Free/Libre software

[T-Paine]

Free (as in freedom) software is something I feel is generally overlooked by the leftist community (at least in the USA) from what I can tell. I did a quick search of the forum and while I saw a few mentions of some free software, there was not really a discussion about the movement nor a recent thread on OI.

Free software (as defined by the Free Software Foundation) is based on 4 fundamental rights/freedoms:


The right/freedom to use the software for any purpose
The right/freedom to copy the software for personal purposes or to share with others
The right/freedom to view the source code of the software and adapt it for your own purposes
The right/freedom to improve on the software and release your improvements to the public


The movement started with the idealistic hacker visionary Richard Stallman who started a movement that changed the future of computing forever (and for the better.)

Free software is usually (but not always) licensed under a copyleft license, such as the GNU Public License. Copyleft allows you to publish or sell modified versions of free software under the condition that your version is under the same license. This way the freedom lives on in all versions of that software. This proved to be effective, as some companies had to release significant software under a free license in exchange for using previous free software. You can read more about it at the Free Software Foundation's website: http://fsf.org

I personally use the Trisquel GNU/Linux operating system (http://trisquel.info/), which unlike more popular distributions such as Ubuntu, is 100% free of proprietary software.

Free software does not strictly have to be free of charge, but since the internet allows for easy sharing, it usually is. Just think how much money governments and schools could save if instead of buying expensive licenses from Microsoft and Apple to use their software they just used free software instead! It's something that really infuriates me because I work in a high school IT environment (which Microsoft pretty much buys up.) That way there would be much less of a monopoly on the computers kids learn to grow up with too.

It seems counter-productive to me that a lot of leftists do not put much thought in the computers that they use. Instead of empowering and enriching corporations that make software that is proprietary and does not contribute to the community and freedom, leftists could easily make the move to software that is built for the good of all. For example, Revleft uses a proprietary and commercial forum software called vBulletin, when there are plenty of other popular free alternatives (such as http://phpbb.com.) It just seems like a no-brainer to me.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Those sound like good ideas.

My level of computer knowledge goes as far as being able to use computer programs:lol:. It's the same with cars, I can fix some real basic things but gear-head speak is all Greek to me.

That being said I would love to see some radicals who specialize not only in the politics of internet technologies but in things like video games and so on. It's not really my area of knowledge, but I think these are fertile grounds for making radical politics relevant to people today. Land, Peace, Bread, and free MP3s!

However I'm not sure that the creation of "online communes" for information sharing or whatnot is the best way leftists with some tech knowledge to use their skills. In the 1990s, there were tons of "internet-utopians" who argued that new technologies would errode the power of corporations or even undermine capitalism in much the same way analogue utopians argue that communes or co-ops can be a viable alternative to capitalism.

I think as the internet has developed - particularly with increased protections on digital copyrights and so on - it's apparent that rather than these technologies changing and shaping new modes of production, the dominant modes of production changed and shaped the way the technology has been developed.

[The Idler]

Leftists are broadly against property and for people so of course they're broadly against intellectual property power elites. Never mind free MP3s what about free oggs?

[redSHARP]

i think there is a list somewhere on this forum that has a list of free software and other shareware. I'll try to find it.

[Susurrus]

There is a thing called copyleft. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyleft

[Decommissioner]

My assumption why you don't see much talk about open source and free software on here is simply because people don't know much about it, and with any given group of people, most aren't computer experts (and that applies to revleft as well).

That isn't to say you need to be an expert to use something like ubuntu linux, but at the same time a lot of people don't know you can even get rid of windows OS and replace with free OS alternatives. To most windows=computers. I would like to see more discussion of open source software if for anything else to raise awareness of its existence and the philosophies behind it.

I personally run an ubuntu/arch/windows machine. I haven't completely severed the windows cord (only use it for gaming) and I use arch to tinker with.

Speaking of open source gaming I am currently attempting to teach myself python to code games with. Wont be easy but I find the challenge exciting.