Part 2 of 2 Free Software. Freedom and Cooperation.

[Don Saklad]

QUESTION: [Inaudible]

STALLMAN: Can't hear you -- what?

QUESTION: [Inaudible]

STALLMAN: Well, it's just not -- you know, it's
 provincial.

QUESTION: But it's more good fortune then finding X and
 Mach?

STALLMAN: Right.  The difference is that the people who
 developed X and Mach didn't have the goal of making a
 complete free operating system.  We're the only ones
 who had that.  And, it was our tremendous work that
 made the system exist.  We actually did a larger part
 of the system than any other project.  No coincidence,
 because those people----they wrote useful parts of the
 system.  But they didn't do it because they wanted the
 system to be finished.  They had other reasons.

Now the people who developed X --- they thought that
 designing across the network window system would be a
 good project, and it was.  And it turned out to help
 us make a good, free operating system.  But that's not
 what they hoped for.  They didn't even think about
 that.  It was an accident.  An accidental benefit.
 Now, I'm not saying that what they did was bad.  They
 did a large, free software project.  That's a good
 thing to do.  But they didn't have that ultimate
 vision.  The GNU Project is where that vision was.

And, so, we were the ones whose --- every title piece
 didn't get done by somebody else, we did it.  Because
 we knew that we wouldn't have a complete system
 without it.  And even if it was totally boring, and
 unromantic like tar or mv.  [Laughter] We did it.  Or
 ld, you know there's nothing very exciting in ld --
 but I wrote one. [Laughter] And I did make efforts to
 have it do a minimal amount of disk I/O so that it
 would be faster and handle bigger programs.  But, you
 know, I like to do a good job.  I like to improve
 various things about the program while I'm doing it.
 But the reason that I did it, wasn't that I had
 brilliant ideas for a better ld.  The reason I did it
 is that we needed one that was free.  And we couldn't
 expect anyone else to do it.  So, we had to do it, or
 find someone to do it.

So, although at this point, thousands of people in
 projects have contributed to this system, there is one
 project which is the reason that this system exists,
 and that's the GNU Project.  It *is* basically the GNU
 System, with other things added since then.

So, however, the practice of calling the system Linux
 has been a great blow to the GNU Project, because we
 don't normally get credit for what we've done.  I
 think Linux, the kernel, is a very useful piece of
 free software, and I have only good things to say
 about it.  But, well, actually, I can find a few bad
 things to say about it.  [Laughter] But, basically, I
 have good things to say about it.  However, the
 practice of calling the GNU system, Linux, is just a
 mistake.  I'd like to ask you please to make the small
 effort necessary to call the system GNU/Linux, and
 that way, to help us get a share of the credit.

QUESTION: You need a mascot! Get yourself a stuffed
 animal!

[Laughter]

STALLMAN: We have one.
 
QUESTION: You do?

STALLMAN: We have an animal -- a gnu.  [Laughter]
 Anyway. So, yes, when you draw a penguin --draw a gnu
 next to it. [Laughter]

But, let's save the questions for the end.  I have more
 to go through.  So, why am I so concerned about this?
 You know, why do I think it is worth bothering you,
 and perhaps giving you a -- perhaps lowering your
 opinion of me [Laughter] to raise this issue of
 credit?  Because, you know, some people when I do
 this, some people think that it's because I want my
 ego to be fed, right?  Of course, I'm not saying --
 calling -- I'm not asking you to call it "Stallmanix"
 --- right?  [Laughter and Applause]

I'm asking you to call it GNU, because I want the GNU
 Project to get credit.  And there's a very specific
 reason for that, which is a lot more important than
 anybody getting credit, in and of itself.  You see,
 these days, if you look around in our community, most
 of the people talking about it, and writing about it
 don't ever mention GNU, and they don't ever mention
 these goals of freedom ---- these political and social
 ideals, either.  Because the place they come from is
 GNU.  The ideas associated with Linux --- the
 philosophy is very different.  It is basically the
 a-political philosophy of Linus Torvalds.  So, when
 people think that the whole system is Linux, they tend
 to think: "Oh, it must have been all started by Linux
 Torvalds.  His philosophy must be the one that we
 should look at carefully".  And when they hear about
 the GNU philosophy, they say: "Boy, this is so
 idealistic, this must be awfully impractical.  I'm a
 Linux-user, not a GNU-user." [Laughter]


What irony!  If they only knew!  If they knew that the
 system they liked -- or, in some cases, love and go
 wild over --- is our idealistic, political philosophy
 made real.  They still wouldn't have to agree with us.
 But at least they'd see a reason to take it
 seriously----to think about it carefully---to give it
 a chance.  They would see how it relates to their
 lives.  You know, if they realized: "I'm using the GNU
 system.  Here's the GNU philosophy.  This philosophy
 is why this system that I like very much exists."
 They'd at least consider it with a much more open
 mind.  It doesn't mean that everybody will agree.
 People think different things.  That's OK.  You know,
 people should make up their own minds.  But I want
 this philosophy to get the benefit of the credit for
 the results it has achieved.

If you look around in our community, you'll find that
 almost everywhere, the institutions are calling the
 system Linux.  You know, reporters mostly call it
 Linux.  It's not right, but they do.  The companies
 mostly say -- that package the system.  Oh, and most
 of these reporters, when they write articles, they
 usually don't look at it as a political issue, or
 social issue.  They're usually looking at it purely as
 a business question or what companies are going to
 succeed more or less, which is really a fairly minor
 question for society.  And, if you look at the
 companies that package the GNU/Linux system for people
 to use.  Well, most of them call it Linux.  And they
 *all* add non-free software to it.

