Software Freedom Day

Three Cheers to ‘Free Software’!
A toast for GNU on its 25th Birthday!^[1]

If you intend to ask, what I did on this day, I have nothing to show. I haven’t done anything that’s tangible but yes, I have re-dedicated myself to the idea of Free Software.
This post intends to shed some light on a few things (if not for the benefit of others, just as a reminder for myself)

• Free Software is a matter of liberty, not price.
  I’ve often been in a position that required me to correct people. ‘Free Software’ is software that’s free as in free speech and not free beer. For the lack of a better word in english, the word ‘free’ which also means gratis has been used. Using the term ‘Libre’ sometimes helps and if you are in this part of the world, “mukt” is the best word to use.
• Free Software comes along with four fundamental freedoms.^[2]
  To put it simply, the freedom to use, study, share and modify any software.
• Free Software may have the advantage of being ‘technically sounder’, but the philosophy is what matters the most to me.
• I will do whatever is possible within my capacity to spread the philosophy and the associated freedom

Be Free, My Friend!

Here is an extract from one of Stallman’s ^[3] Essays:

 We must talk about Freedom

   Estimates today are that there are ten million users of GNU/Linux
   systems such as Debian GNU/Linux and Red Hat Linux. Free software has
   developed such practical advantages that users are flocking to it for
   purely practical reasons.

   The good consequences of this are evident: more interest in developing
   free software, more customers for free software businesses, and more
   ability to encourage companies to develop commercial free software
   instead of proprietary software products.

   But interest in the software is growing faster than awareness of the
   philosophy it is based on, and this leads to trouble. Our ability to
   meet the challenges and threats described above depends on the will to
   stand firm for freedom. To make sure our community has this will, we
   need to spread the idea to the new users as they come into the
   community.

   But we are failing to do so: the efforts to attract new users into our
   community are far outstripping the efforts to teach them the civics of
   our community. We need to do both, and we need to keep the two efforts
   in balance.

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[1] http://www.gnu.org/fry/
[2] The Free Software Definition
[3] The GNU Project by Richard Stallman

Filed under: Libre, Ramblings , freedom, gnu, software

The Third Round.

This post is just to keep up a promise that I made to a friend of mine (well, actually myself).
Presently, its the placement heat in our campus and people are busy writing tests, waiting, giving interviews and partying. This post doesn’t have much to with all that though.
In one of the interviews, I was called back and asked about my Cleft Lip and Palate^[1] . The interview panel had concerns if I faced any serious medical problems due to this. I explained to them everything that I knew about it and they were convinced.

Later, I realized, I never explicitly did any reading on this issue or asked my parents/others about this. I somehow knew about it always. I probably learnt at all those visits to the dentist or may be sub-consciously, when I was a baby. It isn’t, though, surprising to me that those guys had some reservations about it. It’s not everyday that you see a guy with a Cleft, though statistics say there’s prevalence of 1 in 500 births world-wide. As a matter of fact, I myself haven’t seen another guy all my life (except for the pictures at my dentists’) (also, they weren’t too wrong in suspecting other problems, though they had absolutely no clue about this medical condition)

If you are wondering what the point of this post is, it’s nothing. It’s just a pointer to those interested in reading further on Cleft Lip and Palate.

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[1] Cleft Lip and Palate — Wikipedia

Filed under: Ramblings , cleft, job, me