[Discuss] rms

Thu Sep 19 18:09:36 EDT 2019

I doubt that RMS has ever been officially diagnosed. I can't imagine him
willingly sitting down in front of a psychiatrist. But I have no doubt
whatsoever that he is somewhere on the autism spectrum.

My first significant encounters with RMS were back in the days of Lisp
Machines. A bunch of people had recently left the MIT AI Lab to start a
company, Symbolics, and had also made the Symbolics hardware and software
proprietary. RMS was busily replicating all the new capabilities of the
Symbolics software and adding them to MIT's version of the Lisp Machine
code, which was still open, and sharing it with competing company Lisp
Machine Inc. RMS's genius as a coder was evident, as he managed to keep up
with Symbolics nearly single-handedly. LMI's Lambda design was also more
openly disclosed than the Symbolics 3600 line and the microcode was
provided with the systems, though it still was not an open hardware
platform in the sense that we have now. (The full source distribution was a
no-cost option with LMI systems, and was provided so long as the customer
had bought a large enough hard drive to hold it along with the binary
builds. Before the Lambda was ready, LMI sold a commercial version of MIT's
CADR, the second generation Lisp Machine; those came with either 80 or 300
megabyte hard drives, big for the day but unimaginably small now,
especially for a computer with a full graphic user interface. Lambdas
normally came with a Fujitsu Eagle drive that held about 400 megabytes, so
they always had room for the source code.)

After fighting that battle for a while, RMS got disillusioned with the Lisp
Machine scene. Some of LMI's actions didn't help; the company released a
non-free (in either sense; it cost extra, source code was not provided, and
symbol information was stripped from the binaries) circuit design program
for its Lisp Machines, started work on a new architecture (the K machine)
that was not planned to be open in the same way as the Lambda (prototypes
were built but the company ran out of money before it reached production),
and licensed its intellectual property to Texas Instruments, which did not
share code with MIT as freely as LMI did.

The battles over Lisp and Lisp Machines inspired RMS to start the Free
Software movement, its eponymous foundation, and the GNU (Gnu's Not Unix)
project. GNU's own kernel, Hurd, still has not reached version 1.0 after
more than 30 years of development, but the dream of an open replacement for
Unix became a reality when people coupled GNU's other work (Emacs, GCC,
bash, Bison, gawk, etc) with the Linux kernel. RMS correctly observed that
a complete Linux distribution contained more code from the FSF than from
Linus Torvalds and the other kernel contributors, but his heavyhanded
attempt to get people to refer to the software as Lignux and later
GNU/Linux failed to take hold. The awkwardness of his proposed names was
one reason, but the fact that some potential Linux contributors found RMS
off-putting was surely another factor.

RMS has always been a challenging person to interact with. His sheer genius
as a coder, especially back when his hands had not yet been damaged by
repetitive stress injuries and he could still type, was intimidating to
mere programming mortals. His insistence on ideological purity for the free
software movement, and especially on licenses that prohibited many mixtures
of free and commercial software, alienated potential allies and led to the
emergence of the competing open source movement. He is socially awkward,
quick to anger, and generally insensitive to social cues. He is
particularly awkward in interactions with women, sometimes engaging in
behavior that borders on harassment and stalking, though I believe it's
because of his general unawareness of and contempt for social norms.

RMS hasn't been actively involved in software design for a number of years.
At this point his contributions are limited to evangelism and a bit of
overall guidance to the cause; he is best known now as a public speaker.
His retirement from the FSF and CSAIL is symbolic and will have little
impact on either organization. It may lead to him getting fewer or no
speaking gigs but his involvement in that scene was likely winding down
anyway, with or without the recent incident.

RMS's impact on the world of computing is undeniable. The internet would be
a very different thing without free software and would probably not have
allowed so many flowers to bloom. Sadly, the ISPs, the big data companies,
and the big media companies, which are often one and the same, are busily
closing the doors again.

