I don’t understand what fantasies you are talking about. We just want people to have freedom when using computers. Freedom that they deserve and that nobody should be able to take away from them. As a side effect we also get privacy and security and a society that works together to achieve common goals in a way that benefits us all. Those problems affect everyone who uses a computer.

The Free Software movement is 40 years old and it has already changed the world. It benefits everyone, not just technical people. Are you gonna tell me that all users of Firefox, Libre Office, Gimp, Matrix or Signal are only technical people? You are talking to me right now using Free Software and I’m responding to you on my fully Free Software operating system.

Free Software is not a licensing method. Software has to use licenses, because that’s how copyright works. It doesn’t give users any rights by default. Software should be free (as in freedom - we are not talking about price) by default, but it isn’t, so we have to use licenses. The Free Software that we use today was created under capitalism, so I don’t see how capitalism prevents us from making useful software and working together on improving it. There are also many developers and companies that sell Free Software (they make commercial programs).

The problem is that people don’t care about freedom, security or privacy. If they cared, they would only choose software that gives them those things. They would use Free Software. Even when it’s not always convenient.

So the issue here is not capitalism, but non-free proprietary software, because it makes it easy to abuse users. Unfortunately most people haven’t even heard of Free Software. They don’t realise that they deserve certain rights when using computers. I think if more people were familiar with the Free Software movement, they would think differently and they would demand freedom. Not all Lemmy users have heard of Free Software, but many of us understand that freedom is important. So we use it, even though it’s not convenient and the UI sucks.

We are capable of competing with corporations and often making better software that them, but that’s not enough. If people don’t understand the issues we are trying to solve, they will just use whatever new shiny app that comes out next. That’s why some Twitter users migrated to Bluesky and Threads. They don’t understand that after a while they will be abused the same way as before.

Even if we make Matrix way better, Discord users will still use Discord, because to them everything is fine and there is no reason to switch. Learning to use something new is always inconvenient. I doubt that all Windows users are unable to switch to GNU/Linux. They just don’t think it’s worth the effort, because to them there is nothing wrong. Being spied on and restricted is ok as long as all their proprietary games work.

That’s not certain and them getting absolute power also isn’t.

So to me it sounds a bit like the arguments that they like to use. Like:

if we accept immigrants, they will slowly replace us and destroy the country

Technically maybe that could happen, but there are many other things that could also happen and that you are failing to consider.

// TODO: fix this code

I will be crushed when this happens along with millions of others, like you, who thought this could never happen again.

Be careful of the slippery slope fallacy.

No worries, he can optimize it later.

You can always write code for Free Software projects in your free time and contribute to a good cause.

Everyone is overwhelmed when learning to program or even learning a new framework. This is normal. We just do our best to ignore that feeling and keep going. You will often fail and sometimes spend hours wondering why something doesn’t work. But eventually it will become easier and you will be able to make cool things. Python and JavaScript are good languages for beginners (but choose one).

If you would like to contribute to Libre Software, there are other ways you can do it too. You can join some chat rooms for a specific project and help people when they have issues. You can help to document things or help translate stuff.

gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw

Yeah I don’t understand what email has to do with crypto wallets at all.

He will just do the same thing as last time. He is too lazy to look something up online so he will just give up and say it’s not ready yet.

Also couldn’t he have just downloaded steam from its website?

Remember that time when he uninstalled his desktop environment? :D

But we need to convince people to care about freedom too. There will always be some excuse to not use the freedom respecting alternative. Look at Reddit users. They could all join us here and change something, but they don’t care. Same with Twitter, Windows, etc. It’s always difficult, it’s always annoying. But if we spread the message and help people with their issues, we can convince at least some of them.

Software takes time to improve. Matrix is a complicated project and unlike Discord it’s also federated. It’s possible that some things will always be harder with Matrix. But even if it improves a lot (which will probably take years), people might find other excuses to not use it. For example Discord might still be more popular.

I know Matrix takes effort to use. You have to understand what a homeserver is, how fediverse works, etc. I had to go through even more effort to set up my own server. It was difficult and took a lot of time of reading the documentation and tutorials. Some of the problems I had were ridiculous. Then to get people to use my server, I had to guide them step by step on how to create an account, because you can’t just send them an invite link.

