On Wed, Feb 01, 2006 at 12:24:34PM -0800, Russ Allbery wrote: > > If we had the right to remove the GNU Manifesto, the Free Software > > Movement would slowly lose its influence. People, especially young > > people, tend to forget how this started and what ideals the movement > > follows and why they are important. > This is a stock RMS talking point that many of the rest of us don't agree > with, including some of us who are fairly political about free software > (not everyone in Debian is). I think he's being far, far too paranoid, > and I doubt that the GNU Manifesto in the manuals is anywhere near the > most effective way that he has of reaching people. In fact, I'm fairly > sure that his current policy is actually counter-productive, since this > inexplicable support of (IMO) badly worded, non-free licenses drives away > people like me who are otherwise members and supporters of the FSF and who > would otherwise be lauding the FSF through word of mouth. And I guarantee > you that, at least *now*, far more people learn about the origins of free > software and the importance of those ideals through word of mouth than > some appendix to some manual that few people read cover-to-cover. As a data point, I think I've only ever read the GNU manifesto on the FSF website, not in any of their manuals. :) -- Steve Langasek Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS Debian Developer to set it on, and I can move the world. vorlon@debian.org http://www.debian.org/
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