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"Richard_Stallman_at_LibrePlanet_2019" by Ruben Rodriguez
The photo comes from
wikimedia.org
"Richard_Stallman_at_LibrePlanet_2019" by Ruben Rodriguez
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This is the personal web site of Richard Stallman.
The views expressed here are my personal views, not those of
the Free Software Foundation or
the GNU Project.
For the sake of separation, this site has always been
hosted elsewhere and managed separately.
I am thinking of making another trip to Europe during February - April. If you would like to invite me to speak during that trip, please write to me at rms-invitation@gnu.org with "feb-apr" as the subject.
If you want to send me GPG-encrypted mail, do not trust key servers! Some of them have phony keys under my name and email address, made by someone else as a trick. See gpg.html for my real key.
Richard Stallman has cancer. Fortunately it is slow-growing and manageable follicular lymphoma. Treatment put it into remission, and he can expect to live many more years. However, he now has to be even more careful not to catch Covid-19.
The largest part of the site is the political notes, and they are typically updated every day.
I'm looking for people to
US citizens: call for removing the name "Trump" from the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.
If you sign, please spread the word!
US citizens: call on Congress to stop the wrecker from abandoning prosecution of fraud so as to persecute immigrants instead.
If you sign, please spread the word!
See the instructions for how to sign this letter campaign without running any nonfree JavaScript code--not trivial, but not hard.
US citizens: call on your local and state leaders to block Big Tech data centers in your community.
See the instructions for how to sign this letter campaign without running any nonfree JavaScript code--not trivial, but not hard.
US citizens: call on governments to start taking notes about when a person dies while in jail or prison, or otherwise in the power of cops.
US citizens: call on Congress to pass the VISIBLE Act, which would prohibit deportation thugs from concealing their identities.
US citizens: Join with this campaign to address this issue.
To phone your congresscritter about this, the main switchboard is +1-202-224-3121.
Please spread the word.
US citizens: call on your state's attorney general to keep deportation thugs out of public schools.
See the instructions for how to sign this letter campaign without running any nonfree JavaScript code--not trivial, but not hard.
US citizens: call on Apple and Google to stop censoring apps — and let users freely release and install free/libre apps.
See the instructions for how to sign this letter campaign without running any nonfree JavaScript code--not trivial, but not hard.
US citizens: call on your elected officials to oppose all funding for the deportation thugs in the absence of systemic reforms.
See the instructions for how to sign this letter campaign without running any nonfree JavaScript code—not trivial, but not hard.
US citizens: Join with this campaign to address this issue.
To phone your congresscritter about this, the main switchboard is +1-202-224-3121.
Please spread the word.
US citizens: call on CBS: Don't Let Bari Weiss Censor Debate.
Us citizens: call on Congress to stop funding DHS and ICE inhumane and lethal tactics amidst ongoing investigations into those practices.
See the instructions for how to sign this letter campaign without running any nonfree JavaScript code--not trivial, but not hard.
US citizens: Join with this campaign to address this issue.
To phone your congresscritter about this, the main switchboard is +1-202-224-3121.
Please spread the word.
US citizens: call on the Senate to block the voter-ID bill and protect poor citizens' right to vote against arbitrary interference.
Many poor people need to move often. Many can't afford to take a couple of hours off work to officially update ID cards. And these requirements are not satisfied by proof that you're a US citizen -- the demand is always for "up to date, currently valid" proof.
US citizens: Join with this campaign to address this issue.
To phone your congresscritter about this, the main switchboard is +1-202-224-3121.
Please spread the word.
I'm looking for a cartoonist who would like to draw cartoons for me once in a while. If you're interested, please write to rms, which refers to me, at the location gnu period org.
Boycott Chevron, in the name of Steven Donziger.
* Abandoned coalmines and oil and gas wells are now one of the biggest sources of the powerful greenhouse gas methane, new data shows, and little effort is being made to clean them up.*
I expect that the fossil fuel companies to divest themselves from old mines and wells in ways that will avoid liability for them — just as they sometimes disconnect themselves from responsibility for supporting former workers.
So I suggest making it a felony to implement a restructuring of business or assets in a way that is likely to result predictably in strand assets that carry financial responsibilities with no one capable of shouldering the responsibilities.
A pitifully weak attempt to solve a real problem: asking for a federal law that would permit victims of domestic abuse and stalking to demand that data brokers delete information about them.
Data, once collected, will be abused. The way to prevent that abuse is to facilitate refusing to hand it over in the first place.
