But if you listen to RMS's critics too much, you can easily make him out to be a tyrant. Everything that he has written, said, or done has been greatly exagerated. Its not hard to fall into the same trap yourself.
scandal, I feel the same as you do. Business is business and like a candle in the dark tends to change its environment rather than be changed by it. This "United Linux" move seems more like a PR move by corporate types than any technical need to standardize. But I only have to remember two things that keep me optimistic. I have access to all this free software. And I'm not a corporate type.
lilo, I never take IRC very seriously. The amount of chest thumping there is horrendous. And its easy to get addicted to that some people believe its a world of its own. For me to take online messaging seriously, it would need some kind of authentication and identity mechanism. Surely this is contrary to what privacy advocates have been saying, but until our government actually does turn over and becomes a tyranny, people often need to be tamed by the social stigmas that exist in the real world.
Other People's Systems
jfleck, I have nothing coherent to say really. Just the phrase "Other People's Systems" hangs over my head after reading your entry. I don't judge by saying your concern of being eaten by seals is good or bad. But out of pure curiousity I ask, why do you care?