See the GNU GPL says that if you take code, and some
 code out of a GPL-covered program, and add some more
 code to make a bigger program, that whole program has
 to be released under the GPL.  But you could put other
 separate programs on the same disk (of either kind,
 hard disk, or CD), and they can have other licenses.
 That's considered mere aggregation.  And, essentially,
 just distributing two programs to somebody at the same
 time is not something we have any say over.  So, in
 fact, it is not true.  Sometimes, I wish it were true
 that if a company uses a GPL-covered program in a
 product, that the whole product has to be free
 software.  It's not --- it doesn't go to that range
 --- that stoke.  It's the whole program.  If there are
 two separate programs that communicate with each other
 at arm's length --- like by sending messages to each
 other --- then, they're legally separate, in general.
 So, these companies, by adding a non-free software to
 the system, are giving the users, philosophically and
 politically, a very bad idea.  They're telling the
 users: "it is OK to use non-free software.  We're even
 putting it on this as a bonus."

If you look at the magazines, about the use of the
 GNU/Linux system, most of them have a title like
 "Linux-something or other".  So they're calling the
 system, Linux, most of the time.  And they're filled
 with ads for non-free software, that you could run on
 top of the GNU/Linux system.  Now those ads have a
 common message.  If they say: "non-free software is
 good for you.  It's so good that you might even *pay*
 to get it."  [Laughter] And they call these things
 "value-added packages", which makes a statement about
 their values.  They're saying: "Value practical
 convenience, not freedom."  And, I don't agree with
 those values, so I call them "freedom-subtracted
 packages".  [Laughter] Because if you have installed a
 free operating system, then you now are living in the
 free world.  You enjoy the benefits of liberty that we
 worked for so many years to give you.  Those packages
 give you an opportunity to buckle on a chain.

And, then if you look at the trade shows---about the
 use of the--- dedicated to the use of the GNU/Linux
 system.  They all call themselves "Linux shows".  And
 they're filled with booths exhibiting non-free
 software, essentially putting the seal of approval on
 the non-free software.  So, almost everywhere you look
 in our community ---- the institutions are endorsing
 the non-free software --- totalling negating the idea
 of freedom that GNU was developed for.  And the only
 place that people are likely to come across the idea
 of freedom is in connection with GNU, and in
 connection with free software: the term "free
 software".  So this is why I ask you: please call the
 system "GNU/Linux".  Please make people aware where
 the system came from, and why.

Of course, just by using that name, you won't be making
 an explanation of the history.  You can type four
 extra characters and write "GNU/Linux"; you can say
 two extra syllables.  But, GNU/Linux is fewer
 syllables than Windows 2000.  [Laughter] But, you're
 not telling them a lot, but you're preparing them, so
 that when they hear about GNU, and what it's all
 about, they'll see how that connects to them, and
 their lives.  And that, indirectly, makes a tremendous
 difference.  So, please help us.

You'll note that Microsoft called the GPL an "open
 source license".  They don't want people to be
 thinking in terms of freedom as the issue.  You'll
 find that they invite people to think in a narrow way,
 as consumers.  (And, of course, not even think very
 rationally as consumers, if they're going to choose
 Microsoft products.)  But they don't want people to
 think as citizens or statesmen.  That's inimical to
 them.  At least it's inimical to their current
 business model.

Now, how does free software...well, I can tell you
 about how "free software" relates to our society.  A
 secondary topic that might be of interest to some of
 you is how free software relates to business.  Now, in
 fact, free software is *tremendously* useful for
 business.  After all, most businesses in the advanced
 countries use software.  Only a tiny fraction of them
 develop software.  And free software is tremendously
 advantageous for any company that uses software,
 because it means that you're in control.  Basically,
 free software means the users are in control of what
 the program does.  Either individually, if they care
 enough to be, or, collectively, when they care enough
 to be.  Whoever cares enough can exert some influence.
 If you don't care, you don't buy.  Then you use what
 other people prefer.  But, if you do care, then you
 have some say.

With proprietary software, you have essentially no say.
 With free software, you can change what you want to
 change.  And it doesn't matter that there are no
 programmers in your company; that's fine.  You know,
 if you wanted to move the walls in your building, you
 don't have to be a carpentry company, you just have to
 be able to go find a carpenter and say, what will you
 charge to do this job?  And, if you want to change
 around the software you use, you don't have to be a
 programming company.  You just have to go to a
 programming company and say: "What will you charge to
 implement these features?  And when will you have it
 done?"  And if they don't do the job, you can go find
 somebody else.

There's a free market for support.  So, any business
 that cares about support, will find a tremendous
 advantage in free software.  With proprietary
 software, support is a monopoly.  Because, one company
 has the source code, or maybe a small number of
 companies that paid a gigantic amount of money have
 the source code, if it's Microsoft's shared source
 program.  But, it's very few.  And so, there aren't
 very many possible sources of support for you.  And
 that means, that unless you're a real giant, they
 don't care about you.  Your company is not important
 enough for them to care if they lose your business, or
 what happens.  Once you're using the program, they
 figure you're locked in to getting the support from
 them, because to switch to a different program is a
 gigantic job.  So, you end up with things like paying
 for the privilege of reporting a bug.  [Laughter] And
 once you've paid, they tell you: "Well, OK, we've
 noted your bug report.  And in a few months, you can
 buy an upgrade, and you can see if we've fixed it."
 [Laughter]

Support providers for free software can't get away with
 that.  They have to please the customers.  Of course,
 you can get a lot of good support gratis.  You post
 your problem on the Internet.  You may get an answer
 the next day.  But that's not guaranteed, of course.
 If you want to be confident, you better make an
 arrangement with a company and pay them.  And this is,
 of course, one of the ways that free software business
 works.

