pieces we had to develop. Some were developed |
740 |
by staff of the Free Software Foundation. The Free Software Foundation |
741 |
is a tax-exempt charity to promote free software which we founded in |
742 |
October, '85, after GNU Emacs' popularity suggested that people might |
743 |
actually start donating money to the GNU project. |
744 |
<span class="gnun-split"></span>So we founded the Free Software |
745 |
Foundation and it asked for donations, but also took over selling the |
746 |
tapes of GNU Emacs. And it turns out that most of the FSF's income for |
747 |
the first many years came from that, from selling things, from selling |
748 |
copies of software and manuals that everyone was free to copy. Now this |
749 |
is interesting, because this was supposedly impossible; but we did it |
750 |
anyway.</p> |
751 |
|
752 |
<p>Now that meant I had to find some other way to make a living. As the |
753 |
president of the FSF, I did not want to compete with it; I thought that |
754 |
would be unfair and not correct behavior. So I started making my living |
755 |
by commissions to change the software I had written and teaching classes |
756 |
about it. So people would want some change to be made in Emacs or GCC, |
757 |
and they would think of hiring me, because they figured I was the author |
758 |
so I could do a better job faster. So I started charging as much as $250 |
759 |
an hour and I calculated I could make a living in 7 weeks of paid work |
760 |
per year—and that meant enough money to spend, an equal amount to |
761 |
save, and an equal amount for taxes. And [when I reached] that point I |
762 |
figured, “I won't take any more paid work this year, I've got other, |
763 |
better things to do.”</p> |
764 |
|
765 |
<p>So I've actually had three different free software businesses during |
766 |
the period I've been working on GNU. I've described two of them; the |
767 |
third one is, I get paid for some of my speeches. Whether I get paid for |
768 |
this speech, I don't yet know. [Laughter] I said, “please pay me what |
769 |
you can.” Now, I think Google ought to be able to afford to pay me some |
770 |
handsome amount, but whether it will, I don't know. Anyway, I figured |
771 |
it's worth doing the speech just for the good it will do for the |
772 |
movement.</p> |
773 |
|
774 |
<h3 id="why-write-free-software">15. Why write free software</h3> |
775 |
|
776 |
<p>So this raises the question of why people develop free software. You |
777 |
see, there are people who believe that no one would ever write software |
778 |
except to get paid, that that's the only motive that anyone would ever |
779 |
have to write code. It's amazing, the kind of utterly stupid, simplistic |
780 |
theories that people will sometimes believe because that's part of a |
781 |
prevailing ideology.</p> |
782 |
|
783 |
<p>Now, human nature is very complex. Whatever it is people are doing, |
784 |
they might do for various reasons. In fact, one person will often have |
785 |
multiple motives simultaneously for a single act. Nonetheless, there are |
786 |
people who say, “if the software is free, that means nobody's paid to |
787 |
write it, so no one will write it.” Now, obviously they were confusing |
788 |
the two meanings of the word “free,” so their theory was based on a |
789 |
confusion. In any case, we can compare their theory with empirical fact |
790 |
and we can see that at least hundreds, maybe thousands of people are |
791 |
paid to work on free software, including some people here, I believe, |
792 |
and there are about a million or so people developing free software at |
793 |
all for the many different reasons they have. {So to say that nobody} |
794 |
This simplistic theory about motivation is absurd.</p> |
795 |
|
796 |
<p>So let's see what motivates people to write free software; what are |
797 |
the real motives? Well, I don't necessarily know about them. There could |
798 |
always be a person who has a motive that I don't know about or I've |
799 |
forgotten about. I can only tell you the motives that I recall |
800 |
encountering.</p> |
801 |
|
802 |
<p>One motive is political idealism: making the world a better place |
803 |
where we can live together in freedom. Now, that's a very important |
804 |
motive for me, but it's not my only motive. And there are others who |
805 |
write free software and don't agree with that motive at all.</p> |
806 |
|
807 |
<p>Another motive that's very important is fun. Programming is |
808 |
tremendous fun. Not for everybody, of course, but for a lot of the best |
809 |
programmers. And these are the people whose contributions we want most. |
810 |
In fact, it's so much fun, it's especially fun, when no one can tell you |
811 |
what to do, which is why so many people who have jobs programming like |
812 |
to write free software in their spare time.</p> |
813 |
|
814 |
<p>But this is not the only motive; another motive is to be appreciated. |
815 |
If 1% of our community is using your program, that's hundreds of |
816 |
thousands of users. That's a lot of people admiring you.</p> |
817 |
|
818 |
<p>Another related, but different, motive is professional reputation. If |
819 |
1% of our community is using your program, you can put that on your |
820 |
resume and it proves you're a good programmer. You don't even have to go |
821 |
to school.</p> |
822 |
|
823 |
<p>Another motivation is gratitude. If you've been using the community's |
824 |
free software for years and appreciating it, then when you write a |
825 |
program, that's your opportunity to pay something back to the community |
826 |
that has given you so much.</p> |
827 |
|
828 |
<p>Another motivation is hatred for Microsoft. [Laughter] Now, this is a |
829 |
rather foolish motive, because Microsoft is really just one of many |
830 |
developers of nonfree software and they're all doing the same evil |
831 |
thing. It's a mistake to focus [solely] on Microsoft, and this mistake |
832 |
can have bad consequences. When people focus too much on Microsoft, they |
833 |
start forgetting that all the others are doing something just as bad. |
834 |
And they may end up thinking that anything that competes with Microsoft |
835 |
is good, even if it is also nonfree software and thus inherently just |
836 |
as evil. <span class="gnun-split"></span>Now, it's true that these |
837 |
other companies have not subjugated as many users as Microsoft has, but |
838 |
that's not for want of trying; they just haven't succeeded in |
839 |
mistreating as many people as Microsoft has, which is hardly, ethically |
840 |
speaking, an excuse. Nonetheless, {when this particular motive |
841 |
motivates} this motive does motivate people to develop free software, so |
842 |
we have to count it as one of the motives that has this result.</p> |
843 |
|
844 |
<p>And another motive is money. When people were being paid to develop |
845 |
free software, that's part of their motive for the work that they're |
846 |
doing. In fact, when I was paid to make improvements in various programs |
847 |
I had written, that money was part of my motive for doing those |
848 |
particular jobs, too.</p> |
849 |
|
850 |
<p>[RMS, 2010: A motive I forgot to mention is improving a free program |
851 |
because you want to use the improvement yourself.]</p> |
852 |
|
853 |
<p>So there are many possible motives to write free software. And, |
854 |
fortunately, there are many developers of free software and a lot of |
855 |
free software is being developed.</p> |
856 |
|
857 |
<h3 id="linux-kernel">16. The Kernel, Linux</h3> |
858 |
|
859 |
<p>So, during the 1980s we were filling in these missing pieces of the |
860 |
GNU operating system. By the early '90s we had almost everything |
861 |
necessary. Only one important piece was missing, one essential piece for |
862 |
an initial system, and that was the kernel. We started developing a |
863 |
kernel in 1990. {I was looking for some way to} I was looking for some |
864 |
shortcut, some way we could start from something existing. I thought |
865 |
