Richard Stallman: Linux's Brave GNU World

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October 09, 1998 (4:58 PM EDT)

By John Borland,

Richard Stallman is one of the pioneers of the free, open source software movement. He helped found the GNU free-software project in 1984, and leads the associated Free Software Foundation. He wrote the projects' Emacs software, a C programming language compiler, and other packages that are widely used in the high-tech community.

Free software activist Richard Stallman is afraid Linux's success will eclipse the rest of the movement. runs 6:23 (requires RealAudio player)

But with the growing popularity of the Linux operating system, he's now worried about GNU being "written out of history." The system popularly known as Linux is filled with GNU code, he says. The Linux kernel, written by Linus Torvalds, is only a tiny, if critical, part of the system as a whole. He's on a crusade to keep GNU in the name of the system.

Stallman is pleased the Linux system is gaining so much currency in the corporate world. But he says this is only a small victory for the free-software movement. He worries that growing interest from big companies like Intel, Netscape, Oracle, and even Microsoft could undermine the movement's original goals.

TechWeb Internet talked to Stallman about Linux's recent successes and the future of free software.

Intel and Netscape have invested in Red Hat, which is the leading commercial distributor of the Linux operating system. What does that mean for Linux and open source?

Well, it's actually not true. Linux isn't an operating system. They're a distributor of a version of the GNU operating system, which uses Linux as a kernel.

Red Hat's been doing a pretty good thing with that. They're not sticking entirely to the principles of free software, but they're getting closer and closer. For example, Red Hat's contributing to the GNU project by hiring people to write on the GNU desktop, Gnome, which is a very useful contribution.

Is the interest of Intel and Netscape and the other large companies a good thing for the free-software movement?

I don't know. I worry that it may not be. The reason is, I've been very happy to see the decisions that Red Hat has been making. So, with Red Hat making better and better decisions on its own, I'm afraid there's nowhere to go but down.

It may well be that Red Hat will continue on that same course of moving more and more into line with all free software everywhere, but I have to worry that if other people start having an influence on their decisions, maybe it won't happen.

This investment from Intel will give Red Hat access to the same pre-announcement Intel hardware information that other operating systems get. But this information won't necessarily get to other Linux or other free-software developers until the announcement. Is that a concern to you at all?

Well, it's a concern if it leads to there being some important piece of non-free software use.

What would they do with that information? You might modify some pieces of GNU software, like the GNU C compiler or the C library, or you might modify some parts of Linux. But if you release them, you have to release them as free software.

But Linus Torvalds made a decision that I think was a mistake, to permit people to load non-free drivers into Linux.
-- Richard Stallman

So maybe they'll be able to release the day after the hardware is announced, which is only a good thing as far as I can see.

But Linus Torvalds made a decision that I think was a mistake, to permit people to load non-free drivers into Linux. So if they were to use that to make non-free drivers for this hardware, that would be very bad. It would be pushing the users toward non-free software. In that case the advantage would come from not participating in the free-software community.

I don't know what Red Hat's actually going to do. I just hope they will make decisions to go the free-software way.

Companies like Intel, Netscape, Oracle, the other big database companies are increasingly moving toward working with or writing their applications for the Linux-kernel operating system.

If you'd call it the GNU-Linux operating system, then you'd be giving people a correct understanding. If I talk about the kernel, I call it Linux. I respect the name the author gave it. But I think that with the system, one should respect the name that the system's main author gave it, and that's GNU.

Anyway, when non-free software is released on a GNU system, its a sort of mixture of good and bad. Is it a good thing for people to use that? Well, it depends on what else they would be doing.

If somebody was going to use a proprietary-application program on Windows, and they use it on GNU-Linux instead, that's better. But it's not the best. It's not the thing we should be aiming for or hoping to achieve someday. What we should be aiming for is for them to be using a free database or a free application, on a free operating system.

Having a free operating system is the first step, but ultimately all software should be free, because users should always have freedom. A non-free program means there's an owner taking away your freedom.

There are people who, when some important software company announces they've released a version of a proprietary application that runs on GNU-Linux ... say, "Look, we're getting popular." But they're thinking only about the operating system, and I'm thinking about free software more generally. It's not a triumph for free software that people can run a proprietary application in more ways.

We must beware of thinking something very simple about those events.

Is it critical that free software be adopted by the mainstream corporate world.

I don't think so. I would like all software that everyone uses to be free. But I wouldn't say that what is done by corporations is more important than what's done by individuals. Corporations just aren't more important than individuals. In no area of life should we be treating corporations as things that really matter. And that includes this.