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www/philosophy free-software-even-more-importan...
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From: |
Dora Scilipoti |
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Subject: |
www/philosophy free-software-even-more-importan... |
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Date: |
Mon, 26 Oct 2020 02:29:26 -0400 (EDT) |
CVSROOT: /web/www
Module name: www
Changes by: Dora Scilipoti <dora> 20/10/26 02:29:26
Modified files:
philosophy : free-software-even-more-important.html
Log message:
Add link to saying-no-even-once.html (RT #1630581). Meaninful text for
link to education. Update boilerplate. Shorten lenght of some lines.
CVSWeb URLs:
http://web.cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewcvs/www/philosophy/free-software-even-more-important.html?cvsroot=www&r1=1.43&r2=1.44
Patches:
Index: free-software-even-more-important.html
===================================================================
RCS file: /web/www/www/philosophy/free-software-even-more-important.html,v
retrieving revision 1.43
retrieving revision 1.44
diff -u -b -r1.43 -r1.44
--- free-software-even-more-important.html 6 Oct 2020 08:00:29 -0000
1.43
+++ free-software-even-more-important.html 26 Oct 2020 06:29:26 -0000
1.44
@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
<!--#include virtual="/server/header.html" -->
-<!-- Parent-Version: 1.90 -->
+<!-- Parent-Version: 1.94 -->
<title>Free Software Is Even More Important Now
- GNU Project - Free Software Foundation</title>
<!--#include
virtual="/philosophy/po/free-software-even-more-important.translist" -->
@@ -20,7 +20,8 @@
<div class="announcement">
<p>
-<a href="/help/help.html">Suggested ways you can help the free software
movement</a>
+<a href="/help/help.html">Suggested ways you can help the free software
+movement</a>
</p>
</div>
<hr class="thin" />
@@ -42,8 +43,8 @@
mistreat the user. Proprietary software nowadays is often malware
because <a href="/proprietary/proprietary.html">the developers' power
corrupts them</a>. That directory lists around 450 different
-malicious functionalities (as of January, 2020), but it is surely just the
-tip of the iceberg.</p>
+malicious functionalities (as of January, 2020), but it is surely just
+the tip of the iceberg.</p>
<p>With free software, the users control the program, both individually
and collectively. So they control what their computers do (assuming
@@ -53,8 +54,8 @@
<p>With proprietary software, the program controls the users, and some
other entity (the developer or “owner”) controls the
program. So the proprietary program gives its developer power over
-its users. That is unjust in itself; moreover, it tempts the developer to
-mistreat the users in other ways.</p>
+its users. That is unjust in itself; moreover, it tempts the developer
+to mistreat the users in other ways.</p>
<p>Even when proprietary software isn't downright malicious, its
developers have an incentive to make it
@@ -76,7 +77,8 @@
</p>
<div class="important">
-<p>(0) The freedom to run the program as you wish, for whatever purpose.</p>
+<p>(0) The freedom to run the program as you wish, for whatever
+purpose.</p>
<p>(1) The freedom to study the program's “source code”,
and change it, so the program does your computing as you wish.
@@ -109,15 +111,15 @@
If any of them is missing or inadequate, the program is proprietary
(nonfree), and unjust.</p>
-<p>Other kinds of works are also used for practical activities, including
-recipes for cooking, educational works such as textbooks, reference
-works such as dictionaries and encyclopedias, fonts for displaying
-paragraphs of text, circuit diagrams for hardware for people to build,
-and patterns for making useful (not merely decorative) objects with a
-3D printer. Since these are not software, the free software movement
-strictly speaking doesn't cover them; but the same reasoning applies
-and leads to the same conclusion: these works should carry the four
-freedoms.</p>
+<p>Other kinds of works are also used for practical activities,
+including recipes for cooking, educational works such as textbooks,
+reference works such as dictionaries and encyclopedias, fonts for
+displaying paragraphs of text, circuit diagrams for hardware for people
+to build, and patterns for making useful (not merely decorative)
+objects with a 3D printer. Since these are not software, the free
+software movement strictly speaking doesn't cover them; but the same
+reasoning applies and leads to the same conclusion: these works should
+carry the four freedoms.</p>
<p>A free program allows you to tinker with it to make it do what you
want (or cease to do something you dislike). Tinkering with software
@@ -139,18 +141,18 @@
href="/proprietary/proprietary.html">proprietary programs are designed
to spy on the users, restrict them, censor them, and abuse them</a>.
For instance, the operating system of Apple <a
-href="/philosophy/why-call-it-the-swindle.html">iThings</a> does all of these,
-and so does Windows on mobile devices with ARM chips. Windows, mobile
-phone firmware, and Google Chrome for Windows include a universal back
-door that allows some company to change the program remotely without
-asking permission. The Amazon Kindle has a back door that can erase
-books.</p>
+href="/philosophy/why-call-it-the-swindle.html">iThings</a> does all
+of these, and so does Windows on mobile devices with ARM chips.
