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This is the personal web site of Richard Stallman.
The views expressed here are my personal views, not those of
the Free Software Foundation or
the GNU Project.
For the sake of separation, this site has always been
hosted elsewhere and managed separately.
It is more likely I can actually go if you have funds to cover the additional cost, and a speaker's fee would be nice.
If you want to send me GPG-encrypted mail, do not trust key servers! Some of them have phony keys under my name and email address, made by someone else as a trick. See gpg.html for my real key.
Richard Stallman has cancer. Fortunately it is slow-growing and manageable follicular lymphoma. Treatment put it into remission, and he can expect to live many more years. However, he now has to be even more careful not to catch Covid-19.
The largest part of the site is the political notes, and they are typically updated every day.
I'm looking for people to
I will have a trip to Europe in the second week of October and I am looking for invitations for additional talks in the same trip. If you would like to invite me to speak in that trip, please write to me at rms-invitation@gnu.org with "october" as the subject.
It is more likely I can actually go if you have funds to cover the additional cost, and a speaker's fee would be nice.
US citizens: tell the self-styled Secretary of War that reporting the news isn't committing a crime, nor attacking the US.
US citizens: call on Congress to oppose the subservience pledges that the bully demands from universities.
If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121
US citizens: call on Congress to pay furloughed workers — no exceptions, no delays.
If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121
US citizens: phone your congresscritter to urge per to fight against the repressor's NSPM-7 decree that calls for treating his political opposition and critics as "anti-American" or "terrorists".
If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121
US citizens: tell Kristi Noem to stop sending troops and deportation agents to invade American cities.
See the instructions for how to sign this letter campaign without running any nonfree JavaScript code--not trivial, but not hard.
US citizens: call on Tell Congress: Rein in the Insurrection Act and End Mr UnAmerican's War on American Cities.
See the instructions for how to sign this letter campaign without running any nonfree JavaScript code--not trivial, but not hard.
US citizens: call on Congress to stop the Paramount-Warner Bros Merger. Don't allow CBS, HBO and CNN to be owned by one giant company that kisses the corrupter's ass.
US citizens: Denounce Republican Attacks on Social Security.
I'm looking for a cartoonist who would like to draw cartoons for me once in a while. If you're interested, please write to rms, which refers to me, at the location gnu period org.
Boycott Chevron, in the name of Steven Donziger.
* Abandoned coalmines and oil and gas wells are now one of the biggest sources of the powerful greenhouse gas methane, new data shows, and little effort is being made to clean them up.*
I expect that the fossil fuel companies to divest themselves from old mines and wells in ways that will avoid liability for them — just as they sometimes disconnect themselves from responsibility for supporting former workers.
So I suggest making it a felony to implement a restructuring of business or assets in a way that is likely to result predictably in strand assets that carry financial responsibilities with no one capable of shouldering the responsibilities.
A pitifully weak attempt to solve a real problem: asking for a federal law that would permit victims of domestic abuse and stalking to demand that data brokers delete information about them.
Data, once collected, will be abused. The way to prevent that abuse is to facilitate refusing to hand it over in the first place.
Here is my proposal for protecting the specific people known to be in particular danger, and everyone else who could be harmed if individuals, businesses or governments use their personal data against them without a search warrant: require services to be available anonymously.
The selfish interest of those who keep trade secrets is rational but antisocial. In many cases the only harm it does is to hold back the general advance of technology. But sometimes it does really nasty things. For digital hardware and software, it often gives companies a way to subjugate their users. Regarding use of toxic chemicals, it endangers public health.
Why would legislators pass laws to "protect" companies instead of protecting the people they harm? I suspect it is partly because these companies are influential and the legislators seek their support, and partly because the legislators ask them for campaign funds.
But it is also partly the result of the mindset of "trickle down", which assumes that the only way to get more funds for the state is to let increase the size of the economy by letting companies have what they want. Unfortunately, what they want is often to be allowed to harm the public.
Most Democrats in Congress got corrupted this way in the 80s and 90s. (The exceptions are the progressive Democrats.) Now in the UK Starmer is guiding Labour into that sort of corruption.
Clearly our laws should say that any public need to know about the presence of toxic substances in a business facility overrides the desire to keep them secret.
Whether the owners are Chinese is a question that there is no need to ask, because the state should never give money to a business "to support it." Instead it should offer to lend money to the company for suitable repayment, or else buy equity at a fair price.
These two ways of supporting a company avoid giving the owners an opporunity to rip off the state -- which the company's owners are likely to try to do, if they can, regardless of which country they are from.
