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Can the Linux Foundation Speak for Free Software?:
[Emphasis in original. --Ed.]
Although the Linux Foundation seems to represent Linux and the entire Linux user community, many community members have complained for years that the organization has defaulted to representing only the interests of its corporate membership.
This situation might not matter so much if organizations representing the community were strong enough to act as a counter-balance. The trouble is, they are not. In the last decade, the Free Software Foundation has backed away from its former activist tradition, while the Software Freedom Conservancy is almost unknown outside a small circle. Even Debian, while the dominant force among Linux distributions, makes fewer position announcements than it once did. As a result, the Linux Foundation has become the accepted public face of free software without any attempt to represent any except corporate interests.
The kindest interpretation of this situation is that the Linux Foundation has a public relations problem that it is unaware of and is overdue to correct. A more cynical interpretation is that, from its very start, the Linux Foundation has been a slow coup, gradually usurping an authority to which it has no right. Ask me on alternate days which one I believe.
Whatever the case, the solutions are the same. A concerted effort to get community members elected to at-large positions might help, although they would still be a minority. Many, too, might not want to legitimize the foundation by participating in it. A more promising response might be to see that community organizations are strengthened to provide a counter-balance, but that would be a slow solution if it worked at all.
(Score: 3, Touché) by DannyB on Friday January 24 2020, @07:54PM (1 child)
"The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich and the poor alike to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread." (Le Lys Rouge)
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 25 2020, @12:47AM
The law, in its majestic equality, has realised that it's an equal nuisance to society when someone sleeps under bridges, begs in the streets or steals bread regardless of their net worth.
... and before you start wringing your hands while your lip trembles and your doe-like eyes fill with shimmering tears, let me point out that the same applies to securities fraud, pyramid schemes, tax evasion and bribery.
... allow me to further point out that in the modern USA as well as the rest of the rich westernised world, there are substantial programmes in place to help people who might otherwise have to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets and steal bread. The fact that some jurisdictions have lost their collective shit to the point that we actually have people shitting on major thoroughfares in broad daylight, despite all the concerns that led to banning that conduct in the first place, is a reflection of the luxury of political correctness that can come back in after the original problems that led to the regulations and laws in question were forgotten.
Needles and manure on the sidewalk: post-modern problems, amiritebro?