On Mon, 29 Sep 2008, Josh Paetzel wrote:

[snip]
> I've had the (mis)fortune of actually meeting RMS, and he's so dedicated 
> to using Free Software that he won't go to SSL enabled websites for 
> example.

Is SSL non-free?  I didn't know that.


> While I admire his zealotry, (in the same way I admire chastity I 
> suppose, a trait best found in others) I find it a bit silly when 
> licenses stop you from using software.  Especially when it's not "Free 
> enough" by virtue of having less restrictions on it than your definition 
> of Free Software.

Stallman does things mostly to promote his ideas.  He must know that very 
few people will follow in his footsteps.  He wrote to me once to tell me 
to stop using Pine because of its license.  I have persisted anyway, but 
if I were to write to him again, I would use Alpine.  I have Alpine 
installed but it is prone to crash on my Solaris box.  Once I get 
everything onto Linux, it is likely that I will use Alpine exclusively and 
stop using Pine.

I really liked your line about chastity.


> I suppose I could go on about how the FSF claims Free Software puts an 
> end to reimplimenting things, and then point out that they are 
> responsible for as many reimplimentations as anyone, but it's far too 
> early to step on the toes of starry-eyed hero worshippers.

I would like to hear about that.  I don't know what "reimplementations" 
means -- are Linux distros considered reimplementations?

Am I one of the "starry-eyed hero worshippers?"  That sounds like an 
exaggeration.  All I am saying is that Stallman has done things that I 
consider to be great, and he has done them at a huge personal cost -- tell 
me how many of his ilk at MIT's AI lab in the 1970s aren't 
multi-millionaires today.  Not Stallman.  In return he has my respect and 
admiration and my thanks (and I paid for a bunch of his manuals even 
though I didn't have to).  My support for Stallman isn't necessarily 
permanent or unconditional though -- if he does something that I consider 
to be improper or crazy, or whatever, I will say so.  So please tell us 
more.

Mike