From: "Soundara Rajan N.S." searchlight@sancharnet.in Subject: [Fsf-friends] The Peacemaker To: fsf-friends@mm.gnu.org.in The Peacemaker How Linus Torvalds, the man behind Linux, keeps the revolution from becoming a jihad. By David Diamond It's no accident that Linus Torvalds has been calling the shots for Linux longer than most world leaders have been in power. In the 12 years since he uploaded his operating system and became de facto master of the open source

Linus Torvalds is an amiable guy, granted. But, it is perhaps a grave mistake to reduce an entire movement to simply building a technically more-efficient solution.

Loaded terms by the media don't help either (e.g. "keeps the revolution from becoming a jihad").

Free Software is no more about software alone. It has grown far beyond that. Today, it is challenging the manner in which artificial blocks are used to control the spread of knowledge and information in fields ranging from education to music, from journalism to scientific knowledge. We need to take the boundaries of this debate further. This is an issue that affects the lives of hundreds, if not thousands, of millions. We in the information-deficit, knowledge-scarce regions face this daily.

Linus seems to look at the word "politics" as something negative. One could argue that even the decision to "keep out politics" is a very political stand in itself.

Last year, when I visited Finland in connection with the FLOSS-in-the-developing-world study, there was quite some debate on Linus "just for fun" approach. Someone came up with the suggestion that he was keen to make himself seem less political, so as not to become unacceptable in the US.

Sam Williams biography of RMS has an interesting point.

To quote Williams: "Most importantly, the MacArthur (genius grant) money gave Stallman more freedom. Already dedicated to the issue of software freedom, Stallman chose to use the additional freedom to increase his travels in support of the GNU Project mission.

"Interestingly, the ultimate success of the GNU Project and the free software movement in general would stem from one of those trips. In 1990, Stallman paid a visit to the Polytechnic University in Helsinki, Finland. Among the audience members was 21-year-old Linus Torvalds, future developer of the Linux kernel -- the free software kernel destined to fill the GNU Project's most sizable gap."

(Okay, one can expect disagreement here from Free Software enthusiasts over the "sizable gap"...)

Williams continues: "When it was time to release the 0.12 version of Linux, the first to include a fully integrated version of GCC, Torvalds decided to voice his allegiance with the free software movement. He discarded the old kernel license and replaced it with the GPL. The decision triggered a porting spree, as Torvalds and his collaborators looked to other GNU programs to fold into the growing Linux stew."

Without intending to turn this into a Linus-versus-RMS or Linux-versus-GNU tug-of-war, we must not reduce the entire idealism (or politics, if you want to call it that) that has gone into this movement which is nearly two decades old.

Should we diminish the goal to just building technically efficient software? Or is this a battle over whether knowledge itself becomes another commodity, sold to the highest bidder? FN

PS: They say, reasonable men change to the ways of the world. Therefore, all progress depends on unreasonable men.... ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Frederick Noronha (FN) | http://www.fredericknoronha.net Freelance Journalist | http://www.bytesforall.org http://goalinks.pitas.com | http://joingoanet.shorturl.com http://linuxinindia.pitas.com | http://www.livejournal.com/users/goalinks ------------------------------------------------------------------------- T: 0091.832.2409490 or 2409783 M: 0 9822 122436 -------------------------------------------------------------------------