Another advantage of free software for businesses that
 use software is security, and privacy.  (And this
 applies to individuals as well.  But I brought it up
 in the context of businesses.)  You see, when a
 program is proprietary, you can't even tell what it
 really does.  It could have features, deliberately put
 in, that you wouldn't like if you knew about them.
 Like it might have a back door, to let the developer
 get into your machine.  It might snoop on what you do,
 and send information back.  This is not unusual.  Some
 Microsoft software did this.  But it's not only
 Microsoft.  There are other proprietary programs that
 snoop on the user.  And, you can't even tell if it
 does this.  And, of course, even assuming that the
 developer's totally honest, every programmer makes
 mistakes.  There could be bugs that affect your
 security, which are nobody's fault.  But, the point
 is: if it's not free software, you can't find them,
 and you can't fix them.

Nobody has the time to check the source of every
 program he runs.  You're not going to do that.  But
 with free software there's a large community, and
 there are people in that community who are checking
 things.  And you get the benefit of their checking.
 Because, if there's an accidental bug, (there surely
 are, from time to time, in any program), they might
 find it and fix it.  And people are much less likely
 to put in a deliberate Trojan horse, or a snooping
 feature, if they think they might get caught.  The
 proprietary software developers figure they won't get
 caught.  They'll get away with it, undetected.  But a
 free software developer has to figure that people will
 look at that, and see it's there.  So, in our
 community, we don't feel we can get away with ramming
 a feature down the users' throats that the users
 wouldn't like.  So, we know that if the users don't
 like it, they'll make a modified version which doesn't
 have it.  And then, they'll all start using that
 version.

In fact, we can all reason enough; we can all figure
 this out enough steps ahead that we probably won't put
 in that feature.  After all, you're writing a free
 program, you want people to like your version.  You
 don't want to put in a thing that you know a lot of
 people are going to hate, and have another modified
 version catch on, instead of yours.  So, you just
 realize that the user is king, in the world of free
 software.  In the world of proprietary software, the
 customer is *not* king.  Because you are only a
 customer, you have no say in the software you use.

In this respect, free software is a new mechanism for
 democracy to operate.  Professor Lessig, now at
 Stanford, noted that code functions as a kind of law.
 Whoever gets to write the code that just about
 everybody uses, for all intents and purposes, is
 writing the laws that run people's lives.  With free
 software, these laws get written in a democratic way.
 Not the classical form of democracy; we don't have a
 big election and say: "everybody vote which way should
 this feature be done?".  [Laughter] Instead we say,
 basically, those of you who want to work on
 implementing the feature this way, do it.  And, if you
 want to work on implementing the feature that way, do
 it.  And, it gets done one way or the other, you know?
 And so, if a lot of people want it this way, it'll get
 done this way.  So, in this way, everybody contributes
 to the social decision by simply taking steps in the
 direction that he wants to go.

And, you're free to take as many steps, personally, as
 you want to take.  A business is free to commission as
 many steps as they find useful to take.  And, after
 you add all these things up, that says which direction
 the software goes.

And it's often very useful to be able to take pieces
 out of some existing program, presumably, usually
 large pieces of course.  And then, write a certain
 amount of code of your own.  And, make a program that
 does exactly what you need, which would have cost you
 an arm and a leg to develop if you had to write it all
 from scratch---if you couldn't cannibalize large
 pieces from some existing "free software" package.

Another thing that results from the fact that the user
 is king, is that we tend to be very good about
 compatibility and standardization.  Why?  Because
 users like that!  Users are likely to reject a program
 that has gratuitous incompatibilities in it.  Now,
 sometimes there's a certain group of users which
 actually have a need for a certain kind of
 incompatibility.  And then, they'll have it; that's
 OK.  But, when users want is to follow a standard, we
 developers have to follow it.  And, we know that.  And
 we do it.  By contrast, if you look at proprietary
 software developers, they often find it advantageous
 to deliberately *not* follow a standard.  And, not
 because they think that they're giving the user an
 advantage that way, but rather, because they're
 imposing on the user---locking the user in.  And
 you'll even find them making changes in their file
 formats from time to time, just to force people to get
 the newest version.

Archivists are finding a problem now, that files
 written on computers ten years ago, often can't be
 accessed.  They were written with proprietary
 software, that's essentially lost now.  If it were
 written with free software, then it could be brought
 up-to-date and run.  And those things would
 not---those records would not be lost, would not be
 inaccessible.  They were even complaining about this
 on NPR recently in citing free software as a solution.
 And so, in effect, by using a non-free program to
 store your own data, you are putting your head in a
 noose.

So, I've talked about how free software affects most
 business.  But, how does it affect that particular
 narrow area which is software business?  Well, the
 answer is mostly not at all.  And the reason is that
 90% of the software industry, (from what I'm told), is
 development of custom software.  Software that's not
 meant to be released at all.  For custom software,
 this issue, or the ethical issue of free or
 proprietary, doesn't arise.  You see, the issue is:
 "Are you users free to change, and redistribute the
 software?"  If there's only one user, and that user
 owns the rights, there's no problem.  That user *is*
 free to do all these things.  So, in effect, any
 *custom* program that was developed by one company for
 use in-house is free software, as long as they have
 the sense to insisting on getting the source code, and
 all the rights.