Here is my proposal for protecting the specific people known to be in particular danger, and everyone else who could be harmed if individuals, businesses or governments use their personal data against them without a search warrant: require services to be available anonymously.
The selfish interest of those who keep trade secrets is rational but antisocial. In many cases the only harm it does is to hold back the general advance of technology. But sometimes it does really nasty things. For digital hardware and software, it often gives companies a way to subjugate their users. Regarding use of toxic chemicals, it endangers public health.
Why would legislators pass laws to "protect" companies instead of protecting the people they harm? I suspect it is partly because these companies are influential and the legislators seek their support, and partly because the legislators ask them for campaign funds.
But it is also partly the result of the mindset of "trickle down", which assumes that the only way to get more funds for the state is to let increase the size of the economy by letting companies have what they want. Unfortunately, what they want is often to be allowed to harm the public.
Most Democrats in Congress got corrupted this way in the 80s and 90s. (The exceptions are the progressive Democrats.) Now in the UK Starmer is guiding Labour into that sort of corruption.
Clearly our laws should say that any public need to know about the presence of toxic substances in a business facility overrides the desire to keep them secret.
Whether the owners are Chinese is a question that there is no need to ask, because the state should never give money to a business "to support it." Instead it should offer to lend money to the company for suitable repayment, or else buy equity at a fair price.
These two ways of supporting a company avoid giving the owners an opporunity to rip off the state -- which the company's owners are likely to try to do, if they can, regardless of which country they are from.
With a policy like this, it wouldn't matter which country the company's owners are from.
Here are some quotations that I particularly like.
You can now read the political notes on Mastodon.
Amazon is giving up on its surveillance-based stores that require every customer to be tracked. Hooray for the failure of an initiative that tried to expand surveillance! But that still leaves so much surveillance that we need to put an end to.
*Bushfires in Victoria push threatened species to the brink.*
One kind of human-caused disaster thus tends to cause other kinds.
Everyone: call on Tell Chevron’s CEO: Stop evading Chevron’s responsibility for your destruction of Louisiana's coast.
See the instructions for how to sign this letter campaign without running any nonfree JavaScript code--not trivial, but not hard.
Scotland has legislated new buildings must include "swift bricks" that provide nesting spaces for swifts.
These special bricks contain a cavity that small birds can nest in. The added cost of construction is minuscule, but business owners think a little more profit is worth destruction of endangered species.
People who use Pretend Intelligence for work meetings and job interviews are causing chaos in business. Some of them are trying to use it to compensate for their own lack of ability or knowledge. People who catch on to this learn they cannot be trusted.
US citizens: call on your local and state leaders to block Big Tech data centers in your community.
See the instructions for how to sign this letter campaign without running any nonfree JavaScript code--not trivial, but not hard.
US homeowners whose homes were destroyed by fire report that some insurance companies seem to be trying to fob them off with much less then the actual value of the destroyed home or what rebuilding would cost.
The UK government tried to cover up its report on ecosystem collapse, after first deleting some of the most frightening parts. (What was not deleted is plenty frightening anyway.)
*"Ecosystem degradation is occurring across all regions. Every critical ecosystem is on a pathway to collapse (irreversible loss of function beyond repair)." This presents a threat to "UK national security and prosperity". It says "the world is already experiencing impacts including crop failures, intensified natural disasters and infectious disease outbreaks. Threats will increase with degradation and intensify with collapse." The results will include geopolitical and economic instability, increased conflict and competition for resources. "It is unlikely the UK would be able to maintain food security if ecosystem collapse drives geopolitical competition for food." It also warns that "conflict and military escalation will become more likely, both within and between states, as groups compete for arable land and food and water resources".*The Starmer government is tossing out environmental protection commitments made by the Tories.
The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists advanced the Doomsday Clock
to 85
seconds before midnight.
* The scientists cited risks of nuclear war, the climate crisis,
potential misuse of biotechnology and the increasing use of
[pretend
intelligence and] artificial intelligence without adequate
controls.*
31 January 2026
How drug searches at events increase the danger to participants from drugs.
The corpse of the last remaining hostage was found -- in the Israel-occupied area of Gaza, were HAMAS could not easily search for it.
This demonstrates that Netanyahu was using that corpse as an excuse to continue the occupation and siege, and the killing of Palestinians.
The article does not say who actually found the corpse. I am curious about this because I conjecture that Netanyahu did his best to avoid its being found.