that debugging a kernel would be painful, because you don't get to do it |
866 |
with your symbolic debugger, and when it crashes, it's sort of |
867 |
annoying.</p> |
868 |
|
869 |
<p>So I was looking for a way to bypass that work, and I found one |
870 |
eventually, a microkernel called Mach that had been developed as a |
871 |
funded project at Carnegie Mellon. Now, Mach doesn't have all the |
872 |
features of UNIX; the idea is, it provides certain general low-level |
873 |
features and you implement the rest in user programs. Well, that, I |
874 |
thought, would be easy to debug, because they're user programs; when |
875 |
they crash, the system isn't dead. So people began working on those user |
876 |
programs, which we called the GNU Hurd, because it's a herd of GNU |
877 |
servers (you see, gnus live in herds).</p> |
878 |
|
879 |
<p>Anyway, I thought that this design would enable us to get the job |
880 |
done faster, but it didn't work out that way; it actually took many |
881 |
years to get the Hurd to run, partly because Mach was unreliable, partly |
882 |
because the debugging environment wasn't very good, partly because it's |
883 |
hard to debug these multithreaded, asynchronous programs and partly |
884 |
because this was somewhat of a research project. At least that's as far |
885 |
as I can tell; I was never involved in the actual development of the |
886 |
Hurd.</p> |
887 |
|
888 |
<p>Fortunately, we didn't have to wait for that, because in 1991, Linus |
889 |
Torvalds, a Finnish college student, developed his own kernel, using the |
890 |
traditional monolithic design, and he got it to barely run in less than |
891 |
a year. Initially, Linux—that's what this kernel's name was—was not |
892 |
free, but in 1992 he re-released it under the GNU General Public License |
893 |
and at that point it was free software. And so it was possible, by |
894 |
combining Linux and the GNU system, to make a complete free operating |
895 |
system. And thus, the goal we had set out for, that I had announced in |
896 |
1983, had been reached: there was, for the first time, a complete modern |
897 |
operating system for modern computers, and it was possible to get a |
898 |
modern computer and run it without betraying the rest of humanity, |
899 |
without being subjugated. You could do this by installing the GNU + |
900 |
Linux operating system.</p> |
901 |
|
902 |
<h3 id="gnu-vs-linux-confusion-problem-freedom">17. GNU vs. Linux |
903 |
confusion problem freedom</h3> |
904 |
|
905 |
<p>But the people who combined GNU and Linux got confused and they |
906 |
started naming the entire thing Linux, which was actually the name of |
907 |
one piece. And somehow that confusion spread faster than we have been |
908 |
able to correct it. So I'm sure you've heard many people speaking of |
909 |
Linux as an operating system, an operating system {most of which} which |
910 |
basically started in 1984 under the name of the GNU Project.</p> |
911 |
|
912 |
<p>Now, this clearly isn't right. This system isn't Linux; it contains |
913 |
Linux, Linux is the kernel, but the system as a whole is basically GNU. |
914 |
So I ask you: please don't call it Linux. If you call it Linux, you're |
915 |
giving Linus Torvalds credit for our work. Now, he contributed one |
916 |
important piece of the system, but he didn't contribute the biggest part |
917 |
and the overall vision was there long before he got involved. We started |
918 |
developing the system when he was in junior high school. So please give |
919 |
us equal mention; surely we deserve at least that. You can do that by |
920 |
calling the system GNU/Linux, or GNU+Linux, or GNU&Linux, whichever |
921 |
punctuation mark you feel expresses it best.</p> |
922 |
|
923 |
<p>[<a |
924 |
href="/gnu/gnu-linux-faq.html">gnu.org/gnu/gnu-linux-faq.html</a>]</p> |
925 |
|
926 |
<p>Now, of course, part of the reason why I'm asking for this is that we |
927 |
deserve credit, but that's not really a very important thing. If it were |
928 |
just a matter of credit, it wouldn't be worth making a fuss about. But |
929 |
there more at stake here. You see, when people think that the system is |
930 |
Linux, they then assume incorrectly that it was mainly developed and |
931 |
started by Linus Torvalds and then they assume incorrectly that the |
932 |
overall vision came from him, so they look at his vision and follow |
933 |
that. Now, his vision is apolitical. He's not motivated to fight for |
934 |
freedom. He doesn't believe that computer users deserve the freedom to |
935 |
share and change software. He has never supported our philosophy. Well, |
936 |
he has a right to his views and the fact that he disagrees with us |
937 |
doesn't reduce the value of his contribution.</p> |
938 |
|
939 |
<p>The reason we have the GNU+Linux system is because of a many-year |
940 |
campaign for freedom. We in the GNU Project didn't develop Linux, just |
941 |
as we didn't develop X, or TeX, or various other free programs that are |
942 |
now important parts of the system. But people who didn't share our |
943 |
values, who weren't motivated by the determination to live in freedom, |
944 |
would have seen no reason to aim for a complete system, and they would |
945 |
never have done so, and never have produced such a thing, if not for |
946 |
us.</p> |
947 |
|
948 |
<p>But this tends to be forgotten nowadays. You will see, if you look |
949 |
around, most of the discussion of the GNU system calls it Linux, and |
950 |
tends to refer to it as “open source” rather than as “free software,” |
951 |
and doesn't mention freedom as an issue. This issue, which is the reason |
952 |
for the system's existence, is mostly forgotten. You see many techies |
953 |
who prefer to think of technical questions in a narrowly technical |
954 |
context, without looking beyond at social effects of their technical |
955 |
decisions. Whether the software tramples your freedom or respects your |
956 |
freedom, that's part of the social context. That's exactly what techies |
957 |
tend to forget or devalue. <span class="gnun-split"></span>We have to |
958 |
work constantly to remind people to pay attention to freedom and, |
959 |
unfortunately, while we keep doing this, the users of our system often |
960 |
don't pay attention because they don't know it's our system. They don't |
961 |
know it's the GNU system, they think it's Linux. And that's why it makes |
962 |
a real difference if you remind people where the system came from.</p> |
963 |
|
964 |
<p>People will say to me that it doesn't look good to ask for credit. |
965 |
Well, I'm not asking for credit for me personally; I'm asking for credit |
966 |
for the GNU Project, which includes thousands of developers. But they |
967 |
are right, it's true: people who are looking for some reason to see evil |
968 |
can see evil in that. So they go on and say, “you should let it drop, |
969 |
and when people call the system Linux, you can smile to yourself and |
970 |
take pride in a job well done.” That would be very wise advice if the |
971 |
assumption were correct: the assumption that the job is done.</p> |
972 |
|
973 |
<p>We've made a great beginning, but that's all. We haven't finished the |
974 |
job. We will have finished the job when every computer is running a free |
975 |
operating system and free application programs exclusively. The job is |
976 |
to liberate the inhabitants of cyberspace. We've made a great beginning; |
977 |
we've developed free operating systems and free GUI desktops and free |
978 |
office suites and there are now tens of millions of users of these. But |
979 |
there are hundreds of millions of users of proprietary systems, so we |
980 |
have a long way to go. And, despite this wide range of free software, |
981 |
there are still a lot of application things that there is no free |
982 |
software to do; so we have a lot more work ahead of us.</p> |
983 |
|
984 |
<p>We've come in view of finishing the job, you know. Maybe we're only |
985 |
one order of magnitude away, having come through many orders of |
