Re: [emacs-humanities] Has Emacs made you appreciate software freedom?

[Alan Davis]

This is an extremely important question.

Emacs made me aware that Free Software even exists, and it revolutionized
how I approach the use of a computer, a PC.

Emacs epitomizes something I take to heart, something that is difficult to
put into words.  Emacs is an instrument, a core component of a system that
has actualized practically every aspect of my work and creativity.  Made
with Love, and shared.   What  could be better?  This is a spirit that is
rare and wonderful, and something we can all use more of.

The only thing I must regret is that I have played so minor a role in
creation of this system, and that I have failed so miserably in expressing
the joy that Free Software brings to me, as I have watched, as proprietary
commercial for-profit computing systems have metastasized across the
globe.  Friend by friend, and colleague by colleague, I have seen this
vision abandoned in favor of the easy way.

Emacs brings a joy, an exhilaration into my heart, the very idea of the
sharing of useful tools.  Thank you is not enough to Richard Stallman, a
visionary, and others who have contributed so selflessly

Is that enough?

Alan Davis



On Sat, May 22, 2021 at 10:20 AM Benjamin Slade <slade@jnanam.net> wrote:

> Thanks, Prot, for starting this discussion. I've been meaning to try to
> participate on this excellent listserv, but up until now I've not managed
> too (including a lack of an intro post). Please accept a long, rambling
> email as back-payment ;)
>
> > + Do you think that Emacs helped/helps you value your liberties, as
> >   those apply to your day-to-day computer experience?
>
> To a certain extent it's made me cognisant of my relative *lack* of
> liberties, both in day-to-day computing and elsewhere. That's sad on the
> one hand, perhaps, but it's made me try to take control over as much of my
> day-to-day computer experience as possible (at the cost of time).
>
> > + Do you believe that there is something to be learnt from Emacs and be
> >   applied to other parts of life?  Could/should, for instance,
> >   scientific research be conducted and publicised in a free,
> >   collaborative fashion?
>
> Most definitely. And occasionally we do even see good true "open access"
> research venues. My field (linguistics), there are at least Glossa [1] and
> Semantics & Pragmatics [2], and a fairly strong tradition of scholars
> posting "pre-prints" in an accessible manner (on Lingbuzz [3], sort of like
> arXiv, but specific to linguistics).
>
> (But still in day-to-day academic life I'm quite literally forced to use a
> lot of software I find morally- (not to mention technologically-)
> questionable, and pressure to use even more of the same.)
>
> Back to the larger question, I think there is still a lot of "alchemical
> practices" (in Doctorowian terms) in academia, perhaps loosely connected to
> the publish-or-perish framework we exist in.
>
> > + More generally, do you see a connection between software freedom and
> >   politics/economics?  Could/should the lessons drawn from Emacs and
> >   free software in general (especially copylefted) be used as an
> >   antipode to repressive forces, be they corporate actors or state
> >   entities?
>
>  Yes, but it's hard to know how exactly to do so.
>
>  To touch back on the linked articles, specifically "The Problem With Free
> Software... ...Is Capitalism", even this article, which obviously isn't
> exactly comfortable with capitalism, still seems to overrate its
> efficiencies ("...it is true that we’ve seen an unprecedented boom under
> capitalism"). If your goal is maximisation of paper clip production, or you
> really enjoy rolling fields of maize whose monotony is largely only broken
> by highways and petrol stations: then Capitalism's your man. That is,
> ever-increasing efficiency of production of some particular product.  But
> otherwise capitalism seems largely parasitic on innovations produced in
> non-capitalistic fashions (creations by dilettante/independently-wealthy
> scientists; creations by artists/inventors with wealthy patrons, or who are
> employed by academic institutions).
>
>  I think here about the software that's most useful to me. As with the
> non-utility of a room full of VC-funded paperclips, there is very little
> commercial software (simply on technical grounds) that's actually useful to
> me. Before Emacs, the software that opened my eyes to power of really
> free/libre software, that was exponentially more powerful than any
> commercial offering, was (La)TeX, which was, and remains, indispensable for
> my work. (And to a large extent I started using Emacs as extensively as I
> did because it provided (& continues to provide), via AUCTeX, the best TeX
> editing environment.)
>
>  And both TeX and Emacs were developed by people who had the ability (at
> least in part due to their affiliations with academic institutions) to make
> tools appropriate for their own uses, without having to worry about
> commercial viability. And luckily both the (La)TeX and Emacs ecosystems
> have had enough contributors (of additional code) to make them viable.
>
>  (The) Linux (kernel) is, I suppose, a different sort of case. It has the
> same 'dilettante'/'hobbyist' origins as TeX or Emacs, and also developed
> its own hobbyist ecosystem, but the ubiquity of Linux across a wide range
> of hardware does reflect in part corporate funding. But my main use case,
> desktop Linux, is just a happy side-effect, since corporate funding doesn't
> care about desktop Linux in the slightest. In this case, I feel we just
> shelter in an alcove accidentally created by market forces.
>
>  So, what does this suggest in practical terms? Don't be seduced by the
> short-term efficiencies of capitalism: they're limited not only in time but
> in scope, and are only really efficient in maximising share-holder revenue.
>
>  Try to create spaces in which people are able to freely create and
> innovate, and which thus are not tied directly to commercial interests.
>
>  Ideally this is people just being independently wealthy, or having
> (largely) benevolent 'patrons' (including universities). But in most cases,
> it's probably actually just trying to figure out how to best co-ordinate
> the efforts that unfunded hobbyists can carve out from their days, and how
> to cobble these together into meaningful actions.
>
>  It's hard to be too optimistic though, since both in software and
> politics/economics it seems far too easy for such efforts to be easily
> frustrated as soon as they run afoul of commercial interests.
>
> [1] <https://www.glossa-journal.org/>
> [2] <https://semprag.org/index.php/sp>
> [3] <https://lingbuzz.net/>
>
> best,
>   —Ben
>
> --
>  '(Benjamin Slade ("he/him") ( https://lambda-y.net )
>   `(pgp_fp: ,(21BA 2AE1 28F6 DF36 110A 0E9C A320 BBE8 2B52 EE19))
>   "sent by mu4e 1.4.15 in GNU Emacs 28.0.50 on Void Linux")
>
>

-- 
<http://documentally.com/2011/12/07/richard-stallman-talks/>
  "When the Last Tree has been cut down, the Last Fish caught,
   the Last River poisoned, only then will we realize
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  “Into this Universe, and why not knowing,
  Nor whence, like water willy-nilly flowing;
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       (Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám )