Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 4, 2016 10:35 UTC (Mon) by DOT (subscriber, #58786)
In reply to: Mono Relicensed MIT by Cyberax
Parent article: Mono Relicensed MIT

I don't believe a free software ideology prevents reaching that many people. Android started out as a very open platform, which overtook iOS' market share a few years ago. It's sad that Google doesn't release more of its software under a free license, and in fact increasingly closed the system, but that was not at all necessary for the initial growth of the system.

Like Google but more so, Apple is subjugating its users. The fact that users voluntarily (mostly unknowingly) set themselves up to be subjugated doesn't change that fact. This is slavery in a microcosm. Compare this with labour laws: they limit what employers can require of employees, because otherwise people would voluntarily enter into actual slavery because it solves their problems (security, sustenance).

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 4, 2016 12:00 UTC (Mon) by ghane (guest, #1805) [Link] (18 responses)

> Like Google but more so, Apple is subjugating its users. The fact that users voluntarily (mostly unknowingly) set themselves up to be subjugated doesn't change that fact.

I cannot comment on the "unknowingly" part, as that would involve speaking with users; but if it is voluntary, how do we correct this? Short of legislating, and enforcing, that users must only use our approved "Free Software", what do you suggest?

The figure of 1 billion iDevices sold has been mentioned. Calling them ignorant slaves (my words) is not likely to be productive to the cause, unless the cause is to irritate them..

Note that this cuts both ways, Corbet has somehow convinced me, perhaps unknowingly, to part with $70 every year for nothing more than early access to a web blog! A blog that he gets Cyberax and you to write for, for free! Who will save me from his subjugation?

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 4, 2016 12:15 UTC (Mon) by DOT (subscriber, #58786) [Link] (17 responses)

Calling them slaves is unlikely to produce results, I agree. ;) I debated with myself whether I should have avoided the term "slavery" in my last post, for the same reason. Education is a very important step though, but I'm not sure how to reach iOS users. They tend to be emotionally attached to the Apple brand, so that makes it very difficult to avoid entrenching them in a tribal mindset.

I agree that theoretically Corbet is our overlord here, but a seven-day embargo is quite a far cry from 70 years after publication, and our esteemed editor is very conservative when it comes to deleting our posts. I tend to think of paying for LWN as more of a donation with benefits. There have been some calls for the LWN source code to be opened up though.

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 4, 2016 15:49 UTC (Mon) by bronson (subscriber, #4806) [Link] (16 responses)

Yes, but that education is needed on both sides. How can the iOS-using hordes reach the free software community about what they need in a phone or desktop environment? Because we don't seem to be anywhere close. Android even provided a road map.

You up for some learning as well as teaching?

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 4, 2016 15:55 UTC (Mon) by DOT (subscriber, #58786) [Link] (15 responses)

Ubuntu seems to be going in the right direction. Freedesktop is doing the plumbing (xdg-app) to let the rest follow Ubuntu. I'm not sure the iOS-using hordes are interested in teaching 'us', since they don't even know we exist.

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 4, 2016 21:30 UTC (Mon) by bronson (subscriber, #4806) [Link] (14 responses)

Oh, I know scads of iPhone-toting web developers who are very familiar with the GPL. They certainly know that free software exists and what it means, yet they choose to reject it. Why do you suppose that is?

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 4, 2016 23:21 UTC (Mon) by DOT (subscriber, #58786) [Link] (13 responses)

I bet they don't reject all the software they download from NPM. They know that free software doesn't cost money to use, but do they really know what it means in terms of safeguarding freedom? Have they internalized that their phone is essentially spying on them? Can they even prove it, since all the software is closed source? What could they even do about it, if they wanted to?

Sadly, the current phone market makes it next to impossible to maintain your freedom. The only somewhat practical free solution is to buy an Android phone, hack it, and put CyanogenMod on it, while resisting the urge to install the Google Apps and instead getting everything from F-droid. And even then you don't get free drivers (and thus no timely updates), since hardware companies routinely violate the GPL.

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 4, 2016 23:57 UTC (Mon) by bronson (subscriber, #4806) [Link] (12 responses)

Of course they know. They're actually very smart. They just have less tolerance for putting up with user-unfriendly BS.

"Trade a little privacy for less time learning how this arbitrary nerd stuff works? And avoid bricking my phone? Sure, sign me up! Here's my credit card number and map coordinates."

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 5, 2016 1:03 UTC (Tue) by jospoortvliet (guest, #33164) [Link] (3 responses)

... and suddenly NPM breaks their software and they wake up, eyes glassy, realizing they were pretty ignorant all that time.

To doze off again until things break even worse the next time. Boiling frog syndrome I'd say.

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 5, 2016 2:44 UTC (Tue) by bronson (subscriber, #4806) [Link] (2 responses)

Huh?? NPM is full of open source, including the GPL. You're saying developers should be scared of it? If so, I strongly disagree.

If you're saying that NPM is poor and unpublish is grossly idiotic, then I agree. But that's a different thread.

