RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee (was: Remove RMS...)

RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee (was: Remove RMS...)

[Giacomo Tesio]

Hi David, thanks for sharing!

On Wed, 31 Mar 2021 14:27:29 -0400 David Edelsohn via Gcc wrote:

> In 2012 RMS was added to the GCC Steering Committee web page
> based on his role in the GNU Project [...]
> we are removing him from the page.

I have to admit that I had never carefully observed the list of members
of the GCC steering committee. As I explained before in this thread,
the presence of Stallman gave me enough reassurance that GCC would have
honoured the values of Free Software.

As I said, enough to chose to port GCC to Jehanne instead of another
C compiler, in the hope to contribute back the port upstream, to GNU.


But now that I'm comparing the old web page [1] and the new one [2],
I realized something entirely new to me.


10 out of 13 members of the GCC steering committee work either for
American corporations (8), their subsidiaries (1) or an American 
University (1) recently covered by the press in India [3].
Also, 4 of these work for the same corporation (IBM / Red Hat).

The other 3 are from German GmbH (2) or from a Nederlands public agency.


To me, and to billions of people, this shows a huge cultural bias.

Even ignoring the huge, unfair and invisible influence that such
American companies could have on the project development, even ignoring
that so many members are subject to the same Law (a Law that includes
the US Cloud Act, FISA, PPD 128, E.O. 12333, etc) decades after the 
Thompson's lecture on trust in compilers development [4], the sole fact
that a single culture and economy can influence so heavily GCC
development through its leaders decisions should be fixed.

GCC is an international project.

I didn't saw this before because I trusted RMS to defend Free Software
values at any cost, but now I do not even need to recall my previous
adventures with Google and Software Freedom Conservancy to see a huge
risk not only to contribute to GCC development, but to rely on GCC.

Just like the Galactic President in The Hitchhiker's Guide, our trust
in RMS was distracting all of us from the very real and very dangerous
geopolitical-diversity issue in GCC leadership.


I'm afraid that if you wanted to attract more developers by cutting
GCC's ties with Stallman, you just proved that he was not even enough.


The GCC Steering Committee doesn't look more inclusive, without RMS.
On the contrary,  it reveals itself as very "exclusive" to the world.


Please, fix it.


Giacomo

[1]
http://web.archive.org/web/20210330171044/https://gcc.gnu.org/steering.html

[2]
http://web.archive.org/web/20210331192841/https://gcc.gnu.org/steering.html

[3]
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/us/twitter-faceoff-rutgers-university-backs-controversial-historian-audrey-truschke-netizens-react/articleshow/81412939.cms

[4]
https://users.ece.cmu.edu/~ganger/712.fall02/papers/p761-thompson.pdf

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee (was: Remove RMS...)

[Jeff Law]

On 3/31/2021 5:11 PM, Giacomo Tesio wrote:

> 10 out of 13 members of the GCC steering committee work either for
> American corporations (8), their subsidiaries (1) or an American
> University (1) recently covered by the press in India [3].
> Also, 4 of these work for the same corporation (IBM / Red Hat).

Actually, it's just 3 working for IBM/Red Hat.  My affiliation changed 
earlier this month.  I've updated the page appropriately.


>
> The other 3 are from German GmbH (2) or from a Nederlands public agency.
>
>
> To me, and to billions of people, this shows a huge cultural bias.

It's more historical than anything.  The majority of members on the 
committee were there since its inception back in the late 90s.  We are 
looking at how to increase diversity on the committee, but that's a 
separate and distinct issue from removal of RMS.


Jeff

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee (was: Remove RMS...)

[Giacomo Tesio]

Hi Jeff,

thanks for fixing your affiliation, but let me note that it doesn't
change a dime for the geopolitical-diversity issue that affects GCC
since before RMS joined the Steering Committee.


On Wed, 31 Mar 2021 17:35:36 -0600 Jeff Law wrote:

> > To me, and to billions of people, this shows a huge cultural bias.  
> 
> It's more historical than anything.

Power is always justified through history and it always affects history.


> We are looking at how to increase diversity on the committee, but
> that's a separate and distinct issue from removal of RMS.

Oh well, sure, but luckily the solution is just as fast and easy as
it was to remove RMS: pick just one person for each nationality and
remove the others.

While the GCC Steering Committee won't still be representative of all
nationalities that contributed and will contribute to GCC, you
instantly reduce the huge imbalance in the representation of the
USA interests.

