tweak wording on paragraph; the substance is unchanged

the substance of the message is no different, but the message is now much more
effective and the reader is less likely to turn away; much of the arguments
are emotionally driven, as opposed to factual, so using such "insulting"
language is probably not a good idea

my motivation is to encourage the fsf to improve, not to attack it. the fsf
should work with the community, not against it; similarly, libreboot and
osboot should not be seen to attack the fsf. however, constructive criticism
is ok, and that is entirely the purpose of this article
hslick-master
Leah Rowe 2022-01-24 05:34:27 +00:00
parent 7389077662
commit cdf24c660d
1 changed files with 18 additions and 17 deletions

View File

@ -99,23 +99,24 @@ The FSF RYF guidelines state the following:
*"However, there is one exception for secondary embedded processors. The exception applies to software delivered inside auxiliary and low-level processors and FPGAs, within which software installation is not intended after the user obtains the product. This can include, for instance, microcode inside a processor, firmware built into an I/O device, or the gate pattern of an FPGA. The software in such secondary processors does not count as product software."*
This is absolute pure nonsense, and should be rejected on ideological grounds.
The rest of libreboot's policy and overall ideology expressed, in this article,
will be based largely on that rejection. The term *product software* is
completely asinine; software is software, and software should always be *free*.
Instead of making such exceptions, more hardware should be encouraged, with
help given to provide as much freedom as possible, while providing education
to users about any pitfalls they may encounter, and encourage freedom at all
levels. When an organisation like the FSF makes such bold exceptions as above,
it sends the wrong message, by telling people essentially to sweep these other
problems under the rug, just because they involve software that happens to run
on a "secondary processor". If the software is possible to update by the user,
then it should be free, regardless of whether the manufacturer *intended* for
it to be upgraded or not. Where it really *isn't* possible to update such
software, proprietary or not, advice should be given to that effect. Education
is important, and the FSF's criteria actively discourages such education; it
creates a false hope that everything is great and wonderful, just because the
software on one arbitrary level is all free.
This is a violation of every principle the FSF stands for, *and it should be
rejected on ideological grounds*. The rest of libreboot's policy and overall
ideology expressed, in this article, will be based largely on that rejection.
The definition of *product software* is completely arbitrary; software is
software, and software should always be *free*. Instead of making such
exceptions, more hardware should be encouraged, with help given to provide as
much freedom as possible, while providing education to users about any pitfalls
they may encounter, and encourage freedom at all levels. When an organisation
like the FSF makes such bold exceptions as above, it sends the wrong message,
by telling people essentially to sweep these other problems under the rug, just
because they involve software that happens to run on a "secondary processor".
If the software is possible to update by the user, then it should be free,
regardless of whether the manufacturer *intended* for it to be upgraded or not.
Where it really *isn't* possible to update such software, proprietary or not,
advice should be given to that effect. Education is important, and the FSF's
criteria actively discourages such education; it creates a false hope that
everything is great and wonderful, just because the software on one arbitrary
level is all free.
This view of the FSF's, as expressed in the quoted paragraph, assumes that
there is primarily *one* main processor controlling your system. On many