And the issue doesn't really arise for software that
 goes in a watch or a microwave oven, or an automobile
 ignition system.  Because those are places where you
 don't download software to install.  It's not a real
 computer, as far as the user is concerned.  And so, it
 doesn't raise these issues enough for them to be
 ethically important.  So, for the most part, the
 software industry will go along, just as it's been
 going.  And the interesting thing is that, since such
 a large fraction of the jobs are in that part of the
 industry, even if there were no possibilities for free
 software business, the developers of "free software
 could all get day jobs writing custom software.
 [Laughter] There's so many; the ratio is so big.

But, as it happens, there is free software business.
 There are free software companies.  And, at the press
 conference that I'm going to have, people from a
 couple of them will join us.  And, of course, there
 are also companies which are *not* free software
 businesses, but do develop useful pieces of free
 software to release.  And, the free software that they
 produce is substantial.

Now, how do free software businesses work?  Well, some
 of them sell copies.  You know, you're free to copy
 it, but they can still sell thousands of copies a
 month.  And, others sell support and various kinds of
 services.  I, personally, for the second half of the
 '80's, I sold free software support services.
 Basically I said, for $200 an hour, I'll change
 whatever you want me to change in GNU software that
 I'd written.  And, yes, it was a stiff rate, but if it
 was a program that I was the author of, people would
 figure that I might get the job done in a lot fewer
 hours.  [Laughter] And I made a living that way.  In
 fact, I'd made more than I'd ever made before.  I also
 taught classes.  And I kept doing that until 1990,
 when I got a big prize, and I didn't have to do it any
 more.

But, 1990 was when the first corporation free software
 business was formed, which was Cygnus Support.  And
 their business was to do, essentially, the same kind
 of thing that I'd been doing.  I certainly could have
 worked for them, if I had needed to do that.  Since I
 didn't need to, I felt it was good for the Movement if
 I remained independent of any one company.  That way,
 I could say good and bad things about the various free
 software and non-free software companies, without a
 conflict of interest.  I felt that I could serve the
 Movement more.  But, if I had needed that to make a
 living, sure, I would have worked for them.  It's an
 ethical business to be in.  No reason I would have
 felt ashamed to take a job with them.  And, that
 company was profitable in its first year.  It was
 formed with very little capital, just the money its
 three founders had.  And it kept growing every year,
 and being profitable every year, until they got
 greedy, and looked for outside investors, and then
 they messed things up.  But it was several years of
 success, before they got greedy.

So, this illustrates one of the exciting things about
 free software.  Free software demonstrates that you
 don't need to raise capital to develop free software.
 I mean, it's useful; it *can* help.  You know, if you
 do raise some capital, you can hire people and have
 them write a bunch of software.  But you can get a lot
 done with a small number of people.  And, in fact, the
 tremendous efficiency of the process of developing
 free software is one of the reasons it's important for
 the world to switch to free software.  And it also
 belies what Microsoft says, when they say: "the GNU
 GPL is bad, because it makes it harder for them to
 raise capital to develop non-free software", and take
 our free software, and put our code into their
 programs that they won't share with us.  Basically, we
 don't need to have them raising capital that way.
 We'll get the job done anyway.  We *are* getting the
 job done.

People used to say, we could never do a complete free
 operating system.  Now we've done that and a
 tremendous amount more.  And I would say that we're
 about an order of magnitude away from developing all
 the general purpose published software needs of the
 world.  And this is in a world where more than 90% of
 the users don't use our free software yet!  This is in
 a world where... Although in certain areas of
 business, you know, more than half of all the web
 servers in the world are running on GNU/Linux with
 Apache as the web server.

QUESTION: [Inaudible] ... What did you say before
 Linux?

STALLMAN: I said GNU/Linux.

QUESTION: You did?

STALLMAN: Yes, if I'm talking about the kernel, I call
 it Linux.  You know, that's its name.  The kernel was
 written by Linus Torvalds, and we should only call it
 by the name that he chose, out of respect for the
 author.

Anyway, but in general in business, most users are not
 using it.  Most home users are not using our system
 yet.  So, when they are, we should automatically get
 10 times as many volunteers, and 10 times as many
 customers for the free software businesses that there
 will be.  And so, that will take us that order of
 magnitude.  So, at this point, I am pretty confident
 that we *can* do the job.

And, this is important, because Microsoft asks us to
feel desperate.  They say:

     "the only way you can have software to run; the
      only way you can have innovation, is if you give
      us power!  Let us dominate you.  Let us control
      what you can do with the software you're running,
      so that we can squeeze a lot of money out of you,
      and use a certain fraction of that to develop
      software, and take the rest as profit."

Well, you shouldn't ever feel that desperate.  You
 shouldn't ever feel so desperate that you give up your
 freedom.  That's very dangerous.

Another thing that Microsoft (well, not just Microsoft)
 --- people who don't support free software generally
 adopt a value system in which the only thing that
 matters is short-term practical benefits.  "How much
 money am I going to make this year?  What job can I
 get done today?"  Short-term thinking and narrow
 thinking.  Their assumption is that it is ridiculous
 to imagine that anybody ever might make a sacrifice
 for the sake of freedom.