I'm sure you can see how this is way more urgent than removing RMS,
since, according to the other members of the SC, he was pretty inactive
and ineffective anyway.


Once you have removed the exceeding member from the page (and the SC,
obviously) you will be able to identify new member from others
countries.

But please, HURRY UP!


RMS was just a potential treat to GCC image, but these power imbalances
on such a fundamental piece of sofware pose (and posed) a way more
severe issue and on a global scale!

People all over the world, whatever their country, should be sure to be
treated fairly and equally by the GCC leaders even if they want to
contribute something that does not match the culture or interests you
represent.


Giacomo

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Thomas Rodgers]

On 2021-03-31 17:04, Giacomo Tesio wrote:

> Hi Jeff,
> 
> thanks for fixing your affiliation, but let me note that it doesn't
> change a dime for the geopolitical-diversity issue that affects GCC
> since before RMS joined the Steering Committee.
> 

Not to argue counter to the observation that there is clear bias in 
terms of large US and
EU corporations, but I wonder how that lines up with the affiliations of 
the major
contributors over the recent past to GCC. Quickly eyeballing the output 
of -

   'git shortlog -s -n --all releases/gcc-9.1.0...master'

Seems to show a similar bias in participation. I don't think that's some 
intentional subversive plot hatched over a decade by bigcorp.com and 
bigcorp.de to undermine GNU. It reflects the economics of whose willing 
and able to commit to that work as a full time undertaking.

The idea of making the SC more diverse over time, as well as what needs 
to be done to improve the diversity of the community of active 
contributors are important. I'm just not sure how it 'moves the needle' 
on the bias toward a bigcorp.com and bigcorp.de affiliated contributors 
who are paid to work on GCC full time and the SC necessarily has to 
represent that constituency of contributors as well.

there to keep the faithful from wander astray.

> On Wed, 31 Mar 2021 17:35:36 -0600 Jeff Law wrote:
> 
> To me, and to billions of people, this shows a huge cultural bias.
> It's more historical than anything.

Power is always justified through history and it always affects history.

> We are looking at how to increase diversity on the committee, but
> that's a separate and distinct issue from removal of RMS.

Oh well, sure, but luckily the solution is just as fast and easy as
it was to remove RMS: pick just one person for each nationality and
remove the others.

While the GCC Steering Committee won't still be representative of all
nationalities that contributed and will contribute to GCC, you
instantly reduce the huge imbalance in the representation of the
USA interests.

I'm sure you can see how this is way more urgent than removing RMS,
since, according to the other members of the SC, he was pretty inactive
and ineffective anyway.

Once you have removed the exceeding member from the page (and the SC,
obviously) you will be able to identify new member from others
countries.

But please, HURRY UP!

RMS was just a potential treat to GCC image, but these power imbalances
on such a fundamental piece of sofware pose (and posed) a way more
severe issue and on a global scale!

People all over the world, whatever their country, should be sure to be
treated fairly and equally by the GCC leaders even if they want to
contribute something that does not match the culture or interests you
represent.

Giacomo

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Giacomo Tesio]

Hello Thomas, Jonathan, David, Nathan Jean and... everybody. :-)


I'm sorry for this long mail that rivals with the original Nathan's
request, but I wanted to back my request properly.
 

On Wed, 31 Mar 2021 18:25:23 -0700 Thomas Rodgers wrote:

> Not to argue counter to the observation that there is clear bias in 
> terms of large US and EU corporations

Well, to be precise, it's 9 members from US corporations and 2 from
German corporations. I mean: the bias is not even balanced between US
and EU! Not even remotely!

And obviously it totally excludes thousands of different interests.
China, Russia, Brazil, Switzerland, Cuba, Iraq, Palestine...
I guess you do not need me to continue.  ;-)


> Quickly eyeballing the output of -
> 
>    'git shortlog -s -n --all releases/gcc-9.1.0...master'
> 
> Seems to show a similar bias in participation.

As I said before, history is always used to justify Power and
(obviously) Power affects history.

Thanks for proving my point by referring to `git shortlog`! :-D


> It reflects the economics of whose willing and able to commit to
> that work as a full time undertaking.

This is another very interesting argument, Thomas.

Just like the Jeff's one "it's more historical than anything", it looks
quite neutral on the surface, even obvious as an argument, until you
look at it "cum grano salis".

