What is free software? by Richard Stallman

[MIG29pilot]

Jabberwocky, StuartC isn't a moderator.


Just goes to show what sort of "arguments" you might have when you don't even know peoples' names.

@Omega, yes I am telling you that is not racist; racist is disliking or consider to be inferior a person because of their race, colour, or nationality. I couldn't care less if He was Chinese or South African.

Also, you two aren't even arguing, you're just begging the question, and saying the same things over and over and over again and again and again.

Also, I heard mention about people getting banned because of knowing you two. Even now, Lyidiot is questioning publically to Mods' decision, and he hasn't been banned. Legoboy is clearly on your side, and he is treated as "just like normal"

Also, all this talk of "political silencing" and "dictatorships". This is really absurd. One looks for these things in national governments, and intrigues concerning lives and money and real power, not in a weekend hobby! I mean, that's like someone vowing eternal vengeance against a man who doesn't agree on how to sweep the floor, because you think he may spread his ideas throughout the nation (without the broom of course), or murdering a man in order to establish complete and totalitarian control over the bathroom.

(Laugh all you like, it's true)

[jwocky]

Well, this is a free forum ... you weren't banned. I was banned over there for speaking my mind ... so is this over there a free forum?
And yes, if the same things are true and people like you are in denial, it is sometimes necessary to repeat them over and over.
And yes, Curt banned to defend his decision. That is the behaviour of a dictator, so I call him what he is. Thorsten and his cronies rejected planes to FGADDON without reasoning just because the persons working on them weren't in their own little circle. That is dictatorial behaviour. So I call it that. I am aware, every follower of every dictator in history has rejected such labeling as "absurd". So you are in really bad company there, Mig29pilot.

[MIG29pilot]

Did you actually consider what I wrote?

And for the umpteenth time, you weren't banned for speaking your mind, you were banned for telling the entire world with a loud voice your mind and telling everyone elses' minds to go to ****.

No, curt banned because that was his decision.

That isn't the behaviour of a dictator, that's the behaviour of someone trying to do his job and keep the peace and keep the project going.

[jwocky]

Well, we can see, the hypocrisy in your alleged love for peace, so that is one point worth to note.

The second is, Curt used his powers (and so did Stuart before) to enforce political motivated silencing. And no, I didn't tell people to go to hell (you can speak such words out in this forum as long as they aren't used as personal insults, free speech, I know, a new concept for you). I reacted on some lies, Thorsten spread over and over again and corrected what he said. Critics on the masters is only considered in established dictatorships as blasphemous. In NKorea, Cuba, China, FG, ... you get the gist ... oh wait, I am sure, you don't.

[SkyBoat]

Here is the main body of the Removal Text from the FG Forum Website:

Preface

There has been a lot of confusion and FUD caused by the FGMEMBERS repository. The core FlightGear team feel that it is important to make clear statement of their position on the matter, and also provide an FAQ.

Background

FGMEMBERS resulted from a fundamental disagreement of a couple of individuals with the consensus of the core FlightGear team over an infrastructure change and split of the FGData repository. That consensus had built up over a number of years of discussion on the
mailing list.

As a results FGMEMBERS forked the FGAddon repository. FGAddon is the official aircraft repository for the FlightGear project, and the source of the aircaft that are available on the FlightGear website.

Subsequently, FGMEMBERS proponents have continually made very emotive statements and accusations regarding the core development team and the way the project is run. The core FlightGear team consider those baseless and has refuted them.

Official FlightGear Position

The core FlightGear team considers the FGMEMBERS fork to be bad for the project for a number of reasons and encourages users and aircraft developers to use the official FGAddon respository instead.

1) Historically, forks of Open Source projects are unsustainable as developers choose one or the other. Over time, the vast majority of forks die. In a small minority of cases they become prevalent and the original dies. In either case, a huge amount of effort is wasted on the fork that eventually loses. We feel that effort is better spent on improving the simulator.

2) It is inevitable that the fork will diverge, as changes are made to one repository but not the other. Attempting to keep the repositories in sync requires huge amounts of effort and is likely to fail due to incompatible changes being made to the same file.

3) The FGAddon repository is actively supported by the core development team, with processes in place to ensure the long term health of the repository, and compatibility with any changes to the FlightGear core. The core FlightGear team have been working on this project for 15 years and has a long track record of ensure the long-term health of the aircraft.