With a policy like this, it wouldn't matter which country the company's owners are from.
Here are some quotations that I particularly like.
You can now read the political notes on Mastodon.
*Palestinian bodies returned by Israel show signs of torture and execution,say doctors.*
Signs that Israel tortures and brainwashes Palestinian prisoners were reported years ago.
Australia accuses chatbot bullshit generators of sending children text that has the effect of bullying them.
To say that X "bullies" Y is a statement about X's intentions. A bullshit generator doesn't understand the text it outputs, and has no intentions, so strictly speaking it can't bully anyone. But it can send someone text expresses bullying, and if that can hurt. Person may even believe that the bullshit generator is judging person. The practical result is the same, but our analysis of the situation should not make that mistake.
*Three UK neo-Nazis jailed for between eight and 11 years over terror plots.*
Summarizimng almost 4000 years of the history of Gaza.
Much of its store of potential archeological knowledge has been churned by bombs falling on the ground.
*Gaza aid still critically scarce, say agencies, as Israel delays convoys.*
HAMAS has mostly carried out the terms it agreed to — failing only to hand over corpses it is unable to find and dig up — but Israel is holding back on both cease fire and aid.
*Revealed: how a Russian fight club expanded into the US with the help of American neo-Nazis.*
*[Actor] Olivia Williams says actors need "nudity rider"-type controls for … body scans [that enable deepfakes].
[She] says performers are regularly pressed to have bodies scanned on set with few rights over how data is used.* Other actors say the pressure to do this is hard to resist.
Global heating seems to be damaging the oceans' photosynthesis, which would mean that the Earth's capacity to deal with CO2 generation would decrease.
In other words, the reduction in CO2 production we would require to curb global heating would be even greater.
Some baby pacifiers (referred to here as "dummies") made in Europe exceed the European legal limit on BPA concentration, although labeled as having no BPA.
*Wealth redistribution is good for growth.*
But even if that were not so, it would be a moral imperative. When you look at the amount economic activity that goes to further enrich the rich, it is clear that we could make do with less GNP if the non-rich are better off as a result.
Amazon Ring cameras will systematically allow many US thug departments to access images of passersby.
This Orwellian system will help find thieves and the (increasingly rare) murderers, but also the increasingly frequent persecuted dissidents.
Global Heating is starting to spiral out of control. Slowly but surely it will grow to the point of disaster unless we eliminate the greenhouse emissions that are forcing the process.
Tipping points are being crossed.
Israel has repeatedly violated the cease-fire, and the violations are increasing.
Firing cannon at a car full of civilians just because it crossed a line on a map is a blatant violation of the rules of war.
Colombian president Alvaro Uribe's conviction was overturned on appeal.
I generally refer to him a "el presidente Horrible" because of his association with the murderous paramilitaries gangs.
*[The corrupted] EPA seeks to weaken scrutiny for some of US’s most toxic chemicals.*
This is a potentially fatal example of plutocracy.
*Welfare cuts have felled rise of far right and [right-wing] populism, top UN expert says.*
*Mosquitoes found in Iceland for first time as climate crisis warms country.*
Some of those mosquito's are likely to spread deadly diseases also formerly unknown in Iceland.
*Can we keep antibiotics working? Yes, but the world needs to follow the EU and the UK.*
Here is a wayback captured link to hud.gov that shows the message currently being displayed on their site due to shutdown.
California has passed a law banning the use of artificial so-called "intelligence" to indirectly coordinate prices between supposedly competing rental companies.
The four factors of the apocalypse:
global heating, global hating,
global eating, global mating.
Copy this button (courtesy of R.Siddharth) to express your rejection of Facebook.
Non-oppressive Commercial E-books
Facebook's face recognition demonstrates a threat to everyone's privacy. I therefore ask people not to put photos of me on Facebook; you can do likewise.
Of course, Facebook is bad for many other reasons as well.
I'd like to make a list of countries that do not require a national identity card, and have no plans to adopt one. If you live in or have confirmed knowledge of such a country, please send email to rms at gnu.org.
Here's my list of countries with no national ID cards and no plans for one: Australia, Canada, New Zealand, UK. Australia's previous government tried to institute national ID cards, but the Labor government dropped the plan.
India has mostly finished imposing a national biometric ID number in a grand act of oppression.
Switzerland has national ID cards which are optional, but they or some other government ID card are needed for some purposes.
Iceland doesn't have ID cards as such, but they have ID numbers that citizens are forced to use frequently. For example, the national ID number is often required to rent a video or use a gym.
Denmark issues non-photo ID cards with a "person number", and many services use this card to identify people.
Norway will impose a national biometric ID card.
Ireland - national ID card by stealth.
ACLU: the five dangers of national ID cards.
Wikipedia has a list of identity card policies by country.
Stay away from certain countries because of their bad immigration policies.
Avoid flight connections in these airports because of their treatment of passengers.
People often ask how I manage to continue devoting myself to progressive activism (such as the free software movement) for years without burning out. The best way I can answer is by recommending a book, The Lifelong Activist by Hillary Rettig.
I disagree with the book on one theoretical point in the last part of the book: we shouldn't think of political activism as being marketing and sales, because those terms refer to business, and politics is something much more important than mere business. However, this doesn't diminish the value of the book's practical advice about borrowing techniques from marketing and sales.
Disclosure: I am friends with the author.
Personal Declaration of Richard Stallman and Euclides Mance on Solidarity Economy and Free Software.
I have reposted some of Rick Falkvinge's articles. As posted on his site, you can't see them in a browser without running some nonfree Javascript code which is apparently non-free. These versions show the same text, without the obstacle.
These are my political articles that are not related to the GNU operating system or free software. For GNU-related articles, see the GNU philosophy directory. You can also download copies of my book, Free Software, Free Society, 3rd edition.
"Those who profess to favor freedom, yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters. This struggle may be a moral one; or it may be a physical one; or it may be both moral and physical; but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will."Frederick Douglass, American Abolitionist, Letter to an associate, 1849
Here are notes about various issues I care about, usually with links to
more information. The current notes are
here. For all previous
notes, see this page.
See this page for information on efforts to maintain links in the political notes.
Political notes about the 2001 G8 summit in Genoa, Italy are being archived on their own page.
Richard Stallman's bio and publicity photos, and other things of interest to the press, have been moved to a separate page.
The Free Software Song, by Richard M. Stallman. You can listen to a performance of the song: Free Software Song performed by Thor Here is a variant of this song called "The Free Firmware Song".
Earth under attack from planet Koch.On doxing, and how to spell it.
A Spanish cartoon: La Ruleta Española. thumbnail
Here I am wearing my "power tie".
Wine snobs get their comeuppance.
Here I am struggling to open a bottle of water.
My application to an join Marian Henley's ex-boyfriends list.
My funny poetry and song parodies.
A song parody, Colors of the Lisp, by Jefferson Carpenter.
The text to a filk song, Johnny v. N., by Paul Rubin.
My Puns in English (Little Leaguer, August 2019).
My Puns in Spanish (New pun: Apostasía April 2019)
My Puns in French (New pun: Microsoft à l'école July 2019)
My Puns in Italian (New pun: Quale pesce fa starnutire? New 10/2018)
My Puns in German (New 02/2016)
Linguistic Swifties (Now with: Wintu, Penutian, Cochiti, Taos, and Towa.)
I am a Saint In the Church Of Emacs --Saint IGNUcius-- The Church of Emacs will soon be officially listed by at least one person as his religion for census purposes.
There are no godfathers in the Church of Emacs, since there are no gods, but you can be someone's editorfather.
Stallman Does Dallas: "I have to warn you that Texans have been known to have an adverse reaction to my personality…"
The Dalai Lama today announced the official release of Yellow Hat GNU/Linux.
I found a funny song about the Mickey Mouse Copyright Act (officially the Sonny Bono Copyright Act) which extended copyright retroactively by 20 years on works made as early as the 1920s.
If you are a geek and read Spanish, you will love Raulito el Friki, who said "Hello, world!" immediately after he was born. Here's an archive of this now-defunct comic strip.
Sleeping with Stallman at MIT.
ESR's favorite programming language: Objectivist C.
No Kludges in Cluj (June 2014)
Made for You (December 2012) (local copy) Esperanto translation
A science fiction story: Jinnetic Engineering (in Portuguese, Farsi, Spanish, Armenian, Russian, French, and Italian).My book of essays about the philosophy of Software Freedom, is available from the GNU Press.
Avec des chapeaux French song parody.
My radio program of Music from Georgia, originally broadcast on WUOG in Athens, Georgia on Oct 13, 2014.
Quantum Theory and Abortion Rights
A proposal for gender neutrality in Spanish, suitable for both speech and writing.
On Hacking: In June 2000, while visiting Korea, I did a fun hack that clearly illustrates the original and true meaning of the word "hacker".
Predicting the attack on Pearl Harbor
I would like to thank:
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