Yesterday, a lot of people were making speeches about
 Americans who made sacrifices for the freedom of their
 compatriots.  Some of them made great sacrifices.
 They even sacrificed their lives for the kinds of
 freedom that everyone in our country has heard about,
 at least.  (At least, in some of the cases; I guess we
 have to ignore the war in Vietnam.)

[Editor's note: The day before was "Memorial Day" in
 the USA.  Memorial Day is a day where war heros are
 commemorated.]

But, fortunately, to maintain our freedom in using
 software, doesn't call for big sacrifices; just tiny,
 little sacrifices are enough.  Like learning a
 command-line interface, if we don't have a GUI
 interface program yet.  Like doing the job in this
 way, because we don't have a free software package to
 do it that way, yet.  Like, paying some money to a
 company that's going to develop a certain free
 software package, so that you can have it in a few
 years.  Various little sacrifices that we can all
 make.  And, in the long run, even *we* will have
 benefitted from it.  You know, it is really an
 investment more than a sacrifice!  We just have to
 have enough long-term view to realize it's good for us
 to invest in improving our society, without counting
 the nickels and dimes of who gets how much of the
 benefit from that investment.

So, at this point, I'm essentially done.

I'd like to mention that there's a new approach to free
 software business being proposed by Tony Stanco, which
 he calls "Free Developers".  Which involves a certain
 business structure which hopes eventually to pay out a
 certain share of the profits to every --- to all the
 authors of the free software who've joined the
 organization.  And they're looking at the prospects of
 getting me some rather large government software
 development contracts in India now.  Because they're
 going to be using free software as the basis -- having
 tremendous cost savings that way.

And so, now I guess that I should ask for questions.


QUESTION: [Inaudible]

STALLMAN: Could you speak up a bit louder please?  I
 can't really hear you.

QUESTION: How could a company like Microsoft include a
 free software contract?

STALLMAN: Well, actually, Microsoft is planning to
 shift a lot of its activity into services.  And, what
 they're planning to do is something dirty and
 dangerous, which is tie the services to the programs,
 one to the next, in a sort of zig-zag, you know?  So
 that to use this service, you've got to be using this
 Microsoft program, which is going to mean you need to
 use this service, to this Microsoft program, -so it's
 all tied together.  That's their plan.

Now, the interesting thing is that selling those
 services doesn't raise the ethical issue of free
 software or non-free software!  It might be perfectly
 fine for them to have the business for those
 businesses selling those services over the Net to
 exist.  However, what Microsoft is planning to do is
 to use them to achieve an even greater lock --- An
 even greater monopoly --- on the software and the
 services.  And, this was described in an article, I
 believe, in Business Week, recently .  And, other
 people said that it is turning the Net into the
 Microsoft Company Town.

And this is relevant, because, you know, the trial
 court in the Microsoft anti-trust trial recommended
 breaking up the company, Microsoft.  But in a way,
 that makes no sense; it wouldn't do any good at all:
 into the operating part, and the applications part.

But, having seen that article, I now see a useful,
 effective way to split up Microsoft into the services
 part and the software part.  To require them to deal
 with each other only at arm's length.  That the
 services [division] must publish their interfaces, so
 that anybody can write a client to talk to those
 services.  And, I guess, that they have to pay to get
 the service; well, that's OK.  That's a totally
 different issue.

If Microsoft is split up in this way [...], "services
 and software", they will not be able to use their
 software to crush competition with Microsoft services.
 And they won't be able to use the services [division]
 to crush competition with Microsoft software.  And we
 will be able to make the free software, and maybe you
 people will use it to talk to Microsoft services, and
 we won't mind!

Because, after all, although Microsoft is the
 proprietary software company that has subjugated the
 most people, the others have subjugated fewer people;
 it's not for want of trying [Laughter], they just
 haven't succeeded in subjugating as many people.  So,
 the problem is not Microsoft, and only Microsoft.
 Microsoft is just the biggest example of the problem
 we're trying to solve, which is proprietary software
 taking away users freedom to cooperate and form an
 ethical society.  So, we shouldn't focus too much on
 Microsoft.  You know, even though they did give me the
 opportunity for this platform, that doesn't make them
 all-important.  They're not the be-all and end-all.

QUESTION: Earlier, you were discussing the
 philosophical differences between open source software
 and free software.  How do you feel about the current
 trend of GNU/Linux distributions as they head towards
 supporting only Intel platforms?  And the fact that it
 seems that less and less programmers are programming
 correctly, and making software that will compile
 anywhere.  And making software that simply works on
 Intel systems.


STALLMAN: I don't see an ethical issue there.
 Although, in fact, companies that make computers,
 sometimes port the GNU/Linux system to it.  HP
 apparently did this recently.  And, they didn't bother
 paying for a port of windows, because that would have
 cost too much.  But getting GNU/Linux supported was, I
 think, five engineers for a few months.  It was easily
 doable.

Now, of course, I encourage people to use autoconf,
 which is a GNU package that makes it easier to make
 your programs portable.  I encourage them to do that.
 Or when somebody else fixes the bug that it didn't
 compile on that version of the system, and sends it to
 you, you should put it in.  But I don't see that as an
 ethical issue.


QUESTION: Two comments.  One is: recently, you spoke at
 MIT.  I read the transcript.  And someone asked about
 patents, and you said that "patents are a totally
 different issue.  I have no comments on that."

