The comments in the blog talk about arrogance and how someone else would have done what RMS did if he didn't exist. They also complain that him being a "nutjob" has actually done harm to freedom. This line of thinking is dead wrong. It takes someone precisely like RMS to stand for his ideal and dedicate his life to what he believes. I, personally, feel a great debt to the man.
It's "funny" that people see his statement, that perhaps it's better he didn't die as an infant because he's done some good, as arrogant. He could be paraphrased as saying something like "I've experienced such misery that sometimes I wish I wasn't here at all but on the other hand I think I've done more good than harm for others and there is some comfort in that." How that's arrogant is beyond me. I can understand people having the opinion that, no, he's done more harm than good - but he's not arrogant for thinking otherwise.
The "someone else would have done it" seems particularly unlikely to me, at least at the time. If you were to list significant bodies of free software that were released between the FSF's founding in 1983 and the Linux kernel's release in 1991, they're almost all GNU projects. The one significant exception I can think of is the X consortium's decision in 1986 to freely license X. And the stuff that started to be released starting in the early-90s pretty much without exception built on GNU stuff (even all the free BSDs still grudgingly include GNU code, despite 10 years of actively reducing their reliance on it).
Quite true. A movement like the free software one needs people who are not willing to barter with their ideals. I for one do not agree with RMS on everything, and I do still use a few proprietary pieces of software, but I do appreciate the fact that RMS is who he is.
An appropriate quote from George Bernard Shaw: "The reasonable man adapts himself to the conditions that surround him... The unreasonable man adapts surrounding conditions to himself... All progress depends on the unreasonable man."
I don't see Stallman's statement as to whether his birth had a good impact on the world or not as necessarily arrogant. Arguably, that's a question everybody needs to or ends up asking themselves: on balance, has my existence been a positive one?
While there might've been an open software advocate without Stallman, it can't be seriously said that the world would've been better off without Stallman's advocacy. And thus, on balance, the world's better off with Stallman than without.
He's about the worst PR possible for free software. I like his code & I mostly drink the kool aid, I do, but he really needs to let Eben Moglen do the talking..
He should definitely not have a kid. He seems of the opinion that life is painful, and he has wished he had never been born (well, he has wished he had "killed himself when [he] was born", but there's little difference).
To "have a kid" is to create another person who might well wish to never have been born, another person who will have to decide whether or not it is justified to bring kids into this painful world.
I am glad that RMS is so honest about it. Most people cover up their unhappiness.
He is on record as not wanting to have a kid because in his view the planet is over-populated. Also, I don't fully understand (due to lack of inquiry into it) his view of marriage but I'm fairly certain that "thinks it's too easy" is not accurate.
Seems to me that without the programmers who went the commercial route (Gates et al), computers wouldn't be as widely used and his impact wouldn't be as big. Or that someone else wouldn't have stepped up in his absence. And statements like those quoted in the article seem just a wee bit overdramatic.
Stallman is nothing if not dramatic;) I have trouble imagining that computers would not be as widely used today, not without corporate backing and innovation, but without the kinds of hijinks that have kept the Wintel near-monopoly in place for so long. It was a bunch of hackers, not suits, who started the personal computer revolution.
> programmers who went the commercial route (Gates et al)
It's a false dichotomy. There is no need to imprison (as Stallman would say) the user and disrespect his rights (at least to use, understand, improve) in order to be commercial. What "Gates et al" have done is to bind their users through the software they use to manage their lives and jobs, ensuring long-term prosperity through technological dependency.
The folks at Red Hat, Canonical and MindTouch (just to name a few I have in my head right now) are every bit as serious as Microsoft when it comes to be commercial and to be paid for their work.
The main difference being they show much more consideration towards their users and customers.
Either computers would be useless novelties or they would be mainstream and lose the hacker/counterculture status. Those are the only two options. There is no way that every person on earth was going to care about source code. Progress is still progress even if it's not what you want.
There is plenty of fun to be had still in technology, just don't get married to a philosophy. I learned that the hardway.
In the early days I ran a BBS. When the Internet became mainstream I remember thinking "how do I compete?" I redoubled my efforts: upgrading modems, adding drives/door games, increasing my software library, etc.... All the time thinking "where's the 'community feel' on the Inet?" By the late 90s I realized the problem was me and not the world.
