Re: [libreplanet-discuss] interview with Noam Chomsky

[J.B. Nicholson-Owens]

Kẏra wrote:
> If you can explain free software in 5 minutes flat, spend 5 minutes
> working out what he doesn't understand, and manage to get some sort of
> endorsement out of him, that would be great.

This seems eminently achievable; it's not hard to explain what software 
freedom is, but also relate software freedom to people in a way where 
they can see how its obviously a good thing in the world.

> I would tie it into his previous work, like manufacturing consent. Talk
> about how software mediates every aspect of our lives, and when other
> people have control over our software, they have control over us.

Some specifcs to build on this point:

Karen Sandler's hypertrophic cardiomyopathy talk is online in multiple 
places: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XDTQLa3NjE for the video 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0zQnM82MZO0 for a related interview and 
her whitepaper "Killed by Code: Software Transparency in Implantable 
Medical Devices" 
https://www.softwarefreedom.org/resources/2010/transparent-medical-devices.html

It's not difficult to see how proprietary software in everyday devices 
people trust with their lives and their civil liberties -- in cars, 
boats, medical equipment including devices worn inside their bodies, and 
the voting machines people use just to name a few examples -- is 
foreseeably dangerous and wholly unnecessary.

I wrote an article for Counterpunch.org some time ago about my work 
fighting proprietary software in voting machines in Champaign county 
Illinois, USA.  I introduced software freedom including a brief bit of 
history of how Stallman arrived at an ethical approach -- 
http://www.counterpunch.org/2004/08/19/why-we-need-quot-free-software-quot-voting-machines/