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 5, 2016 15:08 UTC (Tue) by jospoortvliet (guest, #33164) [Link] (1 responses)

NPM is ran by a company in sole control over the ecosystem, that's the problem... The GPL and AGPL are great licenses but the platform you distribute them on should be under that license too, clearly ;-)

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 5, 2016 16:51 UTC (Tue) by bronson (subscriber, #4806) [Link]

Agree 100%. The current situation is venture-backed crazy pills. It's the Node community's biggest liability right now.

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 5, 2016 8:01 UTC (Tue) by DOT (subscriber, #58786) [Link] (4 responses)

This is what Apple and Google are counting on. They have created a system where it is much easier to just give up your privacy out of despair and just 'take' it. It is an abusive relationship, and the victims are vehemently defending their abusers.

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 5, 2016 10:48 UTC (Tue) by nye (subscriber, #51576) [Link] (3 responses)

>It is an abusive relationship, and the victims are vehemently defending their abusers.

Surely you must at least be willing to entertain the idea that if several billion people disagree with you, they might not *all* be imbeciles suffering from severe Stockholm Syndrome?

Most people do not consider the things that you hate so much to *be* abusive, at all.

I *want* my phone to track where I am, and to track where other people are. This allows it, for example, to give me weather reports and directions, locally relevant searches - and locally relevant *voice recognition*. Voice recognition that *actually works* because it has enough information about the surrounding area to make *intelligent* guesses about what you might have said, like the name of a nearby road or shop with questionable pronunciation. Tracking multiple people, in aggregate, allows it to give predictions about traffic patterns that are *actually useful* in working out when you might get to your destination, not on average, but *today*.

(I won't bother to harp on about everything else, but suffice it to say that location tracking is just a single example. I'm pretty much living in the amazing sci-fi future of my childhood, like at least once a week something makes me stop and think "this is the future - I'm living in the future now".)

Nobody is giving anything up out of 'despair'; we're using useful tools that intrinsically work by processing certain information, so of course we want them to have that information. Most 'enhanced privacy' things that are popular with a certain subset of FOSS advocates look like deliberate antifeatures to me, and apparently to most of the world if their behaviour patterns are any indication.

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 5, 2016 11:18 UTC (Tue) by DOT (subscriber, #58786) [Link] (2 responses)

Location tracking is useful, yes, but indefinite storage of that information goes way beyond usefulness into creepiness. Do you think people realize that Google stores every single movement in their entire life? Obviously, we're not telling each other new information here, so maybe we should just agree to disagree and leave it at that.

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 5, 2016 12:13 UTC (Tue) by raven667 (subscriber, #5198) [Link] (1 responses)

The real problem is the lack of required oversight to prove that nothing unethical is being done with the data, currently there are few laws about this and everything is locked up behind proprietary walls and trade secrets with unverifiable privacy reports as the only mechanism to validate what is happening.

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 5, 2016 15:12 UTC (Tue) by jospoortvliet (guest, #33164) [Link]

Exactly. I'm with Nye in that I want these functions - but I should have some certainty as to how it's used. Maybe it should be on my own private server, or a server I choose at least. Or maybe there should be decent protection offered by the law. Whatever - not the wild west it is right now.

Because it is guaranteed to go wrong at some point. Next up - a company running your pacemaker (which needs a regular check-in to the cloud to function) goes bankrupt and shuts off the server...

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 5, 2016 15:09 UTC (Tue) by jospoortvliet (guest, #33164) [Link] (2 responses)

And then this happens and the hipsters realize that they made the wrong choice... Forgetting it the next day of course.

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 5, 2016 16:47 UTC (Tue) by nye (subscriber, #51576) [Link] (1 responses)

>And then this happens and the hipsters realize that they made the wrong choice... Forgetting it the next day of course

This seems to be a *much* more pertinent complaint about cloud services. Not based on ideology, because *everyone* glazes over questions of ideology when they don't share it, and convincing people to share your ideology is *hard*, but based on practicality.

I know I live my life assuming that any and all Google services will shut down tomorrow, or sooner, because history has shown that to be the safe bet. This is actually a constant nagging worry because I do currently pay for Gmail in particular, and I don't see any serious competitors, Free or otherwise. Some day I need to put some serious effort into contributing to Mailpile, but the realist in me says I will probably never find the time, because I won't really need it until it's too late :-(.

Mono Relicensed MIT

Posted Apr 14, 2016 3:10 UTC (Thu) by linuxrocks123 (subscriber, #34648) [Link]

Shameless plug:

I recently wrote an email application and it's awesome: https://github.com/linuxrocks123/MailTask

It's probably not for everyone, but, for me, it's awesome, and even if no one else ever uses it ever, I'll be glad I wrote it. I'm trying to get other people to use it, too, though; hence it's FLOSS. It probably needs more docs but feel free to post issues on GitHub if you run into setup or usage trouble.

Mailpile is webmail. Webmail is (imo) brain-damaged nonsense.