Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by rightbyte 1775 days ago
There is no contradiction in that.
1 comments

I dont know. I guess I am not well versed with FSF. I thought they were to promote Free Software, I didn't know their world view was any non-open source software are "unacceptable and unjust".
Their origin story is Stallman being frustrated with a buggy printer driver that couldn't be fixed because it was proprietary.

It's told in this talk, you can search for "printer" to find it < https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/rms-nyu-2001-transcript.txt >.

They promote Free Software (and specifically copyleft over permissive licenses) because they view proprietary software as morally wrong and something that should not exist.

According to the FSF[1]:

> To release a nonfree program is always ethically tainted, but legally there is no obstacle to your doing this.

It paints a picture of a bigoted organisation.

[1]: <https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#ReleaseUnderGPLAnd...>

That sounds like the completely wrong word for that. The free software foundation advocates for free software, does not like non-free software, big surprise. Similarly fair trade does consider non-fair trade unethical. You might disagree with that but having an opinion does not make one a "bigot".
There is a difference between advocating for free software and saying that all non-free software is evil. To compare to the original meaning of "bigotry", there is a difference between talking about how great your religion is and talking about how all other religions are evil.
Non-fair trade is considered unethical based on ethics. FSF considers closed source unethical based on their particular agenda, which has nothing to do with ethics or morality.
> Non-fair trade is considered unethical based on ethics.

No, it is not. If it were, fair trade wouldn't be niche. It adds lots of other obligations on companies "based on their particular agenda". I think it is worthwhile goal and something I like to support, but won't pretend that it is somehow pure, self-evident goodness, just like non-fair trade is not pure evil.

Again, you might disagree or have different ideas what "free" is supposed to mean but you should be better than throwing around phrases like "agenda" or "nothing to do with ethics or morality".

People and societies have no problem with ignoring ethics when it benefits them. Otherwise we wouldn’t be waging wars and sucking profits off poorer societies.

Fair trade is based on pretty fundamental ethics, such as fighting slavery. Can you point any such concept being foundational to Free Software?