STALLMAN: Right.  I actually have a lot to say about
 patents, but it takes an hour. [Laughter]


QUESTION: I wanted to say this: it seems to me that
 there is an issue.  I mean, there is a reason that
 companies call both patents and copyrights -- things
 like hard property in trying to get this concept.
 Which is, if they want to use the power of the State
 to create a course of monopoly for themselves.  And
 so, what's common about these things is not that they
 revolve around the same issues, but that motivation is
 not really the public service issues, but the
 motivation of companies to get a monopoly for their
 private interests.

STALLMAN: I understand.  But well, I want to respond
 because there's not too much time.  So I'd like to
 respond to that.

You're right that that's what they want.  But there's
 another reason why they want to use the term
 "intellectual property".  It's that they don't want to
 encourage people to think carefully about copyright
 issues or patent issues.  Because copyright law and
 patent law are totally different, and the effects of
 software copyrighted software patents are totally
 different.

Software patents are a restriction on
 programmers---prohibiting them from writing certain
 kinds of programs.  Whereas, copyright doesn't do
 that.  With copyright, at least if you wrote it
 yourself, you're allowed to distribute it.  So, it's
 tremendously important to separate these issues.

They have a little bit in common, at a very low level.
 And everything else is different.  So, please, to
 encourage clear-thinking, discuss copyright, or
 discuss patents.  But don't discuss "intellectual
 property."  I don't have an opinion on "intellectual
 property".  I have opinions on copyrights and patents
 and software.

QUESTION: You mentioned at the beginning that a
 functional language, like recipes, are computer
 programs.  There's a cross a little bit different than
 other kinds of language created on.  This is also
 causing a problem in the DVD case.

STALLMAN: The issues are partly similar, but partly
 different, for things that are not functional in
 nature.  Part of the issue transfers, but not all of
 it.  Unfortunately, that's another hour speech.  I
 don't have time to go into it.  But, I would say that
 all functional works ought to be free in the same
 sense as software.  You know: textbooks, manuals,
 dictionaries, and recipes, and so on.

QUESTION: I was just wondering on on-line music, there
 are similarities and differences created all through.


STALLMAN: Right.  I'd say that the minimum freedom that
 we should have for *any* kind of published
 information, is the freedom to non-commercially
 redistribute it, verbatim.  For functional works, we
 need the freedom to *commercially* publish a modified
 version, because that's tremendously useful to
 society.  For non-functional works, you know, things
 that are to entertain, or to be aesthetic, or to state
 a certain person's views, you know, perhaps they
 shouldn't be modified.  And, perhaps that means that
 it's OK, to have copyright covering all *commercial*
 distribution of them.

Please remember that according to the
 U.S. Constitution, the purpose of copyright is to
 benefit the public.  It is to modify the behavior of
 certain private parties, so that they will publish
 more books.  And the benefit of this is that society
 gets to discuss issues, and learn And, you know, we
 have literature.  We have scientific works.  The
 purpose is encourage that.  Copyrights do not exist
 for the sake of authors, let alone for the sake of
 publishers.  They exist for the sake of readers and
 all those who benefit from the communication of
 information that happens when people write and others
 read.  And that goal, I agree with!

But, in the age of the computer networks, the *method*
 is no longer tenable, because it now requires
 Draconian laws that invade everybody's privacy and
 terrorize everyone.  You know, years in prison for
 sharing with your neighbor.  It wasn't like that in
 the age of the printing press.  Then, copyright was an
 industrial regulation.  It restricted publishers!
 *Now*, it's a restriction imposed by the publishers on
 the public.  So, the power relationship is turned
 around 180 degrees, even if it's the same law.

QUESTION: So you can have the same thing - but like in
 making music from other music.

STALLMAN: Right.  That is an interesting.

QUESTION: And unique, new works, you know, it's still a
 lot of cooperation.

STALLMAN: It is.  And I think that probably requires
 some kind of fair use concept.  Certainly making a few
 seconds of sample, and using that in making some
 musical work: obviously that should be fair use.  Even
 the standard idea of fair use includes that, if you
 think about it.  Whether courts agree, I'm not sure,
 but they should.  That *wouldn't* be a real change in
 the system as it has existed.

QUESTION: What do you think about publishing *public*
 information in proprietary formats?


STALLMAN: Oh, it shouldn't be.  I mean, the Government
 should never require citizens to use a non-free
 program to access, to communicate with the Government
 in any way, in either direction.


QUESTION: I have been, what I will now say, a GNU/Linux
user ...


STALLMAN: Thank you.  [Laughter]

QUESTION: ...for the past four years.  The one thing
 that has been problematical for me and is something
 that is essential, I think, to all of us, is browsing
 the web.

STALLMAN: Yes.

QUESTION: One thing that has been decidedly a weakness
 in using a GNU/Linux system has been browsing the web,
 because the prevailing tool for that, Netscape...

STALLMAN: ...Is not free software.

Let me respond to this.  I want to get to the point,
 for the sake of getting in more.  So, yes.  There has
 been a terrible tendency for people to use Netscape
 Navigator on their GNU/Linux systems.  And, in fact,
 all the commercially packaged systems come with it.
 So this is an ironic situation: we worked so hard to
 make a *free* operating system, and now, if you go to
 the store, and you can find versions of GNU/Linux
 there (most of them are called "Linux"), and they're
 not free.  Oh, well part of them is.  But then,
 there's Netscape Navigator, and maybe other non-free
 programs as well.  So, it's very hard to actually find
 a free system, unless you know what you're doing!  Or,
 of course, you can [simply]not install Netscape
 Navigator [with the commercial systems].