986 |
magnitude. But that doesn't mean that what's left is easy. And today we |
987 |
have something that we didn't have before: we have enemies; powerful, |
988 |
rich enemies, powerful enough to buy governments.</p> |
989 |
|
990 |
<h3 id="enemies-of-free-software">18. Enemies of free software</h3> |
991 |
|
992 |
<p>At the beginning, GNU and the free software movement had no enemies. |
993 |
There were people who weren't interested, lots of them, but nobody was |
994 |
actively trying to stop us from developing and releasing a free |
995 |
operating system. Nowadays, they are trying to stop us and the main |
996 |
obstacle we face is this, rather than the work itself.</p> |
997 |
|
998 |
<p>In the US, there are two different laws that prohibit various kinds |
999 |
of free software.</p> |
1000 |
|
1001 |
<p>One of them is the DMCA, which has been used to prohibit the free |
1002 |
software to play a DVD. If you buy a DVD, it's lawful for you to view it |
1003 |
in your computer, but the free software that would enable you to do this |
1004 |
on your GNU/Linux system has been censored in the US. Now, this affects |
1005 |
a fairly narrow range of software: software to view encrypted media. But |
1006 |
many users may want to do that, and if they can't do that with free |
1007 |
software, they may take that as a reason to use nonfree software, if |
1008 |
they don't value their freedom.</p> |
1009 |
|
1010 |
<p>But the big danger comes from patent law, because the US allows |
1011 |
software ideas to be patented. Now, writing a non-trivial program means |
1012 |
combining hundreds of different ideas. It's very hard to do that if any |
1013 |
one of those ideas might be someone's monopoly. It makes software |
1014 |
development like crossing a mine field, because at each design decision, |
1015 |
probably nothing happens to you, but there's a certain chance that you |
1016 |
will step on a patent and it will blow up your project. And, considering |
1017 |
how many steps you have to take, that adds up into a serious problem. We |
1018 |
have a long list of features that free software packages don't have, |
1019 |
because we're scared to implement them.</p> |
1020 |
|
1021 |
<p>[<a |
1022 |
href="https://endsoftwarepatents.org">endsoftwarepatents.org</a>]</p> |
1023 |
|
1024 |
<p>And now, the FCC is considering applying the broadcast flag |
1025 |
regulation to software. The FCC adopted a regulation {prohibiting |
1026 |
digital TV tuners unless} requiring digital TV tuners to have a |
1027 |
mechanism to block copying and this has to be tamper-resistant, meaning |
1028 |
it can't be implemented in free software. They haven't finished deciding |
1029 |
whether this applies to software or not, but if they do, they will have |
1030 |
prohibited GNU Radio, which is free software that can decode digital TV |
1031 |
broadcasts.</p> |
1032 |
|
1033 |
<p>Then, there's the threat from hardware that has secret specifications |
1034 |
or is designed to interfere with the user's control. Nowadays there are |
1035 |
many pieces of hardware you can get for your PC whose specifications are |
1036 |
secret. They'll sell you the hardware, but they won't tell you how to |
1037 |
run it. So how do we write free software to run it? Well, we either have |
1038 |
to figure out the specs by reverse engineering or we have to put market |
1039 |
pressure on those companies. And in both cases, we are weakened by the |
1040 |
fact that so many of the users of GNU/Linux don't know why this system |
1041 |
was developed and have never heard of these ideas that I'm telling you |
1042 |
today. And the reason is that, when they hear about the system, they |
1043 |
hear it called Linux and it's associated with the apolitical philosophy |
1044 |
of Linus Torvalds. <span class="gnun-split"></span>Linus Torvalds is |
1045 |
still working on developing Linux. {which is, you know} Developing the |
1046 |
kernel was an important contribution to our community. At the same time, |
1047 |
he is setting a very public bad example by using a nonfree program to |
1048 |
do the job. Now, if he were using a nonfree program privately, I would |
1049 |
never even have heard about it and I wouldn't make a fuss about it. But |
1050 |
by inviting the other people who work on Linux to use it with him, he's |
1051 |
setting a very public example legitimizing the use of nonfree software. |
1052 |
So when people see that, you know, if they think that's okay, they can't |
1053 |
possibly believe that nonfree software is bad. So then, when these |
1054 |
companies say, “yes, {we support} our hardware supports Linux, here is |
1055 |
this binary-only driver you can install, and then it will work,” these |
1056 |
people see nothing wrong in that, so they don't apply their market |
1057 |
pressure and they don't feel motivated to help in reverse |
1058 |
engineering.</p> |
1059 |
|
1060 |
<p>So when we face the various dangers that we must confront, we are |
1061 |
weakened by the lack of resolve. Now, having strong motivation to fight |
1062 |
for freedom won't guarantee that we win all of these fights, but it will |
1063 |
sure help. It will make us try harder, and if we try harder, we'll win |
1064 |
more of them.</p> |
1065 |
|
1066 |
<h3 id="treacherous-computing">19. Treacherous computing</h3> |
1067 |
|
1068 |
<p>We are going to have to politically organize to keep from being |
1069 |
completely prohibited from writing free software.</p> |
1070 |
|
1071 |
<p>Today, one of the most insidious threats to the future of free |
1072 |
software comes from treacherous computing, which is a conspiracy of many |
1073 |
large corporations. They call it “trusted computing,” but what do they |
1074 |
mean by that? What they mean is that an application developer can trust |
1075 |
your computer to obey him and disobey you. So, from your point of view, |
1076 |
it's _treacherous computing_, because your computer won't obey you |
1077 |
anymore. The purpose of this plan is that you won't control your |
1078 |
computer.</p> |
1079 |
|
1080 |
<p>[<a |
1081 |
href="/philosophy/can-you-trust.html">gnu.org/philosophy/can-you-trust.html</a>]</p> |
1082 |
|
1083 |
<p>And there are various different things that treacherous computing can |
1084 |
be used to do, things like prohibit you from running any program that |
1085 |
hasn't been authorized by the operating system developer. That's one |
1086 |
thing they could do. But they may not feel they dare go that far. But |
1087 |
another thing that they plan to do is to have data that's only available |
1088 |
to a particular application. The idea is that an application will be |
1089 |
able to write data in an encrypted form, such that it can only be |
1090 |
decrypted by the same application, such that nobody else can |
1091 |
independently write another program to access that data. And, of course, |
1092 |
they would use that for limiting access to published works, you know, |
1093 |
something to be a replacement for DVDs so that it would be not only |
1094 |
illegal, but impossible to write the free software to play it.</p> |
1095 |
|
1096 |
<p>But they don't have to stop at doing this to published data. They |
1097 |
could do it to your data too. Imagine if treacherous computing is common |
1098 |
in 10 years and Microsoft decides to come out with a new version of Word |
1099 |
format that uses treacherous computing to encrypt your data. Then it |
1100 |
would be impossible to write free software to read word files. Microsoft |
1101 |
is trying every possible method to prevent us from having free software |
1102 |
to read Word files. First, they switched to a secret Word format, so |
1103 |
people had to try to figure out the format. Well, we more or less have |
1104 |
figured it out. There are free programs that will read most Word files |
1105 |
(not all). <span class="gnun-split"></span>But then they came up with |
1106 |
another idea. They said, “let's use XML.” Now here's what Microsoft |
1107 |