4) We are concerned that FGMEMBERS does not have robust enough controls over commit access to the repository and as a result license violations have occurred.

5) Different versions of the same aircraft existing in both FGAddon and FGMEMBERS causes confusion and adds to the burden of support from volunteers who may not have the same version. This makes tracking down bugs much more difficult.

6) We object most strongly to the way that FGMEMBERS proponents have evangelized against FGAddon and the accusations that they have made against the core team. We consider this unacceptable.

It is astonishingly vague, written in speculative language, making statements about the history of "forks of Open Source projects" regularly failing without any citation for historical proof and expressing concerns about the long term viability of FGMEMBERS. They imply that FG, in its 15 year history has been a robust and well-functioning organization (that is not true, I was given access to dozens of communications by Hooray, written by core developers over a period of at least a decade that FlightGear nearly collapsed on more than one occasion They suggest, but provide no proof that aircraft existing in both repositories might at some time in the future make bug issues a problem. They also allege without providing proof that FGMEMBERS has "evangelized against FGAddon" without explaining what the issues of harm are, and making a vague allegation of "accusations that they have made against the core team" again without providing proof.

The six rationalizations, whether looked at separately or taken as a group are so weakly written, they betray the fact the not one is the real reason JWocky and IAHM-COL were banned from their FORUM. The document is one of the best examples of "trumped-up" charges I have ever seen. I can think of only one other historical "trial" that was a bigger scam that took place about 2000 years ago

The rule of thumb, in how I analyze the rhetoric of documents like these is the more vague the arguments for indictment and sentencing are, (1) the more desperate the accusers are NOT to state explicitly what they are really accusing the individual of because it will blow back on them, and (2) the power structure of the group is centered around an alpha male who is weak and is scared of losing his power, so to appease those among his underlings who he perceives as the biggest threat, he caves to their demands to "keep the peace", which translated allows them to act as henchmen, take out the dissenters, and he has again perserved his alpha male status. The ultimate problem is, every time this kind of crisis emerges, he spends some of his alpha political capital and his underlings perceive him as a bit weaker with each encounter. In primate groups, as the primatologist Frans de Waal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frans_de_Waal has taught us, once the alpha is seen as sufficiently weak, contenders for the job will inevitably move in to challenge him and attempt to take over.

My analysis of this document suggests the next big crisis in FlightGear with be the fight for the alpha male position.

[Omega]

Also, you two aren't even arguing, you're just begging the question, and saying the same things over and over and over again and again and again.

That's exactly the point. I'm not here to fight, but instead I'm telling you to reconsider your manners.

And since you love to point out grammatical errors, I will do the exact same thing.

when you don't even know peoples' names.

people's

racist is disliking or consider to be inferior a person because of their race

Wot? Go back to studying English!
racism is disliking or considering a person to be inferior because of their race

I couldn't care less if He was Chinese or South African.

he

Lyidiot is questioning publically to Mods' decision

Lydiot is publicly questioning the mods' decision.

all this talk of "political silencing" and "dictatorships". This is really absurd.

all this talk of "political silencing" and "dictatorships" is really absurd

I mean, that's like someone vowing eternal vengeance against a man who doesn't agree on how to sweep the floor, because you think he may spread his ideas throughout the nation (without the broom of course), or murdering a man in order to establish complete and totalitarian control over the bathroom.

This is probably the most idiotic example I've ever read... and it doesn't even make any sense.

Also, you two aren't even arguing, you're just begging the question, and saying the same things over and over and over again and again and again.

Also, I heard mention about people getting banned because of knowing you two. Even now, Lyidiot is questioning publically to Mods' decision, and he hasn't been banned. Legoboy is clearly on your side, and he is treated as "just like normal"

Also, all this talk of "political silencing" and "dictatorships". This is really absurd. One looks for these things in national governments, and intrigues concerning lives and money and real power, not in a weekend hobby! I mean, that's like someone vowing eternal vengeance against a man who doesn't agree on how to sweep the floor, because you think he may spread his ideas throughout the nation (without the broom of course), or murdering a man in order to establish complete and totalitarian control over the bathroom.

Looks like I won a game of Tic-tac-toe! Is that the only transition word you know? Wow, you really need to extend your vocabulary!

So yeah, you go around criticizing people's writing whereas you TOTALLY fail when you type more than 2 paragraphs.

(Laugh all you like, it's true)

Keep it up Mr. Keyboard Warrior! I'm really enjoying this.

