In a wide-ranging interview, the founder of the Free Software Movement discusses GNU, Linux, the open-source split, large language models, SaaSS, digital surveillance, and why software freedom remains a moral issue.
Posts tagged as “rms”
With Richard Stallman back on the road and FSF backing 46 community-focused LibreLocal meetups worldwide, the free software movement looks anything but finished.
Nearly seven years after Richard Stallman left MIT under pressure and resigned the presidency of the Free Software Foundation he founded, he’s back on a U.S. campus giving a talk that is pure RMS -- and fundraising for FSF in the process.
While RMS has continued to speak at occasional events, he's largely remained publicly invisible until now. Is this about to change?
The auction was part of the Free Software Foundation's way of celebrating its 40th Anniversary. Coming up in May will be LibreLocal community meetups around the globe, and later perhaps, another memorabilia auction.
Also included in this week's FOSS Week in Review: Gnome's new due date, readers say Red Hat's changed for the worse under IBM, and a new poll asks how you like your distros released.
Although Richard Stallman seemed to be absent from this year's LibrePlanet event, the Free Software Foundation has announced he will be livestreaming his "The State of the Free Software Movement" talk on April 13th at 2 p.m. Eastern Time.
Most FOSS leaders came into prominence during the 1980s and 90s and are now approaching, or have passed, the age when most people retire. Are free software organizations ready for the change that appears to be just around the corner?
Although the consensus seems to be that it was time for the founder of the GNU project and the Free Software movement to step down, we shouldn't forget his many contributions aimed at keeping tech free.

Here’s a blast from the past. A tale about RMS from back in the days when Roblimo was young — younger than he is now at least — and Stallman was…well, Stallman.
Roblimo’s Hideaway
This is a true story about something that happened at a Department of Commerce treaty hearing in Washington D.C., the kind of event that gets (nearly) zero press even though it’s important. In fact, I was the only reporter there, covering it for Linux.com because some of the proposed treaty language had to do with software patents and licensing — and also because two people I knew were testifying, namely Jamie Love and Richard M. Stallman.
Robin “Roblimo” Miller is a freelance writer and former editor-in-chief at Open Source Technology Group, the company that owned SourceForge, freshmeat, Linux.com, NewsForge, ThinkGeek and Slashdot, and until recently served as a video editor at Slashdot. Now he’s mostly retired, but still works part-time as an editorial consultant for Grid Dynamics, and (obviously) writes for FOSS Force.