means when they speak of using XML. The beginning of the file has a |
1108 |
trivial thing that says “this is XML and here comes binary Word format |
1109 |
data,” and then there's the binary Word format data and then there's |
1110 |
something at the end that says, “that was binary Word format data.” And |
1111 |
they patented this. {so that… I'm not sure} I don't know exactly what |
1112 |
the patent does and doesn't cover, but, you know, there are things we |
1113 |
could do, either reading or writing that file format, probably they |
1114 |
could try suing us about. And I'm sure that, if treacherous computing is |
1115 |
available for them to use, they'll use that too.</p> |
1116 |
|
1117 |
<p>This is why we have a campaign to refuse to read Word files. Now |
1118 |
there are many reasons you should refuse to read Word files. One is, |
1119 |
they could have viruses in them. If someone sends you a Word file, you |
1120 |
shouldn't look at it. But the point is, you shouldn't even try to look |
1121 |
at it. Nowadays there are free programs that will read most Word files. |
1122 |
But it's really better, better than trying to read the file is if you |
1123 |
send a message back saying, “please send that to me in a format that |
1124 |
isn't secret. It's not a good idea to send people Word files.” And the |
1125 |
reason is, we have to overcome the tendency in society for people to use |
1126 |
these secret formats for communication. |
1127 |
<span class="gnun-split"></span>We have to convince people to insist on |
1128 |
publicly documented standard formats that everyone is free to implement. |
1129 |
And Word format is the worst offender and so that's the best place to |
1130 |
start. If somebody sends you a Word file, don't try to read it. Write |
1131 |
back, saying “you really shouldn't do that.” And there's a page in |
1132 |
www.gnu.org/philosophy which is good to reference. It gives an |
1133 |
explanation of why this is an important issue.</p> |
1134 |
|
1135 |
<p>[<a |
1136 |
href="/philosophy/no-word-attachments.html">gnu.org/philosophy/no-word-attachments.html</a>]</p> |
1137 |
|
1138 |
<h3 id="help-gnu">20. Help GNU</h3> |
1139 |
|
1140 |
<p>Now, www.gnu.org is the website of the GNU Project. So you can go |
1141 |
there for more information. In the /gnu directory you'll find the |
1142 |
history and in the /philosophy directory you'll find articles about the |
1143 |
philosophy of free software and in the /directory you'll find the Free |
1144 |
Software Directory, which now lists over 3,000 usable free software |
1145 |
packages that will run the on GNU/Linux system.</p> |
1146 |
|
1147 |
<p>[It is now over 6000, and located in directory.fsf.org]</p> |
1148 |
|
1149 |
<p>Now, I'm about to close my speech, but before I do, I'd like to |
1150 |
mention that I've got some stickers here to give away. These stickers |
1151 |
show a flying gnu and a flying penguin, both rather unrealistic, but |
1152 |
they're superheroes. And {I also have some things} if people don't mind, |
1153 |
I've got some things I'm selling on behalf of the Free Software |
1154 |
Foundation, so if you buy them, you're supporting us. I've got these |
1155 |
buttons that say, “ask me about free software—it's all about freedom” |
1156 |
and I've got some GNU keyrings and GNU pins that are sort of pretty. So |
1157 |
you can buy those. You can also support us by becoming an associate |
1158 |
member. Now, you can do that just through our website, but I also have |
1159 |
some cards you can have if you would like to join [right now].</p> |
1160 |
|
1161 |
<h3 id="saint-ignucius">21. Saint Ignucius</h3> |
1162 |
|
1163 |
<p>So now I will close my speech by presenting my alter ego. See, people |
1164 |
sometimes accuse me of having a “holier than thou” attitude. Now, I hope |
1165 |
that's not true. I'm not going to condemn somebody just for not being as |
1166 |
firmly committed as I am. I will try to encourage him to become more so, |
1167 |
but that's different. So I don't think I really have a “holier than |
1168 |
thou” attitude, but I have a holy attitude because I'm a saint; it's my |
1169 |
job to be holy.</p> |
1170 |
|
1171 |
<p>[Dons a black robe and a magnetic disk halo]<br /> |
1172 |
[Laughter, applause]<br /> |
1173 |
[Richard holds a laptop like a holy book and waves]</p> |
1174 |
|
1175 |
<p>I am Saint Ignucius of the Church of Emacs. I bless your computer, my |
1176 |
child.</p> |
1177 |
|
1178 |
<p>Emacs started out as a text editor which became a way of life for |
1179 |
many computer users and then a religion. Does anyone know what the |
1180 |
alt.religion.emacs newsgroup was used for? I know it existed, but since |
1181 |
I'd never read net news, I don't know what was said in it.</p> |
1182 |
|
1183 |
<p>In any case, now we even have a great schism between two rival |
1184 |
versions of Emacs, and we also have saints; no gods, though.</p> |
1185 |
|
1186 |
<p>To be a member of the Church of Emacs, you must recite the Confession |
1187 |
of the Faith: you must say, “There is no system but GNU, and Linux is |
1188 |
one of its kernels.”</p> |
1189 |
|
1190 |
<p>The Church of Emacs has advantages compared with other churches I |
1191 |
might name. To be a saint in the Church of Emacs does not require |
1192 |
celibacy. So if you're looking for a church in which to be holy, you |
1193 |
might consider ours.</p> |
1194 |
|
1195 |
<p>However, it does require making a commitment to live a life of moral |
1196 |
purity. You must exorcise the evil proprietary operating systems that |
1197 |
possess all the computers under either your practical control or your |
1198 |
authority, and you must install a wholly [i.e., holy] free operating |
1199 |
system, where “wholly” can be spelled in more than one way, and then |
1200 |
only install free software on top of that. If you make this commitment |
1201 |
and live by it, then you, too, will be a saint and you, too, may |
1202 |
eventually have a halo—if you can find one, because they don't make |
1203 |
them anymore.</p> |
1204 |
|
1205 |
<p>Sometimes people ask me if, in the Church of Emacs, it is a sin to |
1206 |
use Vi. Well, it's true that VI-VI-VI is the editor of the Beast, |
1207 |
[laughter] but using a free version of Vi is not a sin, it's a |
1208 |
penance.</p> |
1209 |
|
1210 |
<p>And sometimes people ask me if my halo is really an old computer |
1211 |
disk. [Points at halo] This is no computer disk, this is my halo. But it |
1212 |
was a computer disk in a previous existence.</p> |
1213 |
|
1214 |
<p>So, thank you everyone.</p> |
1215 |
|
1216 |
<p>[Applause]</p> |
1217 |
|
1218 |
<h3 id="about-anonymity-credit-cards-cell-phones">22. About anonymity, |
1219 |
credit cards, cell phones</h3> |
1220 |
|
1221 |
<p>So I can answer questions for a while.</p> |
1222 |
|
1223 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> Yeah, do you know, or can you tell us why Linus |
1224 |
Torvalds, who has very very different attitudes with yours, released |
1225 |
Linux under your [unintelligible]? What motivated him?</p> |
1226 |
|
1227 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> I don't know why Linus Torvalds switched to the GNU |
1228 |
GPL for Linux. You'd have to ask him that. I don't recall ever seeing |
1229 |
the reason for that. I don't know.</p> |
1230 |
|
1231 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> Can you say something about the current effort to |
1232 |
put security in the network itself?</p> |
1233 |
|
1234 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> I don't know… he said, “efforts to plug security |
1235 |
into the network.” I don't know what that means.</p> |
1236 |
|
1237 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> [unintelligible] remove anonymity from the network |
1238 |
itself.</p> |
1239 |
|
1240 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> Remove anonymity? Well, I don't know about those |
1241 |
efforts, but I think it's horrible. I don't do e-commerce because I |
1242 |
don't like to buy things with credit cards. I want to buy things |
