Re: About SWH, let avoid the wrong discussion

[MSavoritias <email@msavoritias.me>]

On Fri, 21 Jun 2024 09:51:30 -0700
Vagrant Cascadian <vagrant@debian.org> wrote:

> On 2024-06-21, MSavoritias wrote:
> > On Fri, 21 Jun 2024 11:46:56 +0200
> > Andreas Enge <andreas@enge.fr> wrote:  
> >> Am Fri, Jun 21, 2024 at 12:12:13PM +0300 schrieb MSavoritias:  
> >> > and as I mention in my first email I want to apply social pressure and make it clear to package authors what is happening so we can move to an opt-in model.    
> >> 
> >> Well, the opt-in model is in place: As soon as I put my code under a free
> >> license on the Internet, I opt in for it to be harvested by SWH (and anybody
> >> else, including non-friendly companies and state actors).  
> >
> > That may be how you have understood it but that is not how most people understand it.
> > See for example mirroring videos that creators have made online, or more recently some activitypub software harvesting posts for a search engine.  
> 
> I think the fundamental difference is that such videos or activitypub
> posts are not necessarily released under a license that *expressly*
> permits sharing.
> 
> In most cases, those posts and videos are often released without any
> license at all, and the person retains the legal, social, moral and
> ethical rights to decide how that content is shared if at all. (I am
> speaking with those terms in the "plain" english sense, although they
> may have specific legal meanings in some contexts)

Its not actually. License doesn't matter to fediverse communities (I am talking ones that are part of the BadSpace here)
It is a social issue and treat accordinly. As in defederate (dont assosiate) with people who dont respect your community rules.
Laws, and licenses have nothing to do with it.

Also bear in mind that the same communities opposed and blocked search engines that tried to make the posts searchable.
That is why it became opt-in in the end :D

> > As I have been saying a lot in this thread (because there seem to be a
> > lot of people in the Guix community not familiar that legal are not
> > the same as social rules):  
> 
> > -Just because you CAN do something doesn't mean you SHOULD. In the sense that yes somebody can probably harvest all my posts from activitypub and post them somewhere else, 
> > in practise they are an asshole tho and probably are going to be
> > deferated pretty fast for breaking the social rules of common human
> > decency :)  
> 
> With something released under a Free Software license, calling someone
> an "asshole" simply for using the permissions granted by that license,
> by the very person who granted those permissions, starts to feel a bit
> like a baited trap and honestly, maybe outright duplicitous. Certainly
> rude, at the very least.
> 
> Again, that is different from some arbitrary post or video or cat
> picture on the internet, which more likely than not has no explicit
> permissions granted.

See about fediverse again. Its understood socially to be a bad thing not legally.
Because after all mostly nobody has the time and money for state laws to work.

> > TBH it seems you are not the only one in this thread not knowing that laws (legal rules of states) ie. the FSF licenses and work and whatever, are not the same as social rules.
> > But given that Guix has a CoC and social rules on top of that I am hopeful :)  
> 
> Well... free software ... is a bunch of social rules. Licenses are
> social rules. Contracts are social rules. Laws are social
> rules. Admittedly, a lot of the mechanics involved in law creation and
> enforcement are dubious and suspect and weighted in the favor large,
> wealthy and/or otherwise powerful entities...
> 
> I am not sure arguing about social vs. legal vs. whatever is even really
> a useful direction... almost missing the point entirely.
> 
> I would rather ask... what is the intention of the Free Software
> movement?
> 
> The licenses are merely imperfect tools to achieve those aims, and a
> clever way to leverage some specific legal mechanisms, but the licenses
> are not an end unto themselves.
> 
> For me personally, it is about creating a shared commons that can be
> used to build healthy thriving local, regional, global and virtual
> communities that do useful or interesting things... I dare dream that
> some of those collaboration skills leak into other aspects of life too,
> not just software!

That is all well and good but sadly Free Software says nothing about social rules.
For example what is Guix supposed to do when racists come in the chat?
or what if there is a hostile fork with the same name and submits itself for Guix inclusion?
or what if like a few months ago you have a trans person saying in the mailing list that you deadnamed them? Do we not change the software even if FSF free software says we can do whatever we want?

I doubt the last case would go well with a lot of people in the Guix community.
These are just some examples that Free Software can't solve for better or for worse. So it is up to social rules to decide what to do.

That is to say I agree we need collaboration and shared commons and such. But to create said collaborations we need to create safe spaces, protect people, value consent.

> If some social pressure from the Guix community could improve things, by
> all means, though I worry that it might be at best performative rather
> than effective, especially if the pressure is placed N parties removed
> from the source of the actual problem (e.g. those irresponsibly training
> of LLMs without respecting the licenses).

Maybe, maybe not. Its not only about "changing" SWH tho. That would be nice indeed by itself.
What it also accomplishes is that it signals that Guix cares about consent and about its community.
 
> Aaaaaand... I have to cut myself off now. :)
> 
> 
> live well,
>   vagrant

Regards,
MSavoritias