On Thu, Sep 19, 2019 at 5:11 PM Stuart Conner <genuineaudio at gmail.com>
wrote:

> I wonder if he is an undiagnosed autism spectrum case and his “stubborn”
> and “antisocial” behaviors are something he really can’t just “knock off”.
> Having said that even if one has autism it doesn’t mean behaviors are
> always excused there is therapy and training to get them selves under
> control and more capable of interaction in public.
>
> SMC
>
> > On Sep 19, 2019, at 12:00 PM, discuss-request at blu.org wrote:
> >
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> >
> > Today's Topics:
> >
> >   1. Re: RMS in the news (Derek Martin)
> >   2. Re: RMS in the news (Rich Pieri)
> >   3. Re: RMS in the news (Randy Cole)
> >   4. Re: RMS in the news (Kent Borg)
> >   5. Re: RMS in the news (John Abreau)
> >   6. Re: RMS in the news (Rich Pieri)
> >   7. Re: RMS in the news (Bill Horne)
> >
> >
> > ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > Message: 1
> > Date: Wed, 18 Sep 2019 12:38:48 -0500
> > From: Derek Martin <invalid at pizzashack.org>
> > To: discuss at blu.org
> > Subject: Re: [Discuss] RMS in the news
> > Message-ID: <20190918173848.GC3811 at bladeshadow.org>
> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8
> >
> >> On Wed, Sep 18, 2019 at 06:40:31AM -0400, Jack Bennett wrote:
> >> I thought it was a mildly funny exchange at the time, but I hadn't
> >> known of his reputation for singling out women in the audience and
> >> making them uncomfortable. I wonder if he would have done the same
> >> call out with a male professor in the same situation.
> >
> > I've interacted with RMS on a few occasions, and my impression has
> > always been he would not hesitate to confront anyone, regardness of
> > any of their identifying characteristics, for any reason he deemed
> > suitable.  I tend to think this is as it should be, except that his
> > threshold for when it's OK to confront people needs some rather
> > heavy-handed tuning.
> >
> > Despite that I mostly agree with his message, I would characterize
> > 100% of those interactions as negative.  He is coarse sand paper, and
> > a taste I would prefer not to acquire, much like every other SJW type
> > I'm aware of having encountered (since such awareness has generally
> > been imparted via similar behavior).
> >
> > --
> > Derek D. Martin    http://www.pizzashack.org/   GPG Key ID: 0xDFBEAD02
> > -=-=-=-=-
> > This message is posted from an invalid address.  Replying to it will
> result in
> > undeliverable mail due to spam prevention.  Sorry for the inconvenience.
> >
> >
> >
> > ------------------------------
> >
> > Message: 2
> > Date: Wed, 18 Sep 2019 14:03:01 -0400
> > From: Rich Pieri <richard.pieri at gmail.com>
> > To: discuss at blu.org
> > Subject: Re: [Discuss] RMS in the news
> > Message-ID: <5d827156.1c69fb81.80d61.7d74 at mx.google.com>
> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
> >
> > On Wed, 18 Sep 2019 11:34:44 -0400
> > Dan Ritter <dsr at randomstring.org> wrote:
> >
> >> And then we do.
> >>
> >> RMS hasn't stopped in at least 30 years.
> >>
> >> Don't use Asperger's as an excuse for RMS acting like an asshole.
> >> It's rude to all of the rest of us.
> >
> > This.
> >
> > I would like to add that I'm sick and tired of RMS' friends telling me
> > I need to be tolerant of whatever his damage might be. I'm a difficult
> > person to deal with. I know it. I'm not always good at handling it but
> > I try and when someone tells me to knock it off I knock it off.
> >
> > RMS has somehow leveraged *not* knocking it off into a career.
> > Now it's over.
> >
> > Instead of telling us that we should be tolerant of RMS who "thinks
> > differently" from most of us, maybe those of you who call him friend
> > should have been telling him to knock it off. If you had done this 30
> > years ago instead of making excuses for him and encouraging his
> > assholery then maybe this whole situation could have been avoided.
> >
> > --
> > Rich Pieri
> >
> >
> > ------------------------------
> >
> > Message: 3
> > Date: Wed, 18 Sep 2019 15:05:07 -0400
> > From: Randy Cole <randyokc at gmail.com>
> > To: blug <discuss at blu.org>
> > Subject: Re: [Discuss] RMS in the news
> > Message-ID:
> >    <CAHyaXi0aYsghc+kQJkoix=NyG83Xvrmz9H48pC2UpdLBAUhayQ at mail.gmail.com>
> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"
> >
> > It's interesting that the media yesterday was talking about the SNL
> > comedian first, then eventually RMS.
> > * * *
> > When my brother was in high school he got a guest account at the AI
> > lab.  Something happened & that person couldn't sponsor guests
> > anymore, so he got one sponsored by RMS, which led to a summer job
> > working there.
> >
> >
> > ------------------------------
> >
> > Message: 4
> > Date: Wed, 18 Sep 2019 17:28:13 -0400
> > From: Kent Borg <kentborg at borg.org>
> > To: Rich Braun <richb at pioneer.ci.net>, "discuss at blu.org"
> >    <discuss at blu.org>
> > Subject: Re: [Discuss] RMS in the news
> > Message-ID: <14dadd78-ea78-52e5-b276-9a0cc30f0404 at borg.org>
> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8; format=flowed
> >
> >> On 9/18/19 1:53 AM, Rich Braun wrote:
> >> I?d love to hear more RMS stories. -rich
> >
> > Many, many years ago...
> >
> > I was once introduced to Stallman, but I had met him before, so I
> > reminded him of the party, and of the conversation we had had.
> >
> > He remembered me: "Oh, your *that* asshole."
> >
> > One of my proudest moments, I retell it every chance I get. Kinda feel
> > like now people will think I'm just heaping on because it is cool to dis
> > Stallman. No, he's been worth it a long time.
> >
> > I'm glad his vision of open source software is out there, he had a lot
> > of influence over where we are...and I am also very glad he didn't get
> > his way as to all his utopian details--because utopia is a perfect
> > place, and one man's perfection and absolute utopia is another man's
> hell.
> >
> > -kb
> >
> >
> >
> > ------------------------------
> >
> > Message: 5
> > Date: Wed, 18 Sep 2019 19:10:13 -0400
> > From: John Abreau <abreauj at gmail.com>
> > To: Kent Borg <kentborg at borg.org>
> > Cc: Rich Braun <richb at pioneer.ci.net>, "discuss at blu.org"
> >    <discuss at blu.org>
> > Subject: Re: [Discuss] RMS in the news
> > Message-ID:
> >    <CAFv2jcYc6vLpR6L_ddQG_i7w=km_ECGErawJo=ryxsPX_+QCiA at mail.gmail.com>
> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"
> >
> > I first heard of RMS at the Boston Computer Society in 1985. My friend
> > Glenn Hoffman gave me a BCS membership for Christmas in 1984, and we both
> > attended the BCS/Mac meeting in January 1985, where Bernard Aboba handed
> > out printed copies of the GNU Manifesto. I was duly impressed by his
> ideas.
> >
> > Many years later, after I founded the BCS Linux/UNIX SIG, we had a
> meeting
> > where the speaker cancelled a few days before the meeting, and the
> > alternate speaker we found at the last minute gave a talk on booting
> > diskless Sun workstations from a Linux server, but his entire talk lasted
> > about 10 minutes. RMS was in the audience, and during the Q&A after the
> > talk, someone asked about running WordPerfect on Linux. RMS immediately
> > responded to this by loudly asking, "Why bind yourselves in the chains of
> > commercial software when you can be *FREE* !!!".
> >
> > Since we had another 90 minutes to fill, I turned the meeting over to
> him.
> > His impromptu talk was lively and entertaining.
> >
> > A few months later I invited him to give a talk on software patents, to
> > which he responded that he won't speak at any of our meetings until we
> > rename our group to the BCS GNU/Linux SIG. Needless to say, I found this
> > demand unreasonable and unacceptable, so the meeting never happened.
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >> On Wed, Sep 18, 2019 at 5:29 PM Kent Borg <kentborg at borg.org> wrote:
> >>
> >>> On 9/18/19 1:53 AM, Rich Braun wrote:
> >>> I?d love to hear more RMS stories. -rich