But we can’t just give up on our freedom and privacy. We are aware of Matrix’s issues and they won’t be fixed in a month or even a year. In the future Discord will have even more users and it will be even harder to escape it. So there is no reason to wait, we have to fight this battle now. This is the right thing to do.

Ah, interesting. I didn’t realise that it was slow.

I bought The Orange Box, so I had the same problem. All physical copies of games are like this now and Valve is the reason. That killed the used games market on PC. You used to be able to sell your game after you got bored of it, but not anymore.

GOG’s client is proprietary just like Steam and Epic, which is bad, but the difference is that their client is optional. You can get offline installers of games directly from the website, because games there are DRM-free. So that makes GOG better than those platforms. There is also a Free Software alternative client developed by the community - Heroic Games Launcher. It works with Epic Games Store as well.

Another store is itch.io, which sells DRM-free games and their optional client is Free Software. But this store only has indie games.

It’s not easy to have freedom when you are a gamer. Steam and Epic Games Store are both proprietary (but for Epic you can use Heroic Games Launcher) and so are most games. There aren’t that many libre games and maybe around 10 of them are good. I hope that will change in the future.

It took me a while to realise this, but 2 of the quotes that this person has posted were not full quotes. I will post them here in case you are curious.

The one from 2003:

The nominee is quoted as saying that if the choice of a sexual partner were protected by the Constitution, “prostitution, adultery, necrophilia, bestiality, possession of child pornography, and even incest and pedophilia” also would be. He is probably mistaken, legally–but that is unfortunate. All of these acts should be legal as long as no one is coerced. They are illegal only because of prejudice and narrowmindedness.

Some rules might be called for when these acts directly affect other people’s interests. For incest, contraception could be mandatory to avoid risk of inbreeding. For prostitution, a license should be required to ensure prostitutes get regular medical check-ups, and they should have training and support in insisting on use of condoms. This will be an advance in public health, compared with the situation today.

For necrophilia, it might be necessary to ask the next of kin for permission if the decedent’s will did not authorize it. Necrophilia would be my second choice for what should be done with my corpse, the first being scientific or medical use. Once my dead body is no longer of any use to me, it may as well be of some use to someone. Besides, I often enjoy rhinophytonecrophilia (nasal sex with dead plants).

Source: https://stallman.org/archives/2003-mar-jun.html

The one from 2013:

There is little evidence to justify the widespread assumption that willing participation in pedophilia hurts children.

Granted, children may not dare say no to an older relative, or may not realize they could say no; in that case, even if they do not overtly object, the relationship may still feel imposed to them. That’s not willing participation, it’s imposed participation, a different issue.

Source: https://stallman.org/archives/2013-jan-apr.html#04_January_2013_(Pedophilia)

The one from 2006 was a full quote, but that post contains a note now:

[Many years after posting this note, I had conversations with people who had been sexually abused as children and had suffered harmful effects. These conversations eventually convinced me that the practice is harmful and adults should not do it.]

Source: https://stallman.org/archives/2006-mar-jun.html#05 June 2006 (Dutch paedophiles form political party)

I used it last year on Windows 10 (I was forced to use Windows by my employer). I didn’t use it with WSL, just with Git Bash.

I don’t think it’s silly at all to demand that users should have rights and that they should be able to control their computers. Valve makes proprietary software, which takes away user’s freedom, so it is unethical. They could make money in an ethical way if they only wanted. SteamOS is proprietary software too.

I don’t know much about VR, but if Valve makes a headset that doesn’t require proprietary software, that will be great. It should then be used as an example that other companies could follow. But it can’t be used as an excuse for them abusing users in other ways.

Also someone need to be paid to develop open source software. This being the beginning of the topic and all. I’m happy for that to be Valve at the moment as they have shown the industry how to be better.

Certainly, but Valve’s business is mostly focused on proprietary software and DRM. When they do make Free Software, it seems to be for the purpose of attracting people to their proprietary platform.