[ Date Index ] [ Thread Index ] [ <= Previous by date / thread ] [ Next by date / thread => ]
On 28/04/12 17:52, paul sutton wrote: > Sometimes we have to put freedom to one side With the greatest respect to all of you, and the best wishes for your future LUG endeavours, I think this is where we shall have to part philosophical ways. I really do not consider myself to be a Stallman-esque fanatic by any stretch of the imagination: as a sysadmin I by necessity have to be pragmatic in my work. Well over 50% of my workload involves strictly proprietary systems (Windows, AIX, HP-UX, IOS, etc) and I long ago learnt to stop patronising friends and relatives with lectures on free-as-in-freedom whilst fixing their computers. Each to their own of course. But I think there is a strange dichotomy here. Whilst I can tolerate, and in some cases even quite like, decidedly non-free software (Windows server 2008r2 is excellent, SGI's IRIX is fantastic) I personally struggle to understand the willingness of some otherwise die-hard open source/free software proponents to sacrifice another, equally important aspect of their digital-age freedom in what seems to me an almost Faustian gamble. Sure, as modern cloudy, web-based software solutions google+, linkedin, facebook, twitter and a plethora of other social network platforms all run fine in our open-source web browsers on our open-source operating systems, right? Why not use them? Well, forgive me if you disagree, and you are of course more than welcome to, but to answer my own question: because these 'solutions' pose a considerably greater threat to their s/users/commodities/g freedom in the broader, and I would argue, more important sense than merely using a closed source software ecosystem ever could. To sum up: I have (perhaps mistakenly) conceived of this proposition as a gambit. Is it worth sacrificing privacy and independence to use closed, corporate social networking platforms to spur the adoption of linux? Or is it better to eschew the use of these platforms, retain at least a semblance of one's control of one's own data and risk being unable to evangelize linux and open source/free software because of the lack of the exposure? Or as it has been put more bluntly: > Sometimes we have to put freedom to one side No. We do not ever have to put freedom to one side. It is a choice that any of us can make individually, hopefully in full possession of the facts and consequences thus entailed, but we certainly do not have to. It is certainly not one I will ever take. This is just my personal opinion. I was very surprised to see this issue even come up, and even more surprised to see the seemingly universal positive response (users immediately signing up, etc). This of course probably shows that I am simply out of touch and stupid, and I don't for a moment think that any of you shouldn't do precisely what you want and completely ignore me. But the entire reason that I migrated inexorably from the DOS/CPM/VMS environments of my youth to the open systems like BSD and linux was because I valued my own independence and skills, and wanted to be free to tinker, recompile, host my own webservers, mailing lists, IRC channels, mail servers... I'm aware I sound a bit like a rabid American pro-gun supporter or something when I say you'll prise my privacy from my cold dead hands, but that's one of the chief draws for me: I can always do things myself, rather than having to sell my soul to giant corporate monstrosities like facebook or google. Do you really want to betray one of the foundation principles of the open source/free software 'revolution' just because it might make it a bit easier to recruit a few more people? Apologies for a somewhat longer than intended email. Regards, Mat -- The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG http://mailman.dclug.org.uk/listinfo/list FAQ: http://www.dcglug.org.uk/listfaq