
Free Software Foundation Priority Projects - brudgers
https://www.fsf.org/campaigns/priority-projects/
======
mynegation
This is the right thing to do and I hope it is not too little too late.
Free/libre OSS won the battle for the server, lost the battle for the desktop,
but desktop is not (that) relevant anymore. FLOSS phone ecosystem will be hard
to next to impossible, in my opinion, but worth going into. Self-hosted server
side software has a very good chance of succeeding. For a long time I
essentially wanted something like Synology and QNAP but completely open, with
a single package installation interface and ecosystem of phone apps working
with my self hosted software.

~~~
idobai
> Free/libre OSS won the battle for the server, lost the battle for the
> desktop

I don't think it lost the battle on desktop - if you don't rely on platform(or
interest)-specific software like the adobe/microsoft suites and some 3A games
then you'll be more than fine on the linux desktop.

~~~
no_wizard
I take slight issue with this.

It's not you personally, but I see this a lot in tech, in particular from the
FOSS crowd 'Well, if you don't need x or y, then its fine!'

FOSS will always be second tier for most people until the plethora of software
available is at some relative parity, similar to that of macOS at least. (I'm
talking strict availability). The fact that there isn't more cohesive efforts
to have big software vendors port their software to FOSS systems I feel like
is part of the problem.

I personally feel the FOSS community doesn't have good evangelism to actual
software developers that develop non-idealistic software. Adobe is a good
example of this. So is Microsoft. So is Autodesk (With some exceptions,
granted, but I think those come from the need to run in parallel processing
environments that Linux supports quite well, and Maya). Heck, so is
Wunderlist. Or 2do. 1password. They don't make native apps or even some
semblance of apps for any FOSS platform, and I see no attempts to evangelize
coming out of FOSS communities to get these places on their side. I'm sure
there are exceptions I'm missing or perhaps some of these examples listed have
progressed but my point still stands.

FOSS is great for users, and has really evangelized well to a certain subset
of users in particular (mostly the tech literate enthusiasts and developer
crowd, myself included). I however, will never accept this is a good answer.
We should be demanding better evangelism to get big name products on the
platforms. I do the best I can myself in this regard, but I feel that the
entire idea that we should be more inclusive of these
vendors/companies/developers is scoffed at in the FOSS/OSS communities and I
do not inherently understand why. Yes, they create code that isn't meeting the
guidelines of FOSS/OSS, but if you don't create the best toolsets independent
of them or have some semblance of balance, then the platform will stagnant at
x number of users.

I think idealism colors perspectives but reality is much more grey than either
side is willing to cede, perhaps.

~~~
mikekchar
It's an interesting point of view, but I'm not sure I agree with the
underlying argument. Specifically, I have not seen the free software
environment stagnating at all. If anything I have seen it accelerating fairly
consistently since I first became aware of it in 1985. There was a time when I
was _forbidden_ from using free software in my day job. Now I am _encouraged_
to use it. How far we have come.

This point of idealism comes up a lot and I think it's something of a red
herring. Keep in mind that the FSF's goal is singular - to promote software
freedom. It is not idealism to hold to that mission. It is their only purpose
for existence.

Let me give you a real world example of why a mixed scenario is not realistic.
My wife has an Android phone that she bought from the phone company. It is on
version 5.02. There is a bug in that version of Android where a log file fills
up and the phone refuses to connect to WIFI connections that have had a lot of
activity. This bug has been fixed for a _long_ time in the Android code base.
The code base is open source. I can inspect it, compile it, etc, etc. I can
see the bug. I can see the fix. But I can't load the fix on the phone because
the phone is locked. I can't even get root on the phone. I can't fix the
problem. The vendor has told me that since the phone is 2 years old (2 years!)
that no updates will be forthcoming and I should buy a new phone.

The problem is that no matter how free a piece of software is, it is really
only as free as the environment in which it runs. We have seen over and over
again, that companies will collude to ensure that their interests trump that
of the user. A world in which free software exists only as an extension of
non-free software is a world in which it is marginalised to the point where
software freedom is lost entirely.

It is not idealism that prevents software freedom from working well in
organisations that do not want software freedom.

Where I agree with you is that we have a _long_ way to go to allow users to
connect the dots between the problems they have as consumers and the
protection that software freedom affords. My own wife thinks it is completely
reasonable to spend $1000 replacing a perfectly good phone simply because the
vendor wishes it. Somewhat unusually, this is a consumer movement held dear by
developers, but virtually unknown to the consumers it seeks to protect. This
is clearly a problem. However, we won't fix that problem by abandoning the
purpose of the movement. Will my next phone be an open source phone that
denies me software freedom, or a proprietary phone that denies me software
freedom? Does it matter?