Either computers would be useless novelties or they would be mainstream and lose the hacker/counterculture status. Those are the only two options.
Maybe you don't look at your cell phone or nintendoDS and think "hmm, there must be some way to run irc on this thing". Maybe you don't care anymore, but there are huge communities who do. Maybe the spirit of openness is fundamental to the tools themselves?
Sure, in his absence others may have stepped up to the job, but in this world, he did. We can sit and imagine all we want that with a different leader, FOSS would be better. But, that doesn't change the fact that we have him to thank for so very much.
I know very little about Stallman beyond his role in the GNU Project. What pain is he referring to that makes him wish that he had never been born? The loss of hacker culture?
I'm wondering too. He has a kind of "Woe is me" attitude, but all I know of him is that he eats his toe skin in front of his audience.
I also don't know if his existence has had a net positive effect. Free software he advocates is used to power robots, missiles, and other weapons that kill many people. It has also taken money from developers who write good software and shifted it to middlemen who sell services for free code, which limits the viability of writing code and the financial options for hackers to put a roof over their heads and food in their mouths.
If you really want to help hackers and keep the hacker culture alive, teach the world that software has value and is worth paying for.
Stallman's hubris is shocking -- and I'm not talking about his claim that the world is a better place for him having lived. I'm talking about this line of shit:
That quote makes a lot more sense when taken in context. It's from the 1983 epilogue to Hackers.
In 1983, there was no "free software" as we have today. No FSF, no EFF, no Creative Commons.
Additionally, Stallman's interview is at the end of a book about the guys who started "hacker culture". These guys did some amazing stuff: they physically modified one of their computers to add new machine instructions, wrote editors, compilers and games from scratch, etc, etc. Then they made their code available for free.
When I read that quote in the book, I interpreted it as Stallman expressing sadness over the loss of hacker culture.
"This "pain" that Stallman says he has endured makes his decision to champion tirelessly freedom and free software for all these decades all the more remarkable."
Alright, I realize this might be a bad statement to make on this subject... but seriously? He's a free software advocate. It's not like he's Ghandi going on a hunger strike or Martin Luther King Jr going to jail over his beliefs.
"I hesitate to exaggerate the importance of this little puddle of freedom," he says. "Because the more well known and conventional areas of working for freedom and a better society are tremendously important. I wouldn't say that free software is as important as they are. It's the responsibility I undertook, because it dropped in my lap and I saw a way I could do something about it. But, for example, to end police brutality, to end the war on drugs, to end the kinds of racism we still have, to help everyone have a comfortable life, to protect the rights of people who do abortions, to protect us from theocracy, these are tremendously important issues, far more important than what I do. I just wish I knew how to do something about them." - Free As In Freedom by Sam Williams (p66 or p73 depending on version).
I think the importance of freedom as it applies to software is often underrated. The idea of freedom in software use and development is really a near-perfect model in microcosm of intellectual freedom as a whole, and there's little that can compare with that for importance.
I also think the importance of Stallman as applied to freedom of use and development of software is often overstated, though.
After reading this I felt a deep sense of pity for RMS.
Even if he was only referring to his perceived lack of belonging, openly fantasizing about suicide is not the sign of someone in a healthy emotional state.
I hope very much that he has grown past this point his life.
It's a real shame that inventor of the time machine, Leo Schultz, travelled back in time from 2042 and killed himself as a child. We'll never have a time machine now :-(
[+] [-] doki_pen|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dasht|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] _delirium|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] modokode|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] patrickgzill|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] JCThoughtscream|16 years ago|reply
While there might've been an open software advocate without Stallman, it can't be seriously said that the world would've been better off without Stallman's advocacy. And thus, on balance, the world's better off with Stallman than without.
[+] [-] dzlobin|16 years ago|reply
This guy needs to cheer up.
[+] [-] Herring|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] codyrobbins|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] yesbabyyes|16 years ago|reply
Here, he's dancing to Soulja Boy's "Crank Dat" together with a few other MIT people:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7C6r6fG4k40
[+] [-] axod|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ars|16 years ago|reply
He doesn't want to because he thinks it's too easy, but he's still a human.
