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"Richard_Stallman_at_LibrePlanet_2019" by Ruben Rodriguez
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"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.
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.
I urge you to vote in Democratic primaries for the progressive candidate, if there is one. And in the final election I urge you to vote for Democrats, unless a liberal independent had a good chance of winning.
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)
US citizens: call on university administrators and boards to end the repressive tactics used against Gaza solidarity encampments.
US citizens: call on Congress to do everything it can to fight voter suppression.
If you phone, please spread the word! White House: +1-202-456-1111 and (TTY/TDD) +1-202-456-6213
US citizens: call on Congress to pass the Public Housing for the 21st Century Act. It will set up information-sharing to help the many cities that want to build more public housing.
If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121
US citizens: call on Biden to oppose use of the national guard to crush protests.
If you phone, please spread the word! White House: +1-202-456-1111 and (TTY/TDD) +1-202-456-6213
US citizens: call on news networks not to give election deniers a platform.
US citizens: state your disgust for the fascist's Project 2025.
US citizens: call on the Senate to pass the Fourth Amendment Is Not For Sale Act.
If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121
US citizens: call on state attorneys general to investigate the antiabortion mills (self-called "crisis pregnancy centers") for mistreating clients and abusing their personal data.
US citizens: Call on Congress to let parts of the corrupter's 2017 tax cuts expire.
If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121
US citizens: call on the USPS Inspector General and Board of Governors to protect vote-by-mail from DeJoy.
US citizens: call on Congress to cancel Boeing's nuclear weapons testing contract.
If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121
US citizens: call on Congress to investigate Mercedes's union busting.
If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121
US citizens: call on the DOJ to break up UnitedHealth's medical monopoly.
US citizens: call on Democrats in Congress to reject AIPAC, which supports enemies of US democracy.
If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121
US citizens: call on Biden to declare a climate emergency.
If you phone, please spread the word! White House: +1-202-456-1111 and (TTY/TDD) +1-202-456-6213
US citizens: verify that your voter registration has not been purged. Republicans are doing their usual voter deregistration drive and you may have been targeted.
US citizens: call on Biden to respect the International Criminal Court and reject sanctions against it.
US citizens: call on Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen to endorse a global minimum tax on billionaire wealth ahead of the G20 summit.
US citizens: call on The Senate to investigate Justice Alito's public support for insurrection.
If you phone, please spread the word! White House: +1-202-456-1111 and (TTY/TDD) +1-202-456-6213
US citizens: call on Congress to pass the BATL and TERM acts to regulate membership of the Supreme Court,
If you phone, please spread the word! White House: +1-202-456-1111 and (TTY/TDD) +1-202-456-6213
US citizens: call on Biden to take the steps necessary to replace Postmaster DeJoy.
If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121
US citizens: call on US intelligence agencies: no national security briefings for the corrupter.
Whatever information he gets, he is likely to send to his friend, Putin.
US citizens: Thank members of Congress who supported ending Israel's use of US-supplied weapons in Gaza.
If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121
US citizens: Thank reps that voted against unconditional military aid to Israel.
If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121
US citizens: call on Your senators to reject S. 4136, which would authorize officials to eliminate any nonprofit organization by accusing it of vague "support for terrorism".
For instance, any organization that protests against Israel's atrocities in Gaza could find that people show up and chant, "HAMAS we love you", and it could be wiped out of existence for that.
If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121
US citizens: call on Congress to defeat the GOP bill to restart weapons shipments to Israel.
If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121
US citizens: call on Biden to use every possible means of influence to get Israel to accept a ceasefire in Gaza.
If you phone, please spread the word! White House: +1-202-456-1111 and (TTY/TDD) +1-202-456-6213
US citizens: call on Biden to give no arms to Israel that it could use to attack Rafah.
Stop denying obvious implications!
If you phone, please spread the word! White House: +1-202-456-1111 and (TTY/TDD) +1-202-456-6213
US citizens: call on Biden to stop trying to protect Israeli war criminals from the International Criminal Court.
If you phone, please spread the word! White House: +1-202-456-1111 and (TTY/TDD) +1-202-456-6213
Boycott Chevron, in the name of Steven Donziger.
It is exciting that SB 976 turns towards restricting recommendation algorithms. But these options should not be limited to minors — every user should have this choice. (Please do not refer to teenagers as "children"; that feeds the US tendency to treat them like children and retard their development.)
However, I suggest taking a step beyond just choosing to use or not use the platform's addiction system. Recommendation algorithms should be completely separated from platforms!
If you want to use a nontrivial recommendation algorithm, you should be able to choose it yourself and use it anonymously. You could send it the URLs you want it to base its choices on. These might be some of the pages you had visited, and perhaps pages you had not visited.
Then it should send you its recommendations. You could pass all, or just some, or none of those recommendations to the platform to look at them.
AB 1949 is admirable because it gives a small boost to privacy for users of all ages, not only for children. It isn't enough, though — users should also be guaranteed the right and possibility to access through the Tor network and to use aliases. And collection of a user's data by the state should require a warrant against the user.
The door plug that blew out of a Boeing 737 Max 9 airplane was missing four bolts meant to hold it in place. They were missing because Boeing maintenance removed them and did not put them back in again.
Some workers actually made the mistake, but they were working as part of a work system that Boeing management was responsible for setting up and running. That's where the real fault is.
I suggest passing a law to require aircraft manufacturing and repair companies to have a certain fraction of licensed commercial pilots on their boards. Perhaps 66%.
Private equity is gobbling up large parts of the US nursing home business. This puts patients in danger since private equity can amass lots of money, create an oligopoly, and get away with abuses.
The study suggests that "regulation may be needed." I will take a stronger stand and call for firm limits — perhaps even prohibiting private equity combinations from owning home nursing businesses.
I'v also proposed prohibiting private equity from buying up lots of rental housing.
It should be illegal for a store to charge different prices to customers depending on whether they identify themselves and/or hand over demanded personal data.
Here are some quotations that I particularly like.
You can now read the political notes on Mastodon.
Experimenters passed 517 questions from Stack Overflow to ChatGPT to see what output it would respond with. Around half the answers, when interpreted semantically by humans. turned out to be incorrect.
This is to be expected, because ChatGPT is not intelligent and does not understand the meaning of text that it operates on. It can do more sophisticated text manipulation that Query Replace, but it has no more knowledge or understanding than Query Replace.
How Google decided to make its search work worse so as to make more profit.
If I had experienced the recent enshittification of Google Search with so-called "AI", it might have moved me to stop using it. However, I had stopped using Google Search many years ago because LibreJS could determine that Google Search wouldn't function without running nonfree JavaScript code.
US citizens: call on university administrators and boards to end the repressive tactics used against Gaza solidarity encampments.
US citizens: call on Congress to do everything it can to fight voter suppression.
If you phone, please spread the word! White House: +1-202-456-1111 and (TTY/TDD) +1-202-456-6213
Putin's propaganda and news blackout are effectively teaching thousands of young Russians to want to fight for Putin.
This is a sad change. It used to be that many soldiers in the Putin forces looked for an opportunity to surrender, and some eagerly joined Ukraine's army.
*Increasing use of renewable energy in US [yielded around 250 billion] dollars of benefits [over 4 years].*
Policies proposed by Sanders for the Democratic Party to to protect jobs from businesses' predation.
*Why is Nikki Haley scrawling genocidal messages on Israeli bombs?*
My conjecture is, she is trying to out-hate the fascist leader so as to be chosen as his running mate.
Whether or not Israel's atrocities in Gaza add up to enough to be qualify as "genocide", there is no doubt that what Haley advocates would be genocide.
Let's not lose sight of where we want to end up.
US citizens: call on Congress to pass the Public Housing for the 21st Century Act. It will set up information-sharing to help the many cities that want to build more public housing.
If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121
US citizens: call on Biden to oppose use of the national guard to crush protests.
If you phone, please spread the word! White House: +1-202-456-1111 and (TTY/TDD) +1-202-456-6213
US citizens: call on news networks not to give election deniers a platform.
US citizens: state your disgust for the fascist's Project 2025.
US citizens: call on the Senate to pass the Fourth Amendment Is Not For Sale Act.
If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121
US citizens: call on state attorneys general to investigate the antiabortion mills (self-called "crisis pregnancy centers") for mistreating clients and abusing their personal data.
US citizens: Call on Congress to let parts of the corrupter's 2017 tax cuts expire.
If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121
US citizens: call on the USPS Inspector General and Board of Governors to protect vote-by-mail from DeJoy.
An Israeli air strike on refugee tents in Rafah killed around 45 civilians at once.
If the Israeli air force really tries not to kill civilians, it was not trying very hard that day. The pilot could not have failed to see that the area was full of tents, if perse considered the question.
Israel should obey the International Court of Justice, and the US should insist that it do so.
Let's not lose sight of where we want to end up.
*Some of the biggest [Australian] waste companies broke rules meant to keep contamination [such as asbestos] out of landscaping products.*
*"Crippling" drought in Zambia threatens hunger for millions, says minister.*
This is climate mayhem. We may be able to slow it and stop it, but first we need to adopt a plan adequate to fully do the job.
*Spying, [cracking] and intimidation: Israel's nine-year "war" on the ICC exposed.*
There was no shooting between Israel and the ICC, but Israeli officials described the fight as "war". I wish that Israel had refrained from war crimes against Palestine and Gaza.
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".
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: Apostas??a April 2019)
My Puns in French (New pun: Microsoft ?? l'??cole 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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