+Windows, mobile phone firmware, and Google Chrome for Windows include
+a universal back door that allows some company to change the program
+remotely without asking permission. The Amazon Kindle has a back door
+that can erase books.</p>
<p>The use of nonfree software in the “internet of things”
-would turn it into
-the <a
href="http://ieet.org/index.php/IEET/more/rinesi20150806";>“internet
-of telemarketers”</a> as well as the “internet of
-snoopers”.</p>
+would turn it into the <a
+href="http://ieet.org/index.php/IEET/more/rinesi20150806";>
+“internet of telemarketers”</a> as well as the
+“internet of snoopers”.</p>
<p>With the goal of ending the injustice of nonfree software, the free
software movement develops free programs so users can free themselves.
@@ -159,12 +161,12 @@
run GNU, mainly in the <a href="/gnu/gnu-linux-faq.html">GNU/Linux
combination</a>.</p>
-<p>Distributing a program to users without freedom mistreats those users;
-however, choosing not to distribute the program does not mistreat
-anyone. If you write a program and use it privately, that does no
-wrong to others. (You do miss an opportunity to do good, but that's
-not the same as doing wrong.) Thus, when we say all software must
-be free, we mean that every copy must come with the four freedoms,
+<p>Distributing a program to users without freedom mistreats those
+users; however, choosing not to distribute the program does not
+mistreat anyone. If you write a program and use it privately, that
+does no wrong to others. (You do miss an opportunity to do good, but
+that's not the same as doing wrong.) Thus, when we say all software
+must be free, we mean that every copy must come with the four freedoms,
but we don't mean that someone has an obligation to offer you a copy.</p>
<h3>Nonfree Software and SaaSS</h3>
@@ -174,12 +176,12 @@
a Software Substitute, or SaaSS. That means letting someone else's
server do your own computing tasks.</p>
-<p>SaaSS doesn't mean the programs on the server are nonfree (though they
-often are). Rather, using SaaSS causes the same injustices as using a
-nonfree program: they are two paths to the same bad place. Take the
-example of a SaaSS translation service: The user sends text to the
-server, and the server translates it (from English to Spanish, say)
-and sends the translation back to the user. Now the job of
+<p>SaaSS doesn't mean the programs on the server are nonfree (though
+they often are). Rather, using SaaSS causes the same injustices as
+using a nonfree program: they are two paths to the same bad place.
+Take the example of a SaaSS translation service: The user sends text
+to the server, and the server translates it (from English to Spanish,
+say) and sends the translation back to the user. Now the job of
translating is under the control of the server operator rather than
the user.</p>
@@ -191,12 +193,12 @@
<h3>Primary And Secondary Injustices</h3>
-<p>When you use proprietary programs or SaaSS, first of all you do wrong
-to yourself, because it gives some entity unjust power over you. For
-your own sake, you should escape. It also wrongs others if you make a
-promise not to share. It is evil to keep such a promise, and a lesser
-evil to break it; to be truly upright, you should not make the promise
-at all.</p>
+<p>When you use proprietary programs or SaaSS, first of all you do
+wrong to yourself, because it gives some entity unjust power over you.
+For your own sake, you should escape. It also wrongs others if you
+make a promise not to share. It is evil to keep such a promise, and a
+lesser evil to break it; to be truly upright, you should not make the
+promise at all.</p>
<p>There are cases where using nonfree software puts pressure directly
on others to do likewise. Skype is a clear example: when one person
@@ -262,9 +264,9 @@
<p>Proprietary developers would have us punish students who are good
enough at heart to share software and thwart those curious enough to
-want to change it. This means a bad education. See
-<a href="/education/">http://www.gnu.org/education/</a>
-for more discussion of the use of free software in schools.</p>
+want to change it. This means a bad education. See more discussion
+about <a href="/education/education.html">the use of free software in
+schools</a>.</p>
<h3>Free Software: More Than “Advantages”</h3>
@@ -297,13 +299,26 @@
<h3>Conclusion</h3>
-<p>We deserve to have control of our own computing; how can we win
-this control? By rejecting nonfree software on the computers we own
-or regularly use, and rejecting SaaSS. By <a
+<p>We deserve to have control of our own computing. How can we win
+this control?</p>
+
+<ul>
+ <li>By rejecting nonfree software on the computers we own or
+regularly use, and rejecting SaaSS.</li>
+
+ <li>By <a
href="/licenses/license-recommendations.html"> developing free
-software</a> (for those of us who are programmers.) By refusing to
-develop or promote nonfree software or SaaSS. By <a
-href="/help/help.html">spreading these ideas to others</a>.</p>
+software</a> (for those of us who are programmers.)</li>
+
+ <li>By refusing to develop or promote nonfree software or SaaSS.</li>
+
+ <li>By <a
+href="/help/help.html">spreading these ideas to others</a>.</li>
+
+ <li>By <a
+href="/philosophy/saying-no-even-once.html">saying no and stating our
+reasons</a> when we are invited to run a nonfree program.</li>
+</ul>
<p>We and thousands of users have done this since 1984, which is how
we now have the free GNU/Linux operating system that
@@ -367,7 +382,7 @@
<p class="unprintable">Updated:
<!-- timestamp start -->
-$Date: 2020/10/06 08:00:29 $
+$Date: 2020/10/26 06:29:26 $
<!-- timestamp end -->
</p>
</div>