Take in care this is a "personal" web site and my goal writing is to learn the language. Of course, in another context, it would be pretentious to afford these subjects with my poor English.
by Walter Alejandro Iglesias
Surely a lot of people have experienced something similar (or analogous) to what happened to The Guru Of Hobbyists with that printer at the AI Lab. Some of them skilled in software matters. But they did not start to develop free software, they did not create FSF, they did not create GPL.
Because they had not the "freedom" to do that? No. They had not the will to power (would say a friend of mine) he had.
In fact, it was the 'lack' of freedom what bust him to do what he did. But this lack of freedom seems not produce the same effect in most people. That is THE ISSUE.
Think about this. Some may argue that power is conquered by the arms. But, what kind of arms, slingshots? Why European could throw native people from America or enslave Africans? Have you seen an elephant mounted on an Indian? Brute force is not enough. United States won the top thanks to the atomic bomb, but first thanks to the theory of relativity. Power is first knowledge.
And how to get knowledge? Talent, intelligence, creativity are the sources. However, nothing have to do all that together without initiative, the 'will to'. Knowledge is first 'will to power'.
Now we get the point: to share knowledge is to lose power.
The only way the concept freedom gains significance is like a 'consequence' of how power is distributed. But a group is conformed by individuals and nor 'freedom' neither 'distribution of power' give individuals the 'will to'.
A GPL's paragraph says:
To protect your rights, we need to prevent others from denying you these rights or asking you to surrender the rights. Therefore, you have certain responsibilities if you distribute copies of the software, or if you modify it: responsibilities to respect the freedom of others.
In Ideal World each individual would have the will to defend its own rights and would be aware of [most of the time] to respect others rights is common benefit. This world would not need laws; just moral.
But in Real World, you are tempted to bite the apple ;). Most of the time you deny your rights yourself by clicking the ACCEPT button.
Why do you surrender your rights? Will to Power. You want to have that professional, wonderful tool before your competitors. You've clicked the accept button, you have the atomic bomb... But you surrender more than your rights, you surrender all. Because the atomic bomb is not really yours, its real owner is who knows how to assembly it. Now, your power depends on him, you are his slave. Nothing have to do the 'will to power' without talent, intelligence, creativity. Knowledge is 'will to power + talent + intelligence + creativity'. And knowledge is power.
So why Mr. Guru repeat to the infinite that the goal of GPL is "to win freedom for software users"? Freedom for what?
You may think: "Yeah, the good gay of the film. That fight against pro slavery Egyptians, roman lions, Nazis, Dark Vaders, Lex Luthors in the Defense of Freedom."
Or: "Freedom is a gift (a promise land), therefore who gives freedom to the masses has power. To win freedom for users is just using the masses to overthrow the tyrant".
At this point of human history we all know (be sure Mr. Guru too) that the real tyrant is the inertia of the masses idiocy: the same force that today overthrow the supposed tyrant, yesterday put it at the top.
What GNU project has achieved is a new software development strategy. A development strategy that attempts to avoid knowledge then power get monopolized. Note that we are still talking about 'knowledge' and 'power', not 'freedom'.
Taking in care that for most final users plain text is an abomination (even in an email) we know that the target of closing the code are software industry competitors, not the final users. GPL benefit to small companies and standalone developers which are the directly affected. Final users derive benefit of it, but just indirectly.
Above I said that the principal sources of knowledge are talent, intelligence, creativity, stimulated by the 'will to power' (slightly modified Mr. Guru's playful and inoffensive hacker definition). At a first sight you may think these sources are free in the free beer sense. But they need the appropriate environment.
In today's globalized, overpopulated world where resource management has become a very complex task, politics seem too restrictive in all cases. Today all is fast produced, fast consumed. And this tendency grows exponentially by obvious reasons. The Glob is parceled in farms of semi exhausted land. There is not place, there is not time.
Knowledge has a big advantage respect resources like food; it can grow in virtual land. That's why it is necessary to avoid its sources get strangulated in a few big company's infrastructures. It seems the only way to avoid knowledge exhaustion is by breaking the inertia of the Real Tyrant with the ancient demagogue's argument: liberté, égalité, fraternité. Free Internet, free software.
Rational people will evaluate the relevance of my thinking.