Modeling projects that 40% of the world population will face extreme heat by 2050, if the world reaches 2°C of global heating by then.
The article says 41%, but such a prediction cannot be exact enough to justify stating the result with two significant figures. The proper scientific way to state it is 40%.
The study reports that every nation is unprepared for this level of heat, which generally kills some people. However, instead of planning to treat the symptoms in 2050, the wise priority is to curb global heating so that we don't reach that level of danger. The ecological side effects of that much heating (fires, floods, crop failures and hunger, spreading parasites, diseases, extinctions) may be far more dangerous to civilization and humans than the direct effects of high temperatures.
Is presenting your children's lives on Instagram somehow dangerous to them?
This article seems to take for granted an emotional conclusion that makes no sense to me. I just don't get it. Why would being talked about on Instagram hurt a child?
I am not saying it can't do that -- I don't know. But I can't see why the writer expects that result.
I have never seen Instagram, and have never wished to look. I am not interested in gawking at the details of someone else's luxuries or activities. Why waste time on that when there are so many more important or more interesting things to do?
But I know of bad things that Instagram tends to do to anyone.
Connecting to Instagram requires identifying oneself. I don't want anyone to track what I look at. I don't want anyone to track what you look at, either -- such tracking is the foundation for repression.
Another reason is that connecting to Instagram requires running nonfree software (either an app or JavaScript programs sent to our browser). Running them implies surrendering freedom. I refuse to be a zucker, and I hope you won't be one either.
Instagram seems to promote parasocial relationships. I don't want a parasocial relationship with _anyone_, because that strikes me as a kind of self-delusion. If I wish that a certain famous person were my friend, I also wish to remain aware of the reality of the situation. I can't tell you what to do, but I hope you'll focus on reality.
Starmer's appointees have blocked authentic Labour activist Andy Burnham from running for an open seat in Parliament. Evidently his priority for the Labour Party is to ensure it never returns to championing workers and the non-rich, as it was founded to do. He'd rather nail its coffin shut than allow it to win by allowing it to be true to its purpose.
*NRA and pro-gun groups call for "full investigation" into killing of Alex Pretti.*
Any person or group that upholds any right whatsoever _for citizens in general_ will have conflicts with the magat position, which is that magats can do whatever they like to anyone else.
Gun lovers are up in arms at the statement (by the persecutor's henchman) that thugs are entitled to shoot anyone who has a gun (even if perse doing nothing threatening with it).
The article also says that one of the thugs took Pretti's gun before other thugs shot him. So it seems that thugs are entitled to shoot anyone who had a gun, even if perse has since been disarmed.
I advocate gun control laws, but those who are permitted to carry a gun should not be killed for carrying one as long as they don't threaten anyone.
Israel has ceased using the last hostage corpse as an excuse to continue the siege of Gaza. It is instead searching for the corpse, which at least is not hurting anyone.
Whether Israel will really end the siege now remains to be seen.
A right-wing extremist joined a chat with people discussing how to identify and find deportation thugs, presumed that this was for some illegal plan, informed the henchman in charge of the FBI (who he knows), and the latter eagerly started investigating them in the hopes of finding such a plan.
By contrast, when deportation thugs commit major crimes including murder, federal agencies look aside.
Families of two men killed by a US attack on a small boat are suing the US government.
A federal judge in Minnesota ordered the acting head of the deportation thugs to come personally to court and answer questions, since the agency has ignored court orders and questions from the court.
The four factors of the apocalypse:
global heating, global hating,
global eating, global mating.
Copy this button (courtesy of R.Siddharth) to express your rejection of Facebook.
Non-oppressive Commercial E-books
Facebook's face recognition demonstrates a threat to everyone's privacy. I therefore ask people not to put photos of me on Facebook; you can do likewise.
Of course, Facebook is bad for many other reasons as well.
I'd like to make a list of countries that do not require a national identity card, and have no plans to adopt one. If you live in or have confirmed knowledge of such a country, please send email to rms at gnu.org.
Here's my list of countries with no national ID cards and no plans for one: Australia, Canada, New Zealand, UK. Australia's previous government tried to institute national ID cards, but the Labor government dropped the plan.
India has mostly finished imposing a national biometric ID number in a grand act of oppression.
Switzerland has national ID cards which are optional, but they or some other government ID card are needed for some purposes.
Iceland doesn't have ID cards as such, but they have ID numbers that citizens are forced to use frequently. For example, the national ID number is often required to rent a video or use a gym.
Denmark issues non-photo ID cards with a "person number", and many services use this card to identify people.