~~~
int_19h
By and large, the industry is embracing open source (BSD, MIT, Apache
licenses), but not FSF-style free software (GPL).

~~~
pjmlp
Because it allows them to outsource development, cutting costs in software
licenses, without contributing anything back to those communities.

I am yet to work with any employer, besides the time spent at CERN, that
bothered to contribute anything back to the community.

Many times the idea of even suggesting it was frowned upon.

------
orblivion
While doing all of this catch-up is important, I think it would help FOSS
politically (as it were) if there were something new and exemplary to come
out. Signal is a good example (once they fix the Google thing, and BTW someone
finally took up Moxie on the offer and there's a PR in progress). Maybe
Sandstorm too (Plug and play web apps that are secure? That's kind of novel
and useful if you think about it. And IMO they're doing a bang-up job with UI)
If FOSS can shine, maybe it'll attract more help with the catch-up.

~~~
moxious
FOSS often plays catch-up, because true innovation is really hard and takes a
lot of time and resources. It's frequently too much to ask of an all-volunteer
workforce. It's not that they can't do it (ultimately the people writing FOSS
are the same people as those writing apps for companies) it's just that there
isn't the same set of motives in place.

This is why in earlier days, GNOME's goal was to catch up to Windows, and why
a phone operating system (a pretty standard thing that everyone has) is now a
target.

~~~
orblivion
It's an economic uphill battle to be sure. I hope people keep brainstorming
alternative business models.

------
ramblenode
I think the FSF is spot on with most of these priorities. The free phone and
decentralized web, in particular, are areas for massive improvement and will
be necessary for a FOSSful world. Getting governments to adopt free software
is also a great priority, as they write the laws that govern the software
ecosystem and could be a huge source of revenue for free software projects.

------
slitaz
These are too many to be priority projects. Does the FSF have the resources to
actually be involved in the development of these projects?

~~~
II2II
The page suggests that they are priorities, not that the FSF is supporting the
development of these projects.

Given the diverse skill set and interests of free software developers, it's
probably better to have a long list of priorities as long as there is little
overlap. It would be difficult to attract individuals and businesses into
supporting projects that they are not interested in or don't have the skills
to contribute to.

------
epse
Unrelated, but they should really reform their site. If a phone OS is a goal,
a mobile friendly site should be a first.

~~~
rando832
They are actively working on that. Their other sites are much better, see
gnu.org and defectivebydesign.org.

------
openplatypus
So it is good time to mention

[https://fsfe.org/join](https://fsfe.org/join)

Or

[https://my.fsf.org/join](https://my.fsf.org/join)

------
mark_l_watson
I stopped being a regular member last year, but love their work. After reading
the priority projects list, I just made a small one-time donation.

The first project seems most important, a free and open cellphone operating
system. This seems like a huge challenge, given that phone hardware has
proprietary firmware. I look forward to seeing what comes of this.

------
phantom_oracle
I'm actually happy that the FSF has considered this one:

\- Free phone operating system

They don't have the for-profit nature of both Mozilla and Canonical and
perhaps supporting the FSF over either of those 2 (Mozillas failed FFOS and no
availability of the UbuntuOS mobile devices) will ensure a stable OS that
isn't Google-ware.

PS. I know Mozilla isn't for-profit, but they abandoned FFOS just like a for-
profit would

~~~
icebraining
The only organizations that don't abandon projects are the ones that never
took them on to begin with (or the ones designed around a specific project).
It's not a for-profit vs non-profit distinction.

In this case, unfortunately, being in the high priority list of the FSF
doesn't mean much. It's a list of stuff they'd _like_ to see being developed,
not actually a list of projects being actively supported with funding or
developers' time.

------
tmsldd
if FSF wants a intelligent assistant it will have to collect usage data, no? a
little against the whole principle... but if the data are open, that would be
kind of cool ;)

~~~
carussell
An AI-driven assistant doesn't have to necessarily run on someone else's
servers and be under their control to be useful. In fact, if I teach my
assistant patterns like how when I say "David" I mean David O, then I don't
see a) why this type of learning can't be fully localized, or b) how phoning
home with this kind of data is going to be of any particular use to anybody
else, anyway.

To put it another way, what's wrong with letting my Siri and your Siri just be
two different "people" instead of feeding back into a single, networked
hivemind?