Why most contributions to GCC come from employees of large corporations
from the greatest military power since the fall of the Berlin Wall?
I know: a very good question that cannot be answered here.
But for sure, it's not just a matter of fair merits[1]!


Yet, the fact you look at the economics to explain power (instead of the
other way around) proves my other point.
You are just showing (in absolute good faith!) how your US-priviledge
blinds you from itself and its dogmatic roots that Weber called "the
Spirit of Capitalism" [2].

It's not your fault, but it more than a danger to the rest of the world.
It's sistematic discrimination based on power (that's is expressed and
enforced through wealth and giustified through "economics" and
clearly captured by `git log`s).




But from outside your "cultural bubble", we all see that a bunch of
highly controversial [3][4] US corporations (with long term ties with
the USA DoD [5]) are kicking out of the GCC Steering Committee their
only connection with both the FSF and the GNU project.

A member of FSF and GNU that was representing the only non-profit in
the Steering Committee credibly dedicated to preserve Free Software[6].


You just need to read what David wrote:

On Wed, 31 Mar 2021 08:59:41 -0400 David Edelsohn via Gcc wrote:

> GCC SC whose major purpose is to be a buffer between the GCC
> Community and the Free Software Foundation.

On Wed, 31 Mar 2021 11:23:09 -0400 David Edelsohn via Gcc wrote:

> members of the GCC SC have worked diligently behind the scenes to
> ensure that GCC and GNU Toolchain development can proceed as smoothly
> and unhindered as possible.  We have prevented or resolved many
> conflicts and issues without disturbing the broader community and
> allow the community to focus on its important tasks and great
> progress for the toolchain itself.
> [...]
> It's like a good manager: regardless of the openness, hopefully the
> GCC community feels that the GCC SC "has their back", manages the
> politics, and removes real or potential roadblocks so that the
> software engineer can focus on being productive.

it is quite evident that the interest represented by the members of the
Steering Committee while "managing the politics" will align with that
of their employers (and with their own values and culture).

Please, do not offend our intelligence by pretending otherwise.



On Thu, 1 Apr 2021 10:23:03 +0100 Jonathan Wakely wrote:

> But if you think simply being American causes the same (or "more
> severe") image problem, maybe you missed the point of Nathan's
> original email.

Quite the opposite: I've totally seen the point from the very
beginning[7]: a Facebook employee from the US asked to the US
corporate-members of GCC Steering Committee to remove Stallman 
(and FSF and GNU with him) from the Steering Committee.
And the Steering Committee, did it [8].



Also, note that I focused on your culture just because you accepted
the Nathan's request to remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
because of his "are extremely offensive repugnant opinions"[0].
You did the removal NOW, not years before or years later.
And you know how this particular timing will be interpreted.



But I do NOT ignore the geopolitical hazard of a GCC Steering Committee
whose members are mostly under US legislation while GCC is used to
compile fundamental software all over the world!

Let's not pretend that we didn't read Thompson reflections on trusting
trust or, if you need a more recent example, we haven't read about
Solar Wind supply chain attack or about the backdoor introduced
in PHP [13]!



Nor I do ignore the ECONOMICAL hazard to rely on US corporations to "do
no evil": the world is seeing this VERY well with the Covid vaccines[9].
 


So please, if you really want to attract contributors from all over the
world, fix these geopolitical hazards NOW. Today, literally.



As I said, it's just as easy as it was to remove Stallman.
By removing him (and FSF and GNU, with him) NOW, and on Nathan's
request, you joined a mob based on hearsay[10] and on incidents
that REALLY look like hatred kids squabbles, where nobody can
really decide who was right and who was wrong [11].


So if you promptly removed Stallman on these weak foundations, you
should now fix IN THE SAME WAY this huge hazard that severely demage
(and demaged for decades) not just a US-priviledged minority, but the
vast majority of peoples around the world using or contributing to GCC.


If you will not, if you will "drop the ball on this" as you did
before on different stuffs [12], it will become evident how it is
NOT SAFE for peoples outside the US to use, rely or contribute to GCC.



I'm pretty serious on this.

Maybe I'm not the kind of "new talent" you (and Nathan, or your
employeers) aim to attract to GCC development, but for sure I feel
betrayed by your decision to cancel your ties with FSF and GNU.
All of my efforts to port GCC look now to me as effect of a
naive and misguided trust in GCC name: GNU Compiler Collection.

I wanted to contribute to a fair and global Free Software, not to a
bunