2010/8/18 Marcos Germán Guglielmetti
<marcos@ovejafm.com>
"Public Software": a serious symptom of the crisis in the Free Software Social
Movement
"Public Software? The so-called Public Software is a political project which
aims to remove the Free Software main feature: the Freedom. It tries to put
the people in the role of mere "viewing public".
The Free Software Social Movement historically called the participation of the
entire society for the transformation of the surrounding reality, it aimed to
create PRODUCERS of free culture, free software, free computer networks and
free hardware in order to achieve a freer society . Produced tangible results
as well as GNU/Linux, the Internet Protocol, Wikipedia, Firefox, eMule,
BitTorrent and many other tools that not only were suitable for all, but can
also be produced / used by anyone.
By removing the idea of working for freedom, some people is trying to
avoid disturbing the political/economical interests of the various national
governments when adopting free software because the migration process will be
carried out using partly Proprietary or Open Source Software as for instance
the one that produces Canonical (Ubuntu). So the say "public" and avoid to
say "free", because the ideas of Free Software Foundation (100% free
software!) could anoy these political/economical interests.
Thus the Social Movement of Free Software is excluded in its philosophical
basis and asked to participate only if it does not generate "controversy"
(http://solar.org.ar/spip.php?rubrique59) and agree to talk about Public
Software rather than referring to Free Software.
Recently the chief of staff of the Argentine Government, Anibal Fernandez,
released a video interview
(http://www.anibalfernandez.com.ar/te-lo-digo-yo/309-video-entrevista.html)
Public speaking and inviting the free software activists to stop using
the "free" software terminology. There are 70 million dollars at stake "for
the creation of technology-based firms"
(http://www.mincyt.gov.ar/index.php?contenido=noti_empretec).
A few days later, Martin Olivera, who has served as President of the NGO SOLAR
(Software Libre Argentina), published on his blog
(http://blog.martinolivera.com.ar/?p=169) an explanation of why Adding to the
Federal Bureau of Public Software "PJ Digital"
(http://www.pjdigital.org/2010/08/09/pjdigital-inicio-el-armado-de-la-mesa-federal-del-software "Public /)
>From the Peronism movement they say that "the PJ Digital now opens a space for
public discussion of the software, which is a political discussion that can
be carried forward on a political level and from a Peronist view but open to
all who want to participate".
Obviously they want to make the adoption of Free Software their partisan
achievement but not to speak of political freedom because these friends of
big business, dont want the people's emancipation. In any case, the national
bourgeoisies want "their" working classes to work for them and for the State
taking care of their extraordinary profits, giving to the people a "finished"
software, in many cases with available source code but:
Without the necessary activity for the people to take all the freedoms of free
software?
0) The freedom to run the program, for any purpose
1) The freedom to study how the program works, and adapt to your needs.
2) The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbor.
3) The freedom to improve the program, and release the improvements to others,
so that the whole community benefits. Access to the source code is a
precondition for this.
How will free software (bad called "public") get to the people? Will the
people know something about the 4 basic freedoms?
In the website of the CLAD (Latin American Centre for Development
Administration) regarding the issue, not even once mention the word freedom
or liberty
(http://www.clad.org/reforme/boletin-324/proyecto -software-public-international).
CLAD is an international project that brings all States benefiting from the
definition of "Public Software". The project began in Brazil
(http://www.softwarepublico.gov.br/) and now spread to Argentina and other
countries.
There is much talk of "Public" but these projects are woven behind the public,
or at least people are called to be "viewing public" rather than producers of
reality: the calls to the vaunted "Federal Bureau of Public Software" was not
done to all the activists of the Social Movement of Free Software: rarely
summoned some which could be aligned with the National Government of
Kirchner. The rest were excluded from any prior notice.
It is remarkable that into the NGO SOLAR it had happened as follows: one day
someone asked what it meant "Public Software", days later Aníbal Fernández
did the video interview published on his blog to leave "Free Software"
denomination, the NGO SOLAR bureaucracy responds with a critique
(http://solar.org.ar/spip.php?article784) (calling it an "add") "In this
context the question arises why a project of far-reaching as Equal Connect
incorporates proprietary software the laptops of the boys. The very idea
of "public" is challenged by this action, which goes directly to one of the
places where teens spend more time to socialize, which ultimately build their
idea of citizenship. "and then the President of the NGO joins the Public
Software and yet with endless excuses. We already know that the one that
denominate, dominate (http://www.rebelion.org/noticia.php?id=111147).
Yes, the very idea of "public" is questioned, not only by the action of
distributing computers with proprietary software, but also by the manner in
which meetings are being held without calling the "public" in general, the
call is not free.
So: the Open Source accomplished through the assistance of States and
bureaucratic NGOs to conquer new positions and render the computer struggle
for emancipation which is the Social Movement of Free Software.
This sad trip is a great example about why the free software philosophy is so
important, why it is so important to defend against the confusion of some
politicians of different states defending oppressors and an unjust capitalist
system in which it is "necessary" to subtract the people's freedom so a
wealthy social class can perpetuate in power.
Public Software = Gattopardo: Change everything so that nothing changes.
The Social Movement of Free Software has a fundamental task for the
emancipation of society: to build horizontal organizations, free and
independent from states and oppressive business that want to use "Free
Software" or "Public Software" only to generate large profits for the
capitalists and juicy win elections while population is intended to play
the "Public Viewer."
Source:
http://lunar.org.ar/?q=node/179
http://softwarelibre.org.ar/?q=node/125
http://argentina.indymedia.org/news/2010/08/745852.php