~~~
icebraining
I'm not involved in AI projects, but my understanding is that current state-
of-the-art work, including in digital assistance components like speech
recognition, the approach involves gathering large amounts of data and
throwing it into deep learning algorithms. This is why Google had free
services like Voice, which served as sources for their modelling data.

~~~
flukus
IMO this is a bunch of BS by companies that want to control and centralize
computing.

Years ago we had products like Dragon naturally speaking that could do full
voice dictation reasonably accurately. They had limited digital assistants too
(which is a subset of full dictation, much less valid inputs), though not much
more limited than today. These ran on Pentium 1's.

The downside to this was the training time, but in practice I found this to be
a strength. It was trained to my voice, not whatever generic profile Google
stocks me into. I got better results nearly two decades ago (got a Dragon demo
in a carnival bag) than I get with Google voice today.

------
TheAdamAndChe
> Encourage contribution by people underrepresented in the community

Why is this necessary? There's no force keeping people from contributing, they
are just choosing not to.

edit: To those downvoting me, can you please explain to me what is wrong with
what I said?

~~~
otalp
Not necessarily minorities in the US(in fact a lot of US minorities are
overrepresented in tech), but if you could make say, a few Spanish speaking
people in poorer parts of Brazil contribute, they could spread whatever
knowledge they gained with their broader community and encourage more people
to participate who might have otherwise viewed these things as stuff "genius
hackers with degrees" do.

That would be my reasoning. We need to get people who would never see
themselves as being able to develop software because they never went to
university or don't have the 'brains' to get into it. There's a lot of wasted
brainpower because of the false impression that coding is something for an
elite few.

~~~
soneca
_" a few Spanish speaking people in poorer parts of Brazil"_

Am I missing something here or you really think we speak spanish in Brazil????

~~~
sangnoir
To be fair - Spanish speakers _would_ be a minority in Brazil ;-)

------
QuadrupleA
The site crashed :|

~~~
tyingq
Maybe fast, but lightweight and scalable web server is on the list?

(joking a bit, but there isn't a notable GPL licensed web server, is there?)

~~~
hub_
Why would that be on the list? Isn't there already a solution? It doesn't need
to be GPL licensed for getting FSF recognition - a non copyleft but Libre
license is fine.

------
vpol
I think there is too much politics behind fsf. Instead of battling for users
they are battling for licenses.

~~~
icebraining
The FSF is a political organization; saying it has too much politics behind it
is an oxymoron. And choosing to go after users over licenses is also a
political decision.

Besides, we already have Open Source as a movement that makes the pragmatic
argument for free software, there's no need to water down the FSF.

~~~
Nomentatus
Then let's rephrase to meet that cavil - there's far too much irrelevant,
futile and stupendously wasteful politics, then. The (yes, political) goal of
free software is wonderful. Copyleft is a great invention. But the continued
insistence on grabbing patents or even obviating patent law in its entire from
within a software license - and also the mission to prevent tivoization (which
I might want to protect my OS from an inside job or proximate attack, thank
you) - has wasted billions of dollars (Google recreating GNU under a more
liberal license), fragmented the movement, and tainted the brand, too.

~~~
belorn
Clearly you share the goal but not the politics in how to reach it. That
happens in practically every political movement. Let imagine a similar comment
for ecopolitics:

"The goal of ecopolitics is wonderful. Green energy is a great invention. But
the continued insistence on reduced emissions or even a stop to burning fossil
fuels in its entire - and also the mission to prevent non-ecological farming
(which make food I might want to eat, thank you) - has wasted billions of
dollars and fragmented the movement. To conclude, all discussions about
climate change should stop and the movement should simply focus on building
electric cars and wind farms."

~~~
Nomentatus
So, here you are "strenuously agreeing" with me that the original statement
was false. We both think that "saying it has too much politics behind it is an
oxymoron" is false. You and I agree that one can think that the ice cream cone
might have one too many toppings, and to utter such a statement ain't
oxymoronic - debatable, but not in any way contradictory. In fact, you think
"too much politics" is a common cry. Yes, it is a common kind of debate, but
not therefore trivial - since one might end up with a lot of ice cream on
one's shirt if the pile of toppings is too high. I think that's already
happened.

The more people try to bundle what are in fact quite distinct aims into one
movement, the greater chance of failure. Not to mention the greater chance of
including an aim which is harmful, not helpful. So I'll stand by my thought
that adding in the defeating-the-patent-system-or-bust goal was maybe a tad
much.

Nobody doubts that politics are complex and divisions common therein; but
surely it's also obvious that politic movements can vary in complexity (number
of toppings,) too.

One can't always follow Lincoln's first law of strategy: "One war at a time",
but it's an excellent rule of thumb, for politics as well as war, and I think
it's pretty clear to most of us now that the EFF has wandered much too far
from it, with (economically) catastrophic results - namely all those wasted
billions, not to mention the limited supply of developer work-years thrown
away on mere rewrites. Not every political movement overreaches anything like
this badly.

That there are other arguments with a similar structure to mine does not
distress me. That other, false axioms plugged into the same structure might
produce a false result doesn't - and of course shouldn't - dismay me either.
(Which is not to take one side in the example argument you cite. Not here,
anyway.)