[IAHM-COL]

Thanks for the great points in the post above Skyboat.

Firstly, but foremost, I apologize, but I will decline this honorable company

I can think of only one other historical "trial" that was a bigger scam that took place about 2000 years ago

(that's my definition of too much )

Secondly, I don't know where Flightgear is going to as a management team, but certainly, the leadership is very wobbly. Intriguingly, in spite of "seniority", the general feeling I am left by following their newspaper --the devel list; is that the developer with the last voice heard is Torsten Dreyer (Not Thorsten -JW). But in a way, my banning was a battle to knock down a "young alpha" or so they perceived.

Keep in mind, they had blown as much fog as they could to obscure the real motivations of the whole issue. But on this side it can be definitely said it was the work of a hitman; (as in "sicario"). My head was a personal request to the cores by Edward Bugman and Thorsten (yes, read Thorten Renk here!).

So, personally, I don't feel like Flightgear developer's core are really about fighting for alfa status. I feel they are simulators. --thus they made a simulator--; and they want to simulate a system of governance. And in my particular case, they simulated a justice's trial, on which they lay accusations, privately deliberated, and executed sentence. Their simulation is void. Keep in mind, they took all the roles: Acussator, juror, judge and executioner. And I was never given any defense. They wasted their time: I was "guilty" before the simulated trials began, and JWocky was sentenced by association. The thing really simulated the killing of someone by convenience, and Curtis had to play the dishonorable joy of the hitman. That's all.

Hopefully, later, we may enjoy opportunities to dissect Thorsten motivations and rage towards me -- and thus the continuous hostility around the forums. I think, it is clear that he is severely dissapointed at the fact that I created FGMEMBERS without the core developers' consent. And it is clear that he sees FGMEMBERS as a threat to the integrity of FGADDon, in the short and long run. The whole scam is just a way to regain "officialness" of the core infrastructure, to make clear that FGMEMBERS is not endorsed (thus the manifesto), and to set a precedent, demostrate and exhert control over the Flightgear project. Reduce FGMEMBERS support and enjoyment in the official infrastructure was thus paramount, and then my convenient retirement was a must -- because as they elsewhere indicated; I was not compromising.

I wonder if my fellow FGers had been attentive of me making an statement with respect to this shameful situation. For now, all I can say is that unfortunately, --regardless of the extreme postures of MiG29 pilot-- my involvement in Flightgear is not of obedience towards a superior power. And I deem there is not immoral action by creating, maintaining and promoting FGMEMBERS (which I will for now continue). FGMEMBERS is not a fork of flightgear flightsimulator; it is a collection of aircrafts and scenery for that simulator under a mix of licenses. It is a great library for Flightgear users to enjoy freely and participate in its development as they please.

In Free Software --which is still to be established whether FG qualifies-- the developer does not design an specific way of usage. And it does not exert control on how the software is deemed to be used. It is acceptable --and thanked-- that the core developers offer FGADDon as a viable alternative to obtain the aircrafts with the latest improvements --and for development of such aircraft. It is not acceptable that expanded alternatives of aircraft development be prosecuted to the extreme and vehemence of banning an user from their infrastructure (Devel list, Forum and Wiki) for the simple fact of creating, maintaining and actively promoting alternative methods, to those of the core. At least it is not acceptable under the GPL letter, and it is not acceptable under the premises of Free Software.

Meanwhile, I just need to extend a huge thanks to Skyboat and JWocky for their support in this dark-hour. JWocky has been a very amazing friend that sacrificed his status quo for my cause, and went even further to create this independent forum for Flightgear Users and Developers to be able to interact; even in the current situation in Curtis' Forum. Skyboat stood by me, and rejected their dishonorable actions, regardless of his long time association with many of those in the 'core'.

Best,
IH-COL

[IAHM-COL]

That's exactly the point.

(yes we permit more smilies)

You are very on Spot Omega
Great points, and great sense of humor to bring the illogical postures in MiG29Pilot

I am sure we can covert all that energy of MiG29 in creative energy -- If he dares to stand the heat.

[jwocky]

I know, I shouldn't, but I had so to laugh when I read Omega's post. So I guess, Mig29pilot has used up all the pity I was able to muster in his case ...

[legoboyvdlp]

Hahahahahaha, all of ya get out of the bathroom quick or I'l murder you! This is MY bathroom!