Norway will impose a national biometric ID card.
Ireland - national ID card by stealth.
ACLU: the five dangers of national ID cards.
Wikipedia has a list of identity card policies by country.
Stay away from certain countries because of their bad immigration policies.
Avoid flight connections in these airports because of their treatment of passengers.
People often ask how I manage to continue devoting myself to progressive activism (such as the free software movement) for years without burning out. The best way I can answer is by recommending a book, The Lifelong Activist by Hillary Rettig.
I disagree with the book on one theoretical point in the last part of the book: we shouldn't think of political activism as being marketing and sales, because those terms refer to business, and politics is something much more important than mere business. However, this doesn't diminish the value of the book's practical advice about borrowing techniques from marketing and sales.
Disclosure: I am friends with the author.
Personal Declaration of Richard Stallman and Euclides Mance on Solidarity Economy and Free Software.
I have reposted some of Rick Falkvinge's articles. As posted on his site, you can't see them in a browser without running some nonfree Javascript code which is apparently non-free. These versions show the same text, without the obstacle.
These are my political articles that are not related to the GNU operating system or free software. For GNU-related articles, see the GNU philosophy directory. You can also download copies of my book, Free Software, Free Society, 3rd edition.
"Those who profess to favor freedom, yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters. This struggle may be a moral one; or it may be a physical one; or it may be both moral and physical; but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will."Frederick Douglass, American Abolitionist, Letter to an associate, 1849
Here are notes about various issues I care about, usually with links to
more information. The current notes are
here. For all previous
notes, see this page.
See this page for information on efforts to maintain links in the political notes.
Political notes about the 2001 G8 summit in Genoa, Italy are being archived on their own page.
Richard Stallman's bio and publicity photos, and other things of interest to the press, have been moved to a separate page.
The Free Software Song, by Richard M. Stallman. You can listen to a performance of the song: Free Software Song performed by Thor Here is a variant of this song called "The Free Firmware Song".
Earth under attack from planet Koch.On doxing, and how to spell it.
A Spanish cartoon: La Ruleta
Española. 
Here I am wearing my "power tie".
Wine snobs get their comeuppance.
Here I am struggling to open a bottle of water.
My application to an join Marian Henley's ex-boyfriends list.
My funny poetry and song parodies.
A song parody, Colors of the Lisp, by Jefferson Carpenter.
The text to a filk song, Johnny v. N., by Paul Rubin.
My Puns in English (Little Leaguer, August 2019).
My Puns in Spanish (New pun: Apostasía April 2019)
My Puns in French (New pun: Microsoft à l'école July 2019)
My Puns in Italian (New pun: Quale pesce fa starnutire? New 10/2018)
My Puns in German (New 02/2016)
Linguistic Swifties (Now with: Wintu, Penutian, Cochiti, Taos, and Towa.)
--Saint
IGNUcius-- The Church of Emacs will soon
be officially listed by at least one person as his religion for
census purposes.
There are no godfathers in the Church of Emacs, since there are no gods, but you can be someone's editorfather.
Stallman Does Dallas: "I have to warn you that Texans have been known to have an adverse reaction to my personality…"
The Dalai Lama today announced the official release of Yellow Hat GNU/Linux.
I found a funny song about the Mickey Mouse Copyright Act (officially the Sonny Bono Copyright Act) which extended copyright retroactively by 20 years on works made as early as the 1920s.
If you are a geek and read Spanish, you will love Raulito el Friki, who said "Hello, world!" immediately after he was born. Here's an archive of this now-defunct comic strip.
Sleeping with Stallman at MIT.
ESR's favorite programming language: Objectivist C.
No Kludges in Cluj (June 2014)
Made for You (December 2012) (local copy) Esperanto translation
A science fiction story: Jinnetic Engineering (in Portuguese, Farsi, Spanish, Armenian, Russian, French, and Italian).My book of essays about the philosophy of Software Freedom, is available from the GNU Press.
Avec des chapeaux French song parody.
My radio program of Music from Georgia, originally broadcast on WUOG in Athens, Georgia on Oct 13, 2014.
Quantum Theory and Abortion Rights
A proposal for gender neutrality in Spanish, suitable for both speech and writing.
On Hacking: In June 2000, while visiting Korea, I did a fun hack that clearly illustrates the original and true meaning of the word "hacker".
Predicting the attack on Pearl Harbor
I would like to thank:
Please send comments on these web pages to rms at gnu period org.
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