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Berezhnev Vladimir
Berezhnev Vladimir

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Are the RMS beliefs too conservative?

I found a very interesting comment under this article (eng. original):

Stallman himself may be a smart man (in fact, he is), but I can't support this kind of "blatant opsense".

  1. The main thing for the user is the convenience and functionality of the program. If it is also "free", then that is great. But to abandon a convenient program in favor of an inconvenient one, just because of the capabilities of open source is not very sensible. 2) Similarly with Netflix, Spotify and others. If these services are convenient and allow you to use them for free - what do I care about free? If not - then it's up to everyone: pay or look for a free analogue in the form of Yandex.Music and others.
  2. Searching for free bios and concerns about even small non-free code fragments is an openness of the brain. 4) Anonymity on the Internet is needed exactly as much as it is needed in the real world. Of course, you should not shine your passport data anywhere, but it is unwise to go out only with a mask with slits for the eyes.
  3. The idea of rejecting non-anonymous websites on the grounds that some people are forced to be anonymous is akin to rejecting food because there are children starving in Africa.

Indeed, it's something to think about. Though I don't fully agree with the comment, still. As much as we don't want to, proprietary giants like Spotify, Netflix, YouTube are so woven into everyone's lives that it's hard to do without them.

Regarding point 1, it all depends on the beliefs of the individual. If a person is totally indifferent to the topic of whether or not they are being watched, or whether or not they are collecting information about them - fine! If the person is not satisfied with the fact that he is being watched or not, then he can always switch to a free alternative, regardless of whether it is more convenient or not. Here everything is determined by the percentage of what is more important for a person: freedom or convenience.

For RMS, freedom is convenience. It is simply convenient to have the software, knowing full well that he is not being watched, and he can safely look through the source code of the application. This leads to another important point: under the GNU license everyone has the right to modify and redistribute the code of this program.

My opinion: I am willing to use free software and I do care about the subject of being watched (however paranoid that may sound). Provided the time I'm willing to sacrifice is within reason. I'm always happy to explore new alternatives, but I'm not ready to make it my reason for existence. Maybe I just haven't yet experienced this feeling of complete freedom, security, anonymity, and so I don't know what I'm missing.

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