I love that George Bernard Shaw quote. In my life, I try to be as unreasonable as possible. My wife probably would not mind if I would dial that back a bit. My quote is not quite as much fun.
"Fight for the things that you care about, but do it in a way that will lead others to join you." Ruth Bader Ginsburg I think the challenge we have is leadership, drawing other people in a constructive direction. In that dimension, I suspect appointing RMS to a board is likely a mistake. Maybe not so much an outrage, but I feel it is not the right thing for either party. I have not been following closely enough to have a strong conviction on that point. On Fri, Mar 26, 2021 at 9:36 AM D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk <[email protected]> wrote: > [This is nothing to do with the current topic of the propriety or > wisdom of RMS rejoining FSF board.] > > “The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one > persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress > depends on the unreasonable man.” > > ― George Bernard Shaw, Man and Superman > > I first saw this quotation pinned to Henry Spencer's side of the cubicle I > shared with him at the University of Toronto. > > I think that this is very apt when discussing RMS. > > I'm not going to recite the history. It's available elsewhere and in more > accurate form than my memories. > > From my standpoint, RMS has been on the right side of many fights. Even > when the prospects of success have been low or distant. > > The purity and simplicity of his messages (not to mention their repetitive > nature) have made his ideas understandable. They have a logical clarity. > > He has taken a hard line that has often been or seemed impractical, > especially annoying pragmatists. > > All wins for the side he champions have been provisional. For example, > the GPL has not prevented Linux to be "enclosed"; GCC is in the process of > being supplanted by LLVM. He/we can never rest. > > Many critics argue practicality against purity. Often convincingly: they > often are not wrong. "Open Source" vs "Free/Libre Software" was an > example. Evan has been our most assertive representative of this view. > > (I certainly let the pragmatic overrule the principled. For example, I > used to use MythTV when I got an unencrypted TV signal. Then everything > became encrypted (except OTA TV, which we cannot receive). Now I use > proprietary devices and streams (Rogers, Netflix, ...).) > > Again, we depend on the unreasonable people to protect us. > > ================================ > > The reasonable person will use whatever works. This is exploited to > steer the reasonable person towards enclosure. > > Off the top of my head, the most important things that Stallman did were: > > - crystallize a movement > > - create a defensive wall for Free Software (the GPL) > > - produce GCC and related tools > > - create cogent and clear analysis > > The GPL has proven important. It is inconvenient. But look at how Apple > has co-opted BSD-licensed software. Initially I preferred "permissive" > licenses for things I produce but no longer.--- > Post to this mailing list [email protected] > Unsubscribe from this mailing list > https://gtalug.org/mailman/listinfo/talk >
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