Now, in fact, there have been free web-browsers for
 many years.  There is a free web browser that I used
 to use called "Lynx".  It's a free web-browser that is
 non-graphical; it's text-only.  This has a tremendous
 advantage in you don't see the ads.  [Laughter]
 [Applause].

But anyway, there is a free graphical project called
 "Mozilla", which is now getting to the point where you
 can use it.  And I occasionally use it.


QUESTION: Konqueror 2.01 has been very good.

STALLMAN: Oh, OK.  So that's another free graphical
 browser.  So, we're finally solving that problem, I
 guess.


QUESTION: Can you talk to me about that
 philosophical/ethical division between free software
 and open source?  Do you feel that those are
 irreconcilable? ...

[recording switches tapes; end of question and start of
 answer is missing]

STALLMAN: .... to a freedom, and ethics.  Or whether
 you just say: "well, I hope that you companies will
 decide it's more profitable to let us be allowed to do
 these things".

 But, as I said, in a lot of practical work, it doesn't
really matter what a person's politics are.  When a
person offers to help the GNU project, we don't say:
"You have to agree with our politics".  We say that in
a GNU package, you've got to call the system,
GNU/Linux, and you've got to call it free software.
What you say when you're not speaking to the GNU
project; that's up to you.

QUESTION: The company, IBM, started a campaign for
 government agencies to sell their big new machines
 that they used Linux as selling point, and say
 "Linux"!

STALLMAN: Yes, of course, it's really the GNU/Linux
 systems. [Laughter]

QUESTION: That's right!  Well, tell the top sales
 person.  He doesn't know anything for GNU.

STALLMAN: I have to tell who?

QUESTION: The top sales person.

STALLMAN: Oh yes.  The problem is that they've already
 carefully decided what they want to say for reasons of
 their advantage.  And the issue of what is a more
 accurate, or fair or correct way to describe it, is
 not the primary issue that matters to a company like
 that.  Now, some small companies, yes, there'll be a
 boss.  And if the boss is inclined to think about
 things like that, he might make a decision that way.
 Not a giant corporation though. It's a shame, you
 know.

There's another more important and more substantive
 issue about what IBM is doing.  They're saying that
 they're putting a billion dollars into "Linux".  But
 perhaps, I should also put quotes around "into", as
 well, because some of that money is paying people to
 develop free software.  That really is a contribution
 to our community.  But, other parts is paying to
 paying people to write proprietary software, or port
 proprietary software to run on top of GNU/Linux, and
 that is *not* a contribution to our community.  But,
 IBM is lumping that altogether into this.  Some of it
 might be advertising, which, is partly a contribution,
 even if it's partly wrong.  So, it's a complicated
 situation.  Some of what they're doing is
 contribution, and some is not.  And some is sort is
 somewhat, but not exactly.  And you can't just lump it
 altogether and think: "Wow!  Whee!  A billion dollars
 from IBM."  [Laughter] That's over-simplification.


QUESTION: Can you talk a little bit more about the
 thinking that went into the general public license?

STALLMAN: Well, here's the -- I'm sorry, I'm answering
 his question now. [Laughter ]

SCHONBERG: [ Do you want to reserve some time for the
 Press Conference?  Or do you want to continue here?

STALLMAN: Who is here for the Press Conference?  Not a
 lot of press.  Oh, three -- OK.  Can you afford if we
 -- if I go on answering everybody's questions for
 another ten minutes or so?  OK.  So, we'll go on
 answering everybody's questions.

So, the thinking that went into the GNU GPL?  Part of
 it was that I wanted to protect the freedom of the
 community against the phenomena that I just described
 with X Windows, which has happened with other free
 programs as well.  In fact, when I was thinking about
 this issue, X Windows was not yet released.  But I had
 seen this problem happen in other free programs.  For
 instance, TeX.  I wanted to make sure that the users
 would all have freedom.  Otherwise, I realized that I
 might write a program, and maybe a lot of people would
 use the program, but they wouldn't have freedom.  And
 what's the point of that!?

But, the other issue I was thinking about was: I wanted
 to give the community a feeling that it was not a
 doormat---a feeling that it was not prey to any
 parasite who would wander along.  If you don't use
 copyleft, you are essentially saying: [speaking
 meekly] "Take my code.  Do what you want.  I don't say
 no."  So, anybody can come along and say: [speaking
 very firmly] "Ah, I want to make a non-free version of
 this.  I'll just take it."  And, then, of course, they
 probably make some improvements.  Those non-free
 versions might appeal to users, and replace the free
 versions.  And then, what have you accomplished?
 You've only made a donation to some proprietary
 software project!

And when people see that that's happening---when people
 see: "other people take what I do, and they don't ever
 give back", it can be demoralizing.  And, this is not
 just speculation.  I had seen that happen.  That was
 part of what happened to wipe out the old community
 that I belonged to the '70's.  Some people started
 becoming uncooperative.  And we assumed that they were
 profiting thereby.  They certainly acted as if they
 thought they were profiting.  And we realized that
 they can just take off cooperation and not give back.
 And there was nothing we could do about it.  It was
 very discouraging.  We, those of us who didn't like
 the trend, even had a discussion and we couldn't come
 up with any idea for how we could stop it.

So, the GPL is designed to stop that.  And it says:
 "Yes, you are welcome to *join* the community and use
 this code.  You can use it to do all sorts of jobs.
 But, if you release a modified version, you've got to
 release that *to* our community, as part of our
 community---as part of the free world".