1243 |
anonymously and I do so by paying cash in a store. I don't like giving |
1244 |
Big Brother any records about me. For the same reason, I do not have a |
1245 |
cell phone. I don't want to carry a personal tracking device. We have to |
1246 |
fight more to preserve our privacy from surveillance systems. So, |
1247 |
although I'm not familiar with the specific efforts you're talking |
1248 |
about, I find them dangerous, much more dangerous than computer |
1249 |
insecurity. Now, perhaps that's because I'm not a Windows user; so I |
1250 |
have less problem to deal with.</p> |
1251 |
|
1252 |
<h3 id="free-formats-copyright-microsoft">23. Free formats, copyright, |
1253 |
Microsoft</h3> |
1254 |
|
1255 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> [unintelligible]</p> |
1256 |
|
1257 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> No, we can't. Basically he's asking if we can |
1258 |
monopolize file formats. Well, the answer is, we can't do so using our |
1259 |
copyright-based licenses, because copyright does not cover any idea, |
1260 |
principle, method of operation or system; it only covers the details of |
1261 |
expression of a work of authorship. So we can't, using our licenses like |
1262 |
the GNU GPL, prohibit anyone from writing his own code to handle the |
1263 |
same format.</p> |
1264 |
|
1265 |
<p>We could conceivably get patents; however, it turns out patents are |
1266 |
very, very different from copyright; they have almost nothing in common, |
1267 |
and it turns out it costs a lot of money to get a patent and even more |
1268 |
money to keep the patent going. And the other thing is, {Microsoft |
1269 |
doesn't need to get} you shouldn't assume that what Microsoft is getting |
1270 |
a patent on is important because it's a big improvement. It just has to |
1271 |
be different. Microsoft can get a patent on something about a file |
1272 |
format that's different and then they can force most users to switch |
1273 |
over to a new format that uses that idea. And Microsoft can do this |
1274 |
because of its market power, its control.</p> |
1275 |
|
1276 |
<p>We can't do that. The whole thing about the free software is, the |
1277 |
developers don't have any power; the users are in control. We can't |
1278 |
force users to switch over to anything, not even for their own |
1279 |
safety.</p> |
1280 |
|
1281 |
<p>You know, we've been trying since around 1992 or so to convince users |
1282 |
to stop using GIF format, because that format is patented and some users |
1283 |
will get sued. So we said, “everybody please stop using GIF format for |
1284 |
the sake of those who get sued if the public uses this format.” And |
1285 |
people haven't listened. So the thing is, we can't do what Microsoft |
1286 |
does, because that's based on using the power that they have, and since |
1287 |
we have chosen to respect people's freedom, we don't have power over the |
1288 |
public.</p> |
1289 |
|
1290 |
<h3 id="dangers-of-webmail-loss-of-freedom">24. Dangers of webmail |
1291 |
loss of freedom</h3> |
1292 |
|
1293 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> So, when somebody's using Google, they don't have |
1294 |
access to the source code that we use, so they have no way of |
1295 |
[unintelligible] what we do, so using that violates their freedom.</p> |
1296 |
|
1297 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> When a person is accessing the Google server, they |
1298 |
don't have either the binaries or the source code of the program that |
1299 |
Google is using, because it's Google that's using the program; that |
1300 |
person is not using the program. So I wouldn't expect to have the |
1301 |
authority to change the software that's running on your computer. You |
1302 |
should have the freedom to change the software that's running on your |
1303 |
computer, but I would never expect that I would have the freedom to go |
1304 |
into your computer and change the software there. Why should you let me |
1305 |
do that? So that's the way I see it when a person is using Google |
1306 |
server to do a search.</p> |
1307 |
|
1308 |
<p>Now, there is a possible danger there. The danger doesn't come from |
1309 |
things like Google. The danger comes from things like Hotmail. When |
1310 |
people start using a server on the net to store their data and to do the |
1311 |
jobs that they really could be doing on their own computer, that |
1312 |
introduces a danger. I've never understood the people who said that thin |
1313 |
clients were the future, because I can't imagine why I would ever do |
1314 |
things that way. I've got a PC and it's capable of doing things like |
1315 |
running a mail reader; I'm going to have the mail on my own computer, |
1316 |
I'm not going to leave it on anybody's server. Especially not a server I |
1317 |
have no reason to trust. And these days, of course, if you allow your |
1318 |
personal data to be on somebody's server, you might as well be handing |
1319 |
it straight to Ashcroft and his gestapo.</p> |
1320 |
|
1321 |
<p>[RMS, 2010: Gmail is comparable to Hotmail in this regard. See also |
1322 |
<a href="/philosophy/who-does-that-server-really-serve.html"> |
1323 |
gnu.org/philosophy/who-does-that-server-really-serve.html</a> |
1324 |
for another issue that applies to some, but not all, network services.]</p> |
1325 |
|
1326 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> unintelligible</p> |
1327 |
|
1328 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> He's asking, “if people were using a thin client and |
1329 |
all the computation were done on a remote server.” Yes, it does mean |
1330 |
that people lose freedom, because, clearly, you can't change the |
1331 |
software that's set up on somebody else's server, so if you're using the |
1332 |
software on somebody else's server, instead of running it on your own |
1333 |
computer, you lose control. Now, I don't think that's a good thing, and |
1334 |
therefore I'm going to encourage people not to go along with it. People |
1335 |
will keep on developing the software to do these jobs on your own |
1336 |
machine.</p> |
1337 |
|
1338 |
<p>{Leaving so soon? [Laughter] I hope it wasn't something I said. And |
1339 |
gee, now I won't get to meet her. Anyway.}</p> |
1340 |
|
1341 |
<h3 id="copyright-art-vs-software">25. Copyright art vs. software</h3> |
1342 |
|
1343 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> Are the Creative Commons a different denomination of |
1344 |
the same religion or a different religion?</p> |
1345 |
|
1346 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> {Creative Commons} Well, first of all, this isn't a |
1347 |
religion, except as a joke. The Church of Emacs is a joke. Please keep |
1348 |
in mind, taking any church too seriously can be hazardous to your |
1349 |
health, even the Church of Emacs. So this has nothing to do with |
1350 |
religion.</p> |
1351 |
|
1352 |
<p>This is a matter of ethics. It's a matter of what makes for a good |
1353 |
society and what kind of society we want to live in. These are not |
1354 |
questions of dogma, these are questions of philosophy and politics.</p> |
1355 |
|
1356 |
<p>The Creative Commons licenses are designed for artistic works, and I |
1357 |
think that they are good for artistic works. The issue for artistic |
1358 |
works is not exactly the same as for software.</p> |
1359 |
|
1360 |
<p>Software is an example of a practical, functional work. You use it do |
1361 |
to a job. The main purpose of a program is not that people will read the |
1362 |
code and think, “boy, how fascinating, what a great job they did.” The |
1363 |
main purpose of software is, you run it and it does something. And yes, |
1364 |
those people who are interested in software will also read it and learn, |
1365 |
but that's not the main purpose. It's interesting because of the job it |
1366 |
will do, not just because of how nice it is to read. Whereas with art, |
1367 |
the main use of art is the sensation that you get when you look at it or |