[+] [-] koningrobot|16 years ago|reply
To "have a kid" is to create another person who might well wish to never have been born, another person who will have to decide whether or not it is justified to bring kids into this painful world.
I am glad that RMS is so honest about it. Most people cover up their unhappiness.
[+] [-] dasht|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] derwiki|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] flatline|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rbanffy|16 years ago|reply
It's a false dichotomy. There is no need to imprison (as Stallman would say) the user and disrespect his rights (at least to use, understand, improve) in order to be commercial. What "Gates et al" have done is to bind their users through the software they use to manage their lives and jobs, ensuring long-term prosperity through technological dependency.
The folks at Red Hat, Canonical and MindTouch (just to name a few I have in my head right now) are every bit as serious as Microsoft when it comes to be commercial and to be paid for their work.
The main difference being they show much more consideration towards their users and customers.
[+] [-] flipper|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] apu|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] johngalt|16 years ago|reply
There is plenty of fun to be had still in technology, just don't get married to a philosophy. I learned that the hardway.
In the early days I ran a BBS. When the Internet became mainstream I remember thinking "how do I compete?" I redoubled my efforts: upgrading modems, adding drives/door games, increasing my software library, etc.... All the time thinking "where's the 'community feel' on the Inet?" By the late 90s I realized the problem was me and not the world.
[+] [-] r0s|16 years ago|reply
Maybe you don't look at your cell phone or nintendoDS and think "hmm, there must be some way to run irc on this thing". Maybe you don't care anymore, but there are huge communities who do. Maybe the spirit of openness is fundamental to the tools themselves?
[+] [-] dgabriel|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] donaq|16 years ago|reply
From the comments on the OP's blog. :)
[+] [-] Osmose|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fnid2|16 years ago|reply
I also don't know if his existence has had a net positive effect. Free software he advocates is used to power robots, missiles, and other weapons that kill many people. It has also taken money from developers who write good software and shifted it to middlemen who sell services for free code, which limits the viability of writing code and the financial options for hackers to put a roof over their heads and food in their mouths.
If you really want to help hackers and keep the hacker culture alive, teach the world that software has value and is worth paying for.
[+] [-] apotheon|16 years ago|reply
> I’m the last survivor of a dead culture.
[+] [-] jf|16 years ago|reply
In 1983, there was no "free software" as we have today. No FSF, no EFF, no Creative Commons.
Additionally, Stallman's interview is at the end of a book about the guys who started "hacker culture". These guys did some amazing stuff: they physically modified one of their computers to add new machine instructions, wrote editors, compilers and games from scratch, etc, etc. Then they made their code available for free.
When I read that quote in the book, I interpreted it as Stallman expressing sadness over the loss of hacker culture.
[+] [-] tomkinstinch|16 years ago|reply
1. http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/04/ff_hackers/all/1
[+] [-] j_baker|16 years ago|reply
Alright, I realize this might be a bad statement to make on this subject... but seriously? He's a free software advocate. It's not like he's Ghandi going on a hunger strike or Martin Luther King Jr going to jail over his beliefs.
[+] [-] astrec|16 years ago|reply
"I hesitate to exaggerate the importance of this little puddle of freedom," he says. "Because the more well known and conventional areas of working for freedom and a better society are tremendously important. I wouldn't say that free software is as important as they are. It's the responsibility I undertook, because it dropped in my lap and I saw a way I could do something about it. But, for example, to end police brutality, to end the war on drugs, to end the kinds of racism we still have, to help everyone have a comfortable life, to protect the rights of people who do abortions, to protect us from theocracy, these are tremendously important issues, far more important than what I do. I just wish I knew how to do something about them." - Free As In Freedom by Sam Williams (p66 or p73 depending on version).
[+] [-] apotheon|16 years ago|reply
I also think the importance of Stallman as applied to freedom of use and development of software is often overstated, though.
[+] [-] jimmyjames|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jawn|16 years ago|reply
Even if he was only referring to his perceived lack of belonging, openly fantasizing about suicide is not the sign of someone in a healthy emotional state.
I hope very much that he has grown past this point his life.
[+] [-] petercooper|16 years ago|reply