news.bbc.co.uk — To pay so much attention to Bill Gates' retirement is missing the point. What really matters is not Gates, nor Microsoft, but the unethical system of restrictions that Microsoft, like many other software companies, imposes on its customers.
Jul 3, 2008 View in Crawl 4
thatnaysayerJul 4, 2008
Very nice article, though admittedly a bit off. Yes Microsoft is not the most wonderful company ever. Far, far from it. Though there are some claims that are highly exaggerated, such as the claim that you cannot hire a programmer to make software tailored to your companies needs, and some that are not.While I do agree that free software is an amazing thing, and that there are many good free apps out there. Some times there are "proprietary" programs that are proprietary for a reason. They are consistent, they work, and they have been proven to do things efficiently. Sadly Windows is not part of that selection of proprietary software. Every Operating System is in some way proprietary, some are just worse then others.
adinsxJul 4, 2008
"yet has software that will run on any platform"Really? I can get windows for architectures other than x86?"with any kind of hardware you want"That isn't Microsoft's doing; they don't write the drivers, the hardware manufacturers do.Also, Apple is anything but free software. You are arguing one devil against the other here. The article is about GNU/Linux, not proprietary operating systems.I know you're playing devils advocate, but I can't help but respond.
adinsxJul 4, 2008
You don't need an emulator to run Windows executables, you can use Wine.W ineI sN ot anE mulator
will27Jul 4, 2008
The reason Stallman feels the need to protect this work with Creative Commons is the same as the reason the GPL exists to protect free software. If it was public domain there would be no restrictions on another entity taking it and creating derivative works with a more restrictive license. Creative commons ensures that the article can be republished, and remains bound by the same license to be open to others to use, under the condition that they also publish it in an open way. The license is the opposite of restriction, it only restricts someone who would restrict someone else.This concept is what the entire FLOSS community is based around, for more information visit <a class="user" href="http://www.fsf.org/">http://www.fsf.org/</a>Also I'm not completely sure but I'd assume that the no derivative works tag is just so that you don't misquote RMS, otherwise you could rewrite any statement into the article, including ones which he would disagree with. Therefore in this case this is probably the most appropriate license
delphar7Jul 4, 2008
Perhaps he was playing Devil's Advocate, but at least he knew what he was talking about and didn't just make stuff up.Architectures: x86, x64 (Dug), Itanium, Dec Alpha, MIPS, PowerPC. At the end of the day, no one wants Windows on any other architecture than X86/64. Sun isn't interested; apple was annoyed it could run on their power-pc's in the day... You can't blame MS on this one.Hardware Drivers: Actually, except video drivers it is most likely that the rest of the drivers on your box were written by microsoft. Additionally, any critical driver that is 'certified' has it's source stored in a 'neutral vault' so that MS can get the source if that company goes out of business. Protecting the Intellectual Property of the hardware vendor; while insuring the future compatibility for users.There's a reason Linux isn't actually fully GPL compliant you know.What bothers me the most about the torrent (pun coming up) of posts like this is that in reality the great majority of them are driven by individual desire to 'get stuff for free', and no higher purpose. Most of you don't even know how to program in the languages most of this stuff is written in. You don't care about open source - you care about not paying for stuff. But let's step back and assume you do care about the righteous goals of open source. How far do you think your open source would go if there was no MS to passionately despise? I certainly remember those days. We had perl, elm, tin, bash, gcc, and emacs. X10 and just been upgraded to X11 - and frankly it wasn't all that good. What is open source without an 'enemy'? It's hobby programming to show off - no internationalization - no security (ugh - the tftp worm anyone?) - in other words, no one to do the 50% of the work that isn't fun, but actually makes the software usable to non-programmers. Should all the games be open source too? Cause lots of people will be motivated to make great games for free. Yay - 10 more years of nethack, xtrek, and bzone!Ignorance and prejudiceAnd fear walk hand in hand...
init100Jul 4, 2008
What's wrong with him posting his views? If you disagree, fine, but others may agree with him.
init100Jul 4, 2008
Tell that to all the pirates instead of to Mr Stallman, who writes his own software when he isn't satisfied with what's available.
carloszunJul 5, 2008
The problem with the Noderivs is I can't translate it to spanish now :(
guymandoodJul 10, 2008
And when you grow up... you want to be a Developer.... but nobody will be there to pay you. So you can work at McDonald's by day and be a great OSS contributor by night!!!! Is that your path?
daradibAug 4, 2008
Stallman has explained before that there are functional works (i.e. software, encyclopedias, textbooks), which should be free as in free software (copy, distribute, modify, derivative, etc.). Other works (including opinions), may not have the same freedoms, but ideally should have the right to copy and distribute without modifications.The freedom of functional works is important, but other works (like opinions) are exactly what they are---opinions and the freedom of these works only extents to copying and distributing.Though translations would be nice, they may change the opinion of the article.