So, in fact, there are still many ways that people can
 get the benefit of our work, and not contribute, like
 you don't have to write any software.  Lots of people
 use GNU/Linux, and don't write any software.  There's
 no requirement that you've got to do anything for us.
 But, if you do a certain kind of thing, you've got to
 contribute to it.  So what that means is that our
 community is not a doormat.  And I think that that
 helped give people the strength to feel: "Yes, we
 won't just be trampled under foot by everybody.  We'll
 stand up to this".

QUESTION: Yes, my question was, considering free but
 not copylefted software.  Since anybody can pick it up
 and make it proprietary, is it not possible also for
 someone to pick it up, and make some changes and
 release the whole thing under the GPL?

STALLMAN: Yes, it is possible.

QUESTION: Then, that would make all future copies then
 be GPL'ed.

STALLMAN: From that branch.  But here's why we don't do
 that.

QUESTION: Hmm?

STALLMAN: Here's why we don't generally do that.  Let
 me explain.

QUESTION: OK, yes.


STALLMAN: We could, if we wanted to, take X Windows,
 and make a GPL-covered copy, and make changes in that.
 But, there's a much larger group of people working on
 improving X Windows and *not* GPL-ing it.  So, if we
 did that, we would be forking from them.  And that's
 not very nice treatment of them.  And, they *are* a
 part of our community, contributing to our community.

Second, it would back-fire against us, because they're
 doing a lot more work on X than we would be.  So, our
 version would be inferior to theirs, and people
 wouldn't use it, which means: why go to the trouble at
 all?

QUESTION: Mmm hmm.

STALLMAN: So, when a person has written some
 improvement to X Windows, what I say that person
 should do is: cooperate with the X Development Team.
 Send it to them, and let them use it their way.
 Because they *are* developing a very important piece
 of free software.  It's good for us to cooperate with
 them!

QUESTION: Except, considering X, in particular, about
 two years ago, the X Consortium that was far into the
 "non-free" open source...


STALLMAN: Well, actually it *wasn't* open sourced.  It
 wasn't open sourced, either.  They may have said it
 was.  (I can't remember if they said that or not.)
 But it wasn't open source.

It was restricted.  You couldn't commercially
 distribute, I think.  Or you couldn't commercially
 distribute a modified version, or something like that.
 There was a restriction that's considered unacceptable
 by both the Free Software Movement and the Open Source
 Movement.

And yes, that's what using a non-copyleft license
 leaves you open to.  In fact, the X Consortium; they
 had a very rigid policy.  They say: "If your program
 if copylefted even a little bit, we won't distribute
 it at all.  We won't put it in our distribution."  So,
 a lot of people were pressured in this way into not
 copylefting.  And the result was that all of their
 software was wide open, later on.  When the same
 people who had pressured a developer to be too
 all-permissive, then the X people later said: "All
 right.  Now we can put on restrictions.", which wasn't
 very ethical of them.

But, given the situation, would we really want to
 scrape up the resources to maintain an alternate
 GPL-covered version of X?  And it wouldn't make any
 sense to do that.  There is so many other things we
 need to do.  Let's do them instead.  We can cooperate
 with the X developers.


QUESTION: Do you have a comment: is the GNU a
 trademark?  And is it practical to include it as part
 of the GNU General Public License allowing trademarks?

STALLMAN: We are, actually, applying for trademark
 registration on GNU.  But it wouldn't really have
 anything to do with that.  It's a long story to
 explain why.

QUESTION: You could require the trademark be displayed
 with GPL-covered programs.

No, I don't think so.  The licenses cover individual
 programs.  And, when a given program is part of the
 GNU project, nobody lies about that.  The name of the
 system as a whole, is a different issue.  And this, is
 an aside.  It's not worth discussing more.

QUESTION: If there was a button, that you could push
 and force all companies to free their software would
 you press it?

STALLMAN: Well, I would only use this for published
 software.  You know, I think that people have the
 right to write a program privately, and use it.  And
 that includes companies.  This is privacy issue.  And
 it's true, there can be times when it is wrong to do
 that, like if it is tremendously helpful to humanity,
 and you are withholding it from humanity that is a
 wrong, but that's a different kind of wrong.  It's a
 different issue, although it's in the same area.

But yes, I think all published software should be free
 software.  And remember, when it's not free software,
 that's because of Government intervention.  The
 Government is intervening to make it non-free.  The
 Government is creating special legal powers to hand
 out to the owners of the programs, so that they can
 have the police stop us from using the programs in
 certain ways.  So I would certainly like to end that.

SCHONBERG: Richard's presentation has invariably
 generated an enormous amount of intellectual energy.
 I would suggest that some of it should be directed to
 using, and possibly writing free software.

We should close the proceedings, shortly.  I want to
 say that Richard has injected into a profession, which
 is known in the general public for its terminal
 a-political nerd-itude, a level of political and moral
 discussion, which is I think unprecedented in our
 profession.  And we owe him very big for this.  I'd
 like to note to people that there is break.

[Applause]

STALLMAN: You are free to leave at any time, you
 know. [Laughter] I'm not holding you prisoner here.

[Audience adjourns...] 

[overlapping conversations....]

STALLMAN: One final thing.  Our website: http://www.gnu.org


http://www.gnu.org/events/rms-nyu-2001-transcript.txt



_______________________________________________________
Guide to Problematical Library Use
Boston Library Users Group
http://www.geocities.com/dsaklad/socscibpl.html