1368 |
listen to it. So these are very different ways of being used and, as a |
1369 |
result, the ethical issues about copying and modification are |
1370 |
different.</p> |
1371 |
|
1372 |
<p>For practical, functional works, people have to be free with the four |
1373 |
freedoms, including free to publish a modified version. But for art I |
1374 |
wouldn't say that. I think that there's a certain minimum freedom that |
1375 |
we must always have for using any published work, and that is the |
1376 |
freedom to non-commercially distribute verbatim, exact copies. But I |
1377 |
wouldn't say that it has to go further than that necessarily. So I think |
1378 |
the Creative Commons licenses are a very useful and good thing to use |
1379 |
for art.</p> |
1380 |
|
1381 |
<h3 id="malicious-free-software">26. Malicious free software</h3> |
1382 |
|
1383 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> Since everybody has the freedom to modify the code |
1384 |
and republish it, how do you keep out saboteurs?</p> |
1385 |
|
1386 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> Well, you don't. The point is, you can't ever. So you |
1387 |
just look at these different versions and you see which one you actually |
1388 |
like. You can't keep the saboteurs out of nonfree software either; in |
1389 |
fact, the developer could be the saboteur. The developers often put in, |
1390 |
as I said, malicious features. And then you're completely helpless. At |
1391 |
least with free software, you can read the source code, you can compare |
1392 |
the two versions. If you're thinking of switching from this version to |
1393 |
that version, you can compare them and see what's different and look for |
1394 |
some malicious code.</p> |
1395 |
|
1396 |
<h3 id="patented-file-formats">27. Patented file formats</h3> |
1397 |
|
1398 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> Do you happen to know which popular file formats are |
1399 |
secret and which ones are public?</p> |
1400 |
|
1401 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> Well, of the popular file formats, the only ones that |
1402 |
I know of that are secret are some Microsoft ones. But, on the other |
1403 |
hands, there are others that have patent problems. For instance, there's |
1404 |
still a patent covering LZW compression, which is used in GIF format. |
1405 |
And someone has a patent he claims covers JPEG format and is actually |
1406 |
suing a bunch of companies. And then there's a patent on MP3 audio, so |
1407 |
that the free software MP3 encoders have been driven underground in the |
1408 |
US [<a href="#ft1">1</a>]. That's why people should switch to Ogg Vorbis format. And then, if |
1409 |
you look at, say, MPEG-2 video, there are 39 different US patents said |
1410 |
to cover aspects of MPEG-2. So there are a lot of such problems.</p> |
1411 |
|
1412 |
<h3 id="games-as-free-software">28. Games as free software</h3> |
1413 |
|
1414 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> Is there any software that sort of mixes between the |
1415 |
Creative Commons and functional software, such as games or…?</p> |
1416 |
|
1417 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> Well, {you can say that a game} in many cases you can |
1418 |
look at a game as the combination of a program and a scenario. And then |
1419 |
it would make sense to treat the program like a program and the scenario |
1420 |
like a work of fiction. On the other hand, what you see is that it's |
1421 |
quite useful for the users to edit and republish modified versions of |
1422 |
these scenarios. So, although those are like fiction and art, not like |
1423 |
software, it really seems to be useful for users to be free to change |
1424 |
them.</p> |
1425 |
|
1426 |
<h3 id="gpl-freedoms-for-cars-saving-seeds">29. GPL freedoms for cars, |
1427 |
saving seeds</h3> |
1428 |
|
1429 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> Do you envision this free software philosophy to go |
1430 |
across, off the boundary to products, commodities…</p> |
1431 |
|
1432 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> When you say, “products, commodities,” could you be |
1433 |
concrete?</p> |
1434 |
|
1435 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> [unintelligible] cars</p> |
1436 |
|
1437 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> So should the free software philosophy apply to cars? |
1438 |
Okay, well the free software philosophy is, you should be free to copy |
1439 |
and modify them. So, if you have a car copier, I think you should be |
1440 |
free to copy any car. But there are no car copiers, so that really is a |
1441 |
meaningless question. And then, second, modifying. Well, yeah, I think |
1442 |
if you've got a car, you should be free to modify it and, in fact, lots |
1443 |
of people do modify their cars. So, there may be some restrictions on |
1444 |
that, but to a large extent that freedom exists. So what you see is that |
1445 |
this isn't really a meaningful question when you're talking about |
1446 |
physical objects. There are, in general, no copiers for physical |
1447 |
objects.</p> |
1448 |
|
1449 |
<p>If we imagine, someday in the future, that such copiers exist, well |
1450 |
that will be a different situation and yeah, that change would have |
1451 |
consequences for ethics and politics. If we had food copiers, I'm sure |
1452 |
that agribusiness would be trying to forbid people from having and using |
1453 |
food copiers. And that would be a tremendous political issue, just as |
1454 |
today there's a tremendous political issue about whether farmers ought |
1455 |
to be allowed to save seeds. Now, I believe that they have a fundamental |
1456 |
right to save seeds and that it's tyranny to stop them. A democratic |
1457 |
government would never do that.</p> |
1458 |
|
1459 |
<h3 id="no-software-is-better-than-non-free-software">30. No software is |
1460 |
better than nonfree software</h3> |
1461 |
|
1462 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> [roughly] Do you see a problem with free software |
1463 |
being under-produced because nobody wants to invest money |
1464 |
[unintelligible]?</p> |
1465 |
|
1466 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> I don't know what you mean by “under-produced.” We |
1467 |
see that some people develop free software and some don't. So we could |
1468 |
imagine more people developing free software and, if so, we'd have more |
1469 |
of it. But, you see, the tragedy of the commons really is a matter of |
1470 |
overuse. And that's something that can happen maybe with a field, but it |
1471 |
doesn't happen with software; you can't overuse a program, you don't |
1472 |
wear it out. So, really, there's no analogy there.</p> |
1473 |
|
1474 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> Well, the example you gave is, let's say there's a |
1475 |
useful program and a thousand people want a change to it. You said they |
1476 |
could get their money together and go hire a programmer to make the |
1477 |
change. But each individual in that group can say, “well, I'll just let |
1478 |
the 999 pay for the change.”</p> |
1479 |
|
1480 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> Well, they can do that, but that would be pretty |
1481 |
stupid, because if they saw that the result was, it wasn't getting done, |
1482 |
then if it's of some importance to them, then they're much better off |
1483 |
joining and contributing their money so that the change gets made. And |
1484 |
whether they do this or not, either way I won't agree that anything |
1485 |
tragic has happened. If they join and they pay for their change and they |
1486 |
get it, that's good, and if they don't join and they don't pay for that |
1487 |
change, that's good too; I guess they didn't want it enough. Either |
1488 |
one's okay.</p> |
1489 |
|
1490 |
<p>Nonfree software is evil and we're better off with nothing than with |
1491 |
nonfree software. The tragedy of the commons can happen either through |
1492 |
overuse or under-contribution, but overuse is impossible in software. |
1493 |
Under-contribution happens when a program is proprietary. Then it's a |
1494 |
failure to contribute to the commons. And so I would like that |
1495 |
proprietary software to stop being developed. A nonfree program is |
1496 |
worse than no program, because neither one allows you to get a job done |
1497 |
in freedom, but the nonfree program might tempt people to give up their |
1498 |
freedom and that's really bad.</p> |
1499 |
|
1500 |
<h3 id="portability-of-free-software">31. Portability of free |
1501 |
software</h3> |
1502 |
|
1503 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> Is their a potential conflict between the free |
1504 |
software philosophy and the portability of [unintelligible]?</p> |
1505 |
|
1506 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> No, {I don't see} this makes no sense to me at all. I |
1507 |
see no conflict between the philosophy of free software and portability. |
1508 |
And in the free software world we've worked very hard to achieve |
1509 |
portability from all sides. We make our software very portable and we |
1510 |
make our software standardized so that other people can easily have |
1511 |
portability, so we are aiding portability from every possible direction. |
1512 |
Meanwhile, you see Microsoft deliberately introducing incompatibilities |
1513 |
and deliberately blocking interoperability. Microsoft can do that |
1514 |
because it has power. We can't do that. If we make a program |
1515 |
incompatible and the users don't like it, they can change it. They can |
1516 |
change it to be compatible. So we are not in a position where we could |
1517 |
impose incompatibility on anybody, because we have chosen not to try to |
1518 |
have power over other people.</p> |
1519 |
|
1520 |
<h3 id="is-some-free-software-obfuscated-on-purpose">32. Is some free |
1521 |
software obfuscated on purpose?</h3> |
1522 |
|
1523 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> Something [unintelligible] obfuscated |
1524 |
[unintelligible] understand it.</p> |
1525 |
|
1526 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> Well, I disagree with you. Please, this is silly. If |
1527 |
you're saying a program is hard to understand, that's not the same as |
1528 |
the people are restricting it. It's not the same as saying, “you're |
1529 |
forbidden to see it.” Now, if you find it unclear, you can work on |
1530 |
making it clearer. The fact is, the developers probably are trying to |
1531 |
keep it clear, but it's a hard job and, unless you want to compare our |
1532 |
software with proprietary software and see which one is clearer, you |
1533 |
have no basis to make the claim that you're making. From what I hear, |
1534 |
nonfree software is typically much worse and the reason is that the |
1535 |
developers figure no one will ever see it, so they'll never be |
1536 |
embarrassed by how bad it is.</p> |
1537 |
|
1538 |
<h3 id="proprietary-keeping-an-edge">33. Proprietary keeping an |
1539 |
edge</h3> |
1540 |
|
1541 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> You hear the argument a lot from people who |
1542 |
manufacture devices or [unintelligible] hardware that they need to have |
1543 |
proprietary software in order to give them an edge, because, if they |
1544 |
gave away the software for free, then a competitor could manufacture the |
1545 |
device [unintelligible].</p> |
1546 |
|
1547 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> I don't believe this. I think it's all bullshit, |
1548 |
because there they are competing with each other and each one's saying, |
1549 |
“we need to make the software proprietary to have an edge over the |
1550 |
others.” Well, if none of them did it, they might all lose their edge? |
1551 |
I mean, so what? We shouldn't buy this. And I mean, we shouldn't buy |
1552 |
what they're saying and we shouldn't buy their products either.</p> |
1553 |
|
1554 |
<h3 id="forbidding-is-forbidden-how-is-this-freedom">34. Forbidding is |
1555 |
forbidden how is this freedom?</h3> |
1556 |
|
1557 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> I might be saying [unintelligible]</p> |
1558 |
|
1559 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> Please don't. The issue that you want to raise may be |
1560 |
a good issue, but please try to raise it in a neutral way, rather than |
1561 |
raising it with an attack.</p> |
1562 |
|
1563 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> There's something in my mind, so I'll just speak up. |
1564 |
The thing is, by actually registering [unintelligible] thing and saying |
1565 |
that “you can redistribute this software but you have to comply with |
1566 |
these four freedoms,” is that not restricting my freedom too?</p> |
1567 |
|
1568 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> No, it's restricting you from having power. To stop A |
1569 |
from subjugating B is not a denial of freedom to A, because to subjugate |
1570 |
others is not freedom. That's power.</p> |
1571 |
|
1572 |
<p>Now, there may be people who would like to exercise power and we're |
1573 |
stopping them, but that's good and that's not denying anyone |
1574 |
freedom.</p> |
1575 |
|
1576 |
<p>I mean, you could just as well say if you're overthrowing a dictator, |
1577 |
the dictator's saying, “you're taking away my freedom to dictate to |
1578 |
everyone!” But that's not freedom, that's power.</p> |
1579 |
|
1580 |
<p>So I'm making the distinction between freedom, which is having |
1581 |
control over your own life, and power, which is having control over |
1582 |
other people's lives. We've got to make this distinction; if we ignore |
1583 |
the difference between freedom and power, then we lose the ability to |
1584 |
judge whether a society is free or not. You know, if you lose this |
1585 |
distinction, then you look at Stalinist Russia and you say, “well, there |
1586 |
was just as much freedom there, it's just that Stalin had it all.” No! |
1587 |
In Stalinist Russia, Stalin had power and people did not have freedom; |
1588 |
the freedom wasn't there, because it's only freedom when it's a matter |
1589 |
of controlling your own life. Controlling other people's lives is not |
1590 |
freedom at all, not for either of the people involved.</p> |
1591 |
|
1592 |
<h3 id="can-google-help-free-software">35. Can Google help free |
1593 |
software</h3> |
1594 |
|
1595 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> In your opinion, is there anything that Google as a |
1596 |
company could do better in the spirit of free software?</p> |
1597 |
|
1598 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> I actually don't know enough about what Google is |
1599 |
doing to have any opinion. But if Google would like to donate some money |
1600 |
to the Free Software Foundation, we would gladly accept it. {I gather |
1601 |
that, I mean} I met some people here who are working on a particular |
1602 |
free program, namely Linux, the kernel. And I didn't ask actually if |
1603 |
they publish their improvements. [<b>AUDIENCE:</b> They do] Oh good, so |
1604 |
that's contributing. I mean, if you want to contribute to other pieces |
1605 |
of free software, that would be nice too, but I don't know if you have a |
1606 |
need to do that. And, of course, if you ever have a chance to release |
1607 |
some other generally useful new piece of free software, that would be |
1608 |
good too.</p> |
1609 |
|
1610 |
<p>[RMS, 2010: Google now distributes some large nonfree programs. Some |
1611 |
are written in Javascript, and servers install them without your |
1612 |
noticing.]</p> |
1613 |
|
1614 |
<h3 id="free-software-on-windows-good-or-bad">36. Free software on |
1615 |
windows, good or bad</h3> |
1616 |
|
1617 |
<p>I'll take three more questions.</p> |
1618 |
|
1619 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> So, if I develop free software for a proprietary |
1620 |
system such as Windows, essentially I'm supporting the proprietary |
1621 |
system. Am I doing a good or a bad thing here?</p> |
1622 |
|
1623 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> Well, there's a good aspect and a bad aspect. In |
1624 |
regard to the use of your code, you're respecting other people's |
1625 |
freedom, so that's good, but the fact that it only runs on Windows is |
1626 |
bad. So, really, you shouldn't develop it on Windows. You shouldn't use |
1627 |
Windows. Using Windows is bad. {That is, in itself} It's not as bad as |
1628 |
being the developer of Windows, but it's still bad and you shouldn't do |
1629 |
that.</p> |
1630 |
|
1631 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> So you're saying, just don't do it at all.</p> |
1632 |
|
1633 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> Yeah, don't use Windows. Use GNU/Linux and develop |
1634 |
your free program for GNU/Linux instead. And then it will be good in |
1635 |
both ways.</p> |
1636 |
|
1637 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> But couldn't it open Windows users to this |
1638 |
ideology?</p> |
1639 |
|
1640 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> It could, but there's enough free software available |
1641 |
for use on Windows to have that effect. And the thing is, developing |
1642 |
software for Windows is going to create a practical incentive for people |
1643 |
to use Windows, rather than use GNU/Linux. So, please don't.</p> |
1644 |
|
1645 |
<p>[RMS, 2010: to put it more clearly, making free programs run also on |
1646 |
Windows can be useful as he said; however, writing a free program only |
1647 |
for Windows is a waste.]</p> |
1648 |
|
1649 |
<h3 id="scos-suit">37. SCO's suit</h3> |
1650 |
|
1651 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> What would be the impact of SCO winning their |
1652 |
argument against Linux? So what would be the impact on…</p> |
1653 |
|
1654 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> I don't know, it depends. It would have no effect on |
1655 |
the GPL. But {it might have some effect} some code might have to be |
1656 |
removed from Linux. And whether that would be a big problem or a tiny |
1657 |
problem depends on what code, so there's no way of saying. But I don't |
1658 |
think SCO is a real problem. I think software patents and treacherous |
1659 |
computing and hardware with secret specs, those are the real problems. |
1660 |
That's what we've got to be fighting against.</p> |
1661 |
|
1662 |
<h3 id="stallmans-problem-typing">38. Stallman's problem typing</h3> |
1663 |
|
1664 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> I have a non-ideology question. I'm personally very |
1665 |
interested in your battle with repetitive stress injuries and the impact |
1666 |
that it had on the development of GNU Hurd.</p> |
1667 |
|
1668 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> None, because I was never working on the GNU Hurd. |
1669 |
{I've never} We hired a person to write the GNU Hurd. I had nothing to |
1670 |
do with writing it. And there were a few years when I couldn't type much |
1671 |
and then we hired people to type for me. And then I found, by using |
1672 |
keyboards with a light touch, I could type again.</p> |
1673 |
|
1674 |
<h3 id="open-source-good-or-bad-pat-riot-act">39. Open source, good or |
1675 |
bad Pat-riot Act.</h3> |
1676 |
|
1677 |
<p><b>AUDIENCE:</b> Can you give us your opinion of open source?</p> |
1678 |
|
1679 |
<p><b>RICHARD:</b> Well, the open source movement is sort of like the |
1680 |
free software movement, except with the philosophical foundation |
1681 |
discarded. So they don't talk about right and wrong, or freedom, or |
1682 |
inalienable rights, they just don't present it in ethical terms. They |
1683 |
say that they have a development methodology that they say typically |
1684 |
results in technically superior software. So they only appeal to |
1685 |
practical, technical values.</p> |
1686 |
|
1687 |
<p>And what they're saying may be right and if this convinces some |
1688 |
people to write free software, that's a useful contribution. But I think |
1689 |
they're missing the point when they don't talk about freedom, because |
1690 |
that's what makes our community weak, that we don't talk about and think |
1691 |
about freedom enough. People who don't think about freedom won't value |
1692 |
their freedom and they won't defend their freedom and they'll lose it. |
1693 |
Look at the USA Pat-riot Act. You know, people who don't value their |
1694 |
freedom will lose it.</p> |
1695 |
|
1696 |
<h3 id="the-end">40. The end</h3> |
1697 |
|
1698 |
<p>So thank you, and if anyone wants to buy any of these FSF things |
1699 |
or…</p> |
1700 |
|
1701 |
<p>[Applause]</p> |
1702 |
<div class="column-limit"></div> |
1703 |
|
1704 |
<h3 class="footnote">Footnote</h3> |
1705 |
<ol> |
1706 |
<li id="ft1">All the patents on MP3 will have expired by 2018.</li> |
1707 |
</ol> |
1708 |
</div> |
1709 |
|
1710 |
</div><!-- for id="content", starts in the include above --> |
1711 |
<!--#include virtual="/server/footer.html" --> |
1712 |
<div id="footer" role="contentinfo"> |
1713 |
<div class="unprintable"> |
1714 |
|
1715 |
<p>Please send general FSF & GNU inquiries to |
1716 |
<a href="mailto:gnu@gnu.org"><gnu@gnu.org></a>. |
1717 |
There are also <a href="/contact/">other ways to contact</a> |
1718 |
the FSF. Broken links and other corrections or suggestions can be sent |
1719 |
to <a href="mailto:webmasters@gnu.org"><webmasters@gnu.org></a>.</p> |
1720 |
|
1721 |
<p><!-- TRANSLATORS: Ignore the original text in this paragraph, |
1722 |
replace it with the translation of these two: |
1723 |
|
1724 |
We work hard and do our best to provide accurate, good quality |
1725 |
translations. However, we are not exempt from imperfection. |
1726 |
Please send your comments and general suggestions in this regard |
1727 |
to <a href="mailto:web-translators@gnu.org"> |
1728 |
<web-translators@gnu.org></a>.</p> |
1729 |
|
1730 |
<p>For information on coordinating and contributing translations of |
1731 |
our web pages, see <a |
1732 |
href="/server/standards/README.translations.html">Translations |
1733 |
README</a>. --> |
1734 |
Please see the <a |
1735 |
href="/server/standards/README.translations.html">Translations |
1736 |
README</a> for information on coordinating and contributing translations |
1737 |
of this article.</p> |
1738 |
</div> |
1739 |
|
1740 |
<!-- Regarding copyright, in general, standalone pages (as opposed to |
1741 |
files generated as part of manuals) on the GNU web server should |
1742 |
be under CC BY-ND 4.0. Please do NOT change or remove this |
1743 |
without talking with the webmasters or licensing team first. |
1744 |
Please make sure the copyright date is consistent with the |
1745 |
document. For web pages, it is ok to list just the latest year the |
1746 |
document was modified, or published. |
1747 |
|
1748 |
If you wish to list earlier years, that is ok too. |
1749 |
Either "2001, 2002, 2003" or "2001-2003" are ok for specifying |
1750 |
years, as long as each year in the range is in fact a copyrightable |
1751 |
year, i.e., a year in which the document was published (including |
1752 |
being publicly visible on the web or in a revision control system). |
1753 |
|
1754 |
There is more detail about copyright years in the GNU Maintainers |
1755 |
Information document, www.gnu.org/prep/maintain. --> |
1756 |
|
1757 |
<p>Copyright © 2004, 2021 Richard Stallman</p> |
1758 |
|
1759 |
<p>This page is licensed under a <a rel="license" |
1760 |
href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">Creative |
1761 |
Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License</a>.</p> |
1762 |
|
1763 |
<!--#include virtual="/server/bottom-notes.html" --> |
1764 |
|
1765 |
<p class="unprintable">Updated: |
1766 |
<!-- timestamp start --> |
1767 |
$Date: 2021/09/10 09:20:37 $ |
1768 |
<!-- timestamp end --> |
1769 |
</p> |
1770 |
</div> |
1771 |
</div><!-- for class="inner", starts in the banner include --> |
1772 |
</body> |
1773 |
</html> |