Richard Stallman Reportedly Steps Down As Head Of The GNU Project

[fuzz]

Well, you could say Linux has now become mainstream, and witch hunts are mainstream too. But this doesn't seem like a "community" thing, but rather a corporate takedown of RMS. techrights.org has been connecting it to the Department of Defense and IBM, which I can't confirm, but wouldn't be a little bit surprised about.

I think it's a bit of both.

Many of the common voices people have watched for news in the community are now corporate-backed. Whenever something has corporate backing it no longer has the freedom of speech even if they claim their company doesn't really care. It's all money, advertising, and publicity.

So communities that have followed these figures for a long time which now have more corporate backing are more likely to follow the herd mentality just to "fit in". Yes, linux is more mainstream in some circles and the people who use it are no more any better than any other social circles.

Just as an example, there is a prominent linux/technology podcast network (Jupiter Broadcasting) that has been going down this path recently. I don't blame them, they have their own goals and have to live their lives. But the behavior is obvious from the outside, which is why I refused to become closer to their community despite my initial endearment of the participants. Every community that forms is threatened by the possibility of forming epistemic bubbles or, even worse, echo chambers[0].

Granted, this isn't specific to linux itself but still a very large amount of the desktop linux userbase. To make matters worse, they are rightfully trying to gain new contributors and those from "generation z" are in general not being given the opportunity to deal with the world and all of its hardships. I think Jonathan Haidt explains this quite well on Joe Rogan[1]. This is why we have these ridiculous code of conducts.

What can we do to stop it? Stay away from social media, open source or not. Mastodon isn't any better than twitter in this regard and could even be considered worse because instances can easily block other instances. Places like Phoronix as a public forum or open group chats are about as far as I go, as it's discussion-oriented and there are not any biased systems in place to filter out what we can see.

[0] https://aeon.co/essays/why-its-as-ha...to-flee-a-cult
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2e9VYf9FKHo

[IreMinMon]

You lot do realise he's an underage sex apologist, right? He might've done heaps for the free software movement, but he's still a toxic figure. Good riddance.

There's no such thing as "underage sex". Pubescent women, once they get their first period, are by all criteria, either natural, technical, biological or medical, entirely capable for the full process of reproduction.

"Age" is not even a factor. Age is a legal parameter that is used to determine whether the subject is capable of taking responsibility for their own actions.
Having sex with a 17yo is perfectly legal throughout entire Europe. Would getting rid of all European FOSS developers be a "GOOD RIDDANCE" by your standards as well?

[fuzz]

unfortunately for people like you, they also don't tolerate such disgusting behavior.

This has NOTHING to do with behavior. This is about freedom. And you're right, it's unfortunate that there are very few places left who appreciate true freedom.

[fuzz]

I have to wonder how Apple will handle some of these leftist Democrats that are actively trying to tear the company apart, some of which are in the running for the White House. If Apple wants to stay Apple they may very well have to support Trump or whomever gets the Republican ticket.

I'm actually surprised Apple hasn't banned more podcasts from the iTunes directory. Things like "No Agenda" really piss off the left for just trying to show the truth.

[fsfhfc2018]

The message of his resignation no longer appears in his blog.

It's back actually. There are archives that show it was there, then not there, then back, but I've heard from Stallman in the past 12 hours or so:

[[[ To any NSA and FBI agents reading my email: please consider ]]]
[[[ whether defending the US Constitution against all enemies, ]]]
[[[ foreign or domestic, requires you to follow Snowden's example. ]]]

I did not resign from GNU.
The statement was posted in error.
I am still the Chief GNUisance.

--
Dr Richard Stallman
Founder, Free Software Foundation (https://gnu.org, https://fsf.org)
Internet Hall-of-Famer (https://internethalloffame.org)

[ThoreauHD]

Taking Linux and GNU out of this, if any Board of Directors member of any org posted what he did, they would also be gone. Except in this case it's compounding with Harvard and MIT taking millions to fund a global pedo/eugenicists research.

And to be even more clear, this is way beyond CoC(my feelings hurt) territory. It's in active Federal and International crimes against humanity territory.

The crap part is, he's one of those that aren't involved with any of this. At least he wasn't documented on that plane to CARISJAMES. The others, steering our society, are still walking around unscathed. There is no upside for anyone here. It just demonstrates to the people who act/acted on this stuff to keep quiet.

And to be even more clear about the optics, RMS even lost 4chan with his 'actual' comments. Not reported. They are after him now too. Apparently even those sick twist have limits.

[tildearrow]

The message of his resignation no longer appears in his blog.

I wonder why. Has he returned to leadership?

[moilami]

You have 666 posts and that offends me because it's a known hate and evil number

Michael Why do you allow Satanic numbers on your website?

(this is satire)

Haha, after a few years "most righteous" places would never ever allow such symbolism in any form no matter what. I am surprised there is not already bugs filed in forum software whining of different post count numbers and their relations to hate groups.

[danmcgrew]

It's an automated system. As far as blogs go, phoronix is one of the most pro free speech

Here's THE problem:

If it were under manual control, there would be a fire-storm of righteous indignation. And--sorry to use almost the same word again--rightly so.
As it is, because the moderation system is--get ready for that awe-inspiring, quick-answer-to-everything-nowadays--automated, it must be absolutely above reproach and beyond questioning by us mere mortals--as "automated" means "performed by a computer".

This is precisely, exactly what is wrong with the whole concept of AI--the newest (to be resurrected again, that is) "baffle-'em-with-bullshit" bandwagon.

"I find that the main reason a lot of people are interested in artificial intelligence is for the same reason a lot of people are interested in artificial limbs--they are missing one."--David L. Parnas

[skeevy420]

Yeah, Phoronix is unique. But I wonder how long? I am sure there are plenty of people who would like to get Phoronix heavily moderated so that everything they don't agree with is labeled as hateful and hate speech. It could be just a matter of time when Michael will have to bend over for them.

Now Phoronix is like Gaul in Asterix and Obelix, the last fortress of free speech, the last place not fallen under tyranny of thought police

You have 666 posts and that offends me because it's a known hate and evil number

Michael Why do you allow Satanic numbers on your website?

(this is satire)