> >>
> >> Many, many years ago...
> >>
> >> I was once introduced to Stallman, but I had met him before, so I
> >> reminded him of the party, and of the conversation we had had.
> >>
> >> He remembered me: "Oh, your *that* asshole."
> >>
> >> One of my proudest moments, I retell it every chance I get. Kinda feel
> >> like now people will think I'm just heaping on because it is cool to dis
> >> Stallman. No, he's been worth it a long time.
> >>
> >> I'm glad his vision of open source software is out there, he had a lot
> >> of influence over where we are...and I am also very glad he didn't get
> >> his way as to all his utopian details--because utopia is a perfect
> >> place, and one man's perfection and absolute utopia is another man's
> hell.
> >>
> >> -kb
> >>
> >> _______________________________________________
> >> Discuss mailing list
> >> Discuss at blu.org
> >> http://lists.blu.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
> >>
> >
> >
> > --
> > John Abreau / Executive Director, Boston Linux & Unix
> > Email: abreauj at gmail.com / WWW http://www.abreau.net / PGP-Key-ID
> 0x920063C6
> > PGP-Key-Fingerprint A5AD 6BE1 FEFE 8E4F 5C23  C2D0 E885 E17C 9200 63C6
> >
> >
> > ------------------------------
> >
> > Message: 6
> > Date: Wed, 18 Sep 2019 20:39:58 -0400
> > From: Rich Pieri <richard.pieri at gmail.com>
> > To: discuss at blu.org
> > Subject: Re: [Discuss] RMS in the news
> > Message-ID: <5d82ce5f.1c69fb81.c8ff7.9c3b at mx.google.com>
> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
> >
> > On Wed, 18 Sep 2019 17:28:13 -0400
> > Kent Borg <kentborg at borg.org> wrote:
> >
> >> I was once introduced to Stallman, but I had met him before, so I
> >> reminded him of the party, and of the conversation we had had.
> >>
> >> He remembered me: "Oh, your *that* asshole."
> >
> > You win the Internet this week. :)
> >
> > --
> > Rich Pieri
> >
> >
> > ------------------------------
> >
> > Message: 7
> > Date: Thu, 19 Sep 2019 11:13:33 -0400
> > From: Bill Horne <bill at horne.net>
> > To: BLU Discussions <discuss at blu.org>
> > Subject: Re: [Discuss] RMS in the news
> > Message-ID: <8a042dad-fd82-85f9-16e3-17243f764b21 at horne.net>
> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8; format=flowed
> >
> >> On 9/18/2019 7:10 PM, John Abreau wrote:
> >> I first heard of RMS at the Boston Computer Society in 1985.
> >
> > I first met RMS in a room adjoining the workstations aisles in the AI
> > lab at M.I.T.? I was a High-school student who liked computers, and I
> > had the good fortune to know another Amateur Radio operator who worked
> > there. RMS was sitting at a small table with a terminal on it, dictating
> > code into a tape recorder. The only other item in the room was a cot at
> > the other end, and when we shook hands, he said "Happy hacking!" My
> > friend later told me that RMS lived there, but I didn't quite believe it
> > until years later, when I learned that RMS' apartment had been burned
> > out and that he hadn't known about it for about a week.
> >
> > The next time I saw him, RMS was standing in the center strip of
> > Memorial drive, holding a sign that read "Software should be free." I
> > stopped and asked him why, but I didn't understand his explanation.
> >
> > The last time we met, I was swiping groceries at a supermarket in
> > Cambridge. RMS came by and told me that I shouldn't use the self-service
> > section, because I was putting people out of work.
> >
> > RMS has left us the FSF, the GNU organization, and Emacs (which I use
> > every day): we owe him a lot, both as a society and as a group, and I
> > hope we can keep in mind the immense weight of his achievements on the
> > balance of his life.
> >
> > The problem with genius, it has been said, is that there's no way to go
> > but down.
> >
> > Bill Horne
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > ------------------------------
> >
> > Subject: Digest Footer
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