[Reader-list] freedom v/s freesoftware

[Jeebesh Bagchi]

Pankaj wrote : (to Prabhat's mail)

>I belive you dont know any thing about the GPL
>Go sit in a corner for ten minutes. and then read the GPL.

A strange echo of earlier times. "Go and read and then come back" - 
is a line that must have been said in the 20th century sect-battles 
ad infinitum. Why does this have to reappear again on conversations 
about free-code?

The problem is that practitioners and activists tends to become 
proprietary about the thoughts or practices from which they draw 
upon. This is a remnant of the ethos of the`manuscript culture`of 
medieval times and it is intriguing to see it operating within the 
digital domain.

And secondly they get into a representational trap where the self (or 
the organization) becomes the idea. So any discussion of the idea 
have to go over their body. And of course the body is the pure body, 
rest are all impurities!

Last November I visited IT.com in Bangalore. What surprised me was 
the hostility to the usage of the word `free software` among some 
Linux users. Saying GNU/ Linux was an anathema (you could get 
ostracized from some groups if you could stick to this usage). Why is 
it so Pankaj?

The formation of communities of knowledge and practice are complex 
processes and it becomes a problem when these communities create an 
arrogant and defensive public representation and postures. It helps 
no one, least of all the communities themselves.

What surprises me is the almost derogatory reference to a thing 
called `slum` in this discussions. Since people from `slums` are not 
likely to appear in this discussion (at least in the near future) to 
challenge their representation, so why must we then keep on referring 
to them to score points in arguments about `free software`.

Why must the digital avant-garde of Linux programmers be so worried 
and upset about the possibility of having to deal with the realities 
that neither threaten them  and nor contest their claims. I can 
understand when a Linux enthusiast polemicizes against a Microsoft 
propagandist, but why must hackles rise when an argument is made for 
the extension of the best of free software to precisely those areas 
in society where there is the greatest need for it.

Earlier, the debate has been precisely about this, where and when 
could free software enthusiasts expend their energy, with the state, 
in the marketplace or in that area of society that is neither within 
the domain of the state or of the market. There seems to have been a 
totally defensive reaction by those who have been critiqued on the 
grounds that their investment of energies in state and market led 
initiatives may be contrary to what free software is all about.

It is indeed sad that Pankaj should have reacted so strongly against 
the idea of working on free software platforms that work in Languages 
other than those that are written in the Roman Alphabet. To talk 
about the need for software in a particular language which might 
happen to be someone's mother tongue (English too is a mother tongue 
to many) is not the same thing at all, under any circumstances, to a 
call for the defence of the 'mother land'. It is simply a plea that 
the benefits of free software be accessible to those who do not have 
a facility with the English language.

Moreover Pankaj is GPL not an attempt to create a tactical public domain?

Cheers
Jeebesh