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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.
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.
Canadians: I suggest you seek election advice at a local chapter of a group that pushes to curb global heating and has the courage to say, "Canada should stop exporting fossil fuel." It will at least use the right goals to suggest who to vote for in your area.
Join a Friday climate strike.That page is made by scraping Fridays for Future so you can get the information without running any Javascript code. I would be very glad if they made the information on their own site accessible from the Free World; then we could simply refer people to their site and do without the scraping etc.
The largest part of the site is the political notes, and they are typically updated every day.
I'm looking for people to![[America Means Civil Liberties / Patriotism Means Protecting
Them / www.aclu.org/safefree ]](flag_set_vectorized.png)
[ No upcoming talks. ]
The Capitol Switchboard numbers are +1-202-224-3121, +1-888-818-6641 and +1-888-355-3588.
If you phone, please spread the word!
The Capitol Switchboard numbers are +1-202-224-3121, +1-888-818-6641 and +1-888-355-3588.
If you phone, please spread the word!
The Capitol Switchboard numbers are +1-202-224-3121, +1-888-818-6641 and +1-888-355-3588.
If you phone, please spread the word!
If you phone, please spread the word!
*UK mental health charities handed sensitive data to Facebook [with a tracking pixel].*
Let's start the attack on massive surveillance by making it illegal for a server to include a tracking pixel.
There should be a law requiring online services, if they close a user's account, to permit the user to continue to download whatever information perse had left in the account.
To be sure, it is foolish to rely on an online service to hold any data for you; you should store it locally, and use online services only as backups (encrypted). Preferably more than one online service in parallel, for redundancy. But we should not allow online services to cite this as an excuse for arbitrarily causing people great avoidable harm.
It should be a crime to knowingly approach a person while maskless inside a building or vehicle.
The extreme of this is represented by the Amazon warehouse, where a worker's every move is controlled by the computer system. This is one of many reasons to refuse to buy from Amazon.
Unfortunately, surveillance of workers is not limited to Amazon. I think states should pass laws to limit surveillance of workers. It should cover independent contractors as well as employees.
The law should completely forbid demanding that workers run any specific software on their own computers (keep in mind that portable phones are computers); the employer who wants that must furnish the computer at no charge.
Here are some quotations that I particularly like.
You can now read the political notes on Mastodon.
*Some kinds of tree leaves could become too hot to be able to conduct photosynthesis, researchers warn.* Those species would be wiped out.
Google's experimental "artificial intelligence" search was willing to answer about the "benefits of slavery" and offered a supposedly safe recipe for cooking "angel of death" mushrooms.
I think this demonstrates that it is using a language model, Many refer to then as "artificial intelligence", but that is a misuse of that term, since they don't actually understand the subjects they generate text about or what that text means.
Everyone: call on Sonic to stop using styrofoam take-out containers.
*Fossil fuels being subsidized at rate of $13m a minute, says IMF.*
Low levels of sea ice around Antarctica killed most of the emperor penguin chicks, in a large part of that continent. They can't survive if the sea ice melts.
As global heating eliminates sea ice, it may eliminate emperor penguins too. To save them — and to save ourselves — we need to curb global heating.
Ecuador's referendum demonstrates that the people may vote to shut down production in an oil field.
*UPS workers win wage increases, air conditioning in new union contract.*
Suggesting that army officers in Niger held a coup because the president had passed a law, which European countries had pushed for, that cut off the flow of bribes to those officers.
I don't know enough to gauge whether this is true, or to have an opinion about that law.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of Wagner, is reported to have been on a small plane that crashed, or (some say) was shot down by the Russian army.
I wouldn't take any of this as certain. But if Prigozhin is alive but in hiding for the long term, he won't be able to run Wagner effectively, so for most practical purposes it would be equivalent to his death.
If Prigozhin was indeed killed by that crash, it means the end of Wagner too.
This may benefit Putin by removing apparent instability, but I think it will weaken Putin's in Russia and deny him what Wagner used to contribute to the Putin forces' military strength.
DeMentis held a campaign event in Iowa and had Iowa state thugs forcibly exclude Ty Rushing, a reporter from an organization that might criticize him.
The thug leader said this was a "private event". I wonder if that was serious or bullshit. Did the event have a specific guest list, or did it admit strangers as long as they were not Ty Rushing?
G20 countries poured a record-breaking $1.4tn into fossil fuel subsidies in 2022.
The corrupter has a mafia way of thinking and sought to create a mafia state. If he grabs power again, he will learn from his failures and do it more thoroughly.
A US appeals court ruled to uphold Alabama's law prohibiting minors from using puberty blockers.
If our goal is that a minor should not prematurely make a permanent commitment before perse is old enough to be quite sure of per choice, clearly we should ensure per right to use puberty blockers, and prevent anyone from imposing a choice on per before perse is ready.
*Vaping found to be the biggest risk factor for teenage tobacco smoking.*
Hong Kong's security thugs are questioning relatives of overseas dissidents as a reminder that they could put those relatives in prison at any time.
China's fertility rate has become quite low; this implies the population will decrease.
If only India, the world's most populous country, could do the same, it would start to alleviate the danger of overconsumption and pollution and open the path to rewilding half of the Earth's surface.
*Extreme water stress faced by countries home to quarter of world population.*
If thug departments want more people to seek to become cops, they should make efforts to respect the rights of the people they encounter.
Andrew Malkinson was convicted of rape despite strong evidence he was not the rapist. It took the UK judicial system 17 years to conclude that this was wrong.
*[Prosecutors] had key DNA evidence 16 years before Andrew Malkinson cleared.*
What I see here is the effect of a presupposition of guilt, and later a presupposition that a court conviction can't have been wrong.
A vandal attacked a tree in Australia designated by indigenous people SST a "birthing tree". They are fighting a plan to eliminate that tree to build a road which motorists consider necessary.
In my view, the religious feelings and wishes of indigenous people should get the same level of consideration as the religious feelings and wishes of any other people, but not more. Regardless of which group, such feelings do not outweigh everything else in life.
To treat something as "sacred", and extremely protected, simply because some sect calls it so is excessive. We would not be shocked if some neighborhood church, mosque, synagogue, temple or shrine — or tree — were taken by eminent domain if the purpose is sufficient. On the other hand, if the religious object is rare and unusual, or specially old, that would be a stronger reason to preserve it — by rerouting the road, in this case.
Some information crucial for evaluating this case is not present in the article. For instance, how many birthing trees are there per square mile in that region? On the average, how long have they had the status of birthing trees? And how long has that particular tree enjoyed that status?
If there are many birthing trees, preserving them all is an unreasonable demand. If they are few, preserving them is not much to ask, and surely feasible to do.
If that tree has been a birthing tree for 200 years, that makes it rather special, which is a good reason to protect it. But if it was designated 10 years ago, it is reasonable to respond, "Pick another tree."
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 order copies of my book, Free Software, Free Society, 3rd edition', signed or not signed.
"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".
A song parody, Colors of the Lisp, by Jefferson Carpenter.
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.
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:
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