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I expect to have a trip to Europe in May - June. The start and end dates remain to be decided.
If you would like to invite me to speak during that trip, please write to me now so we can start discussing it. Write to `-invitation' following my three-letter username.
My talks consist of an hour of presentation and an hour of Q&A. The overall focus is software and freedom, but generally the talk includes various subtopics; we can discuss which subtopics together.
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 on the head of OSHA to resign in disgrace.
US citizens: call on Congress to investigate the issuance of subpoenas to Reddit and ex-Twitter which aim to identify people who anonymously posted political statements that reproach the deportation thugs.
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 FIFA to stop fueling global climate disaster.
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 senators to fight the wrecker's USPS Board takeover.
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: submit an official comment to the Office of Personnel Management opposing the plan to require federal workers to sign lifelong secrecy agreements covering everything they do and know about their jobs.
I have condemned since around 1980 nondisclosure agreements that cover generally useful technical information, and refused _ever_ to agree to one. These nondisclosure agreements are a different moral issue; they will be aimed protecting corrupt and treacherous acts inside federal agencies.
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 congresscritter and senators to investigate the FBI's raid on a voter registration activity.
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 USPS to obey its mandate by rejecting the magats' attempt to obstruct the mailing of ballots to voters.
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 congresscritter and senators to reject the deeper embedding of U.S.-Israeli military cooperation.
See the instructions for how to sign this letter campaign without running any nonfree JavaScript code--not trivial, but not hard.
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.
In January, the bully demanded that Iran stop killing protesters.
That demand would have been laudable if he had really meant it. But this was shortly after deportation thugs callously killed protest observers Renee Good and Alex Pretti, and the bully's agents protected the killers.
Subsequent events demonstrate that he cares no more about the lives of Iranian protesters than about American protesters. His orders to attack Iran included nothing to protect protesters, but plenty of just plain war, as well as killing the civilian leaders.
I suspect that aggressor countries will henceforth follow the bully's example, targeting the civilian leaders at the start. (The killing of Iran's leaders ironically backfired, but as yet there is no dissuasive evidence that such a result will naturally tend to occur.)
The US branch of TikTok quickly started practicing political censorship through the recommendation algorithm.
*How [the wrecker]'s EPA rollbacks could harm our air and water – and worsen global heating.
* Australia is in a slightly strange moment on renewable energy. From one perspective, it is embracing renewables, and solar in particular, what by any measure is a historic pace. From another, investment in new developments may not be happening fast enough to meet climate targets, or to ensure there is enough replacement capacity in place as old and failing coal plants close.*
Democracy Now discusses the violent cruelty of the US Border Patrol, going back decades, and how the bully has extended that cruelty throughout the US using the deportation thugs.
The harasser has ordered many foreigners living in the US with visas or green cards that they must go to their home countries to apply for or renew a green card.
This can be quite a hassle, since the process takes time, and they can often lose their jobs and homes in the US, while they no longer have any place to live at "home" nor any way to make a living there.
There is no reason for this policy change except harassment. The harassment may be meant to reduce the number who ultimately succeed in immigrating.
*UN adds Israel and Russia to blacklist for sexual violence in conflict.*
The heads of UK government knew when it appointed Peter Mandelson as ambassador to the US that his private personal connections made him unfit for the job. Now they are covering up how much they knew.
Their reason for choosing him was, it seems, that he moved in circles with the corrupter (and Epstein). That very fact assured he could not be trusted. Once you start appeasing the corrupter, you will find yourself pressured into ever increasing corruption.
Mexico is passing a law that would allow the electoral court to annul an election if it finds "foreign interference".
Critics politicians warn that this would enable the government to annul any election. After all, attempts at foreign influence happen often. Some of them are indirect, such as when the president of a neighboring great power threatens to impose 50% tariffs on your exports, or to invade, if your country does not obey his demands.
It is hard to measure objectively what effect the foreign influence has had. It would be better to act in a less drastic manner while the foreign influence is being exerted.
The article does not say what would happen after the annulment of an election.
Several Big Tech figures were invited to speak at graduations recently, and talked about how wonderful their Supposed Intelligence was. The graduating students responded with boos.
One of the speakers reportedly responded arrogantly by claiming that LLMs' triumph and dominion was inevitable, so just give up.
The sensible reaction to that is to stand up, shake a fist, and say, "We'll show you what's 'inevitable'!" And then to organize to fight against the practices of pushing and luring people into using LLMs, especially those implemented in user-subjugating ways — as nonfree software or SaaSS.
But they need to learn to write politically without using LLMs, and to criticize each other's writing constructively to help each other learn. They need to do an effective job of winning support to win this political battle.
Remember, the Republicans are allied with the tech billionaires, and so are the so-called "moderate" corporate Democrats. To stop Supposed Intelligence from being an engine of domination, we need to overcome both groups.
But that's the same thing we need for many other life-or-death goals, such as curbing global heating. It's better to fight for a good world than give up!
*Guards at a New Jersey [deportation prison] are retaliating against [prisoners] for nonviolent protests over poor conditions, including a hunger and labor strike, according to relatives and members of Congress.*
Israel reaffirmed its plans to force Palestinians out of Gaza and then claim they left "voluntarily".
Europe has a framework ready for putting Putin on trial for the crime of aggressive war and other atrocities, along with his deputies who helped him to plan and organize them.
*New York City sued over alleged racial discrimination in removal of children by protective services Plaintiffs say children’s services uses "emergency removal" disproportionately against Black and Latino families.*
It is plausible that ACS in New York City is racist. However, we have seen that such agencies in other parts of the US are overprotective and inclined to persecute parents of any race if they do not treat their children like prisoners.
Israel plans to compel a large fraction of Gaza's population to leave Gaza and then claim they left of their own free will.
Where they would go is not clear.
Arguing that progressives who continue using ex-Twitter despite its imposed domination by right-wing extremists are only exposing themselves to its lies, and achieving no good. It is "an open sewer, beyond redemption."
It appears the persecutor is trying to take revenge on E. Jean Carroll, who sued him for rape and won, by directing the Injustice Department to work hard to find crime to accuse her of.
They have hit on an accusation that was raised in his trial and dismissed already by the judge.
The lawyers in the Injustice Department who participate in this vengeance scheme will demonstrate their unfitness to work for any government agency. I wonder, does this call for disbarring them?
*Fossil fuel firms may have to pay for climate damage under proposed UN tax.*
There is no chance they could afford to reimburse all the damage they are doing, but the tax might help save all of us if it pressures them to reduce the damage.
* Garden crops such as apples, garlic, carrot and beetroot will grow better if they experience low temperatures in winter.*
They will be additional collateral damage of global heating.
The leaders of the South Britain Green Party hit the economic nail on the head: the billionaires the ones making you poor, and don't let Deform's scapegoating of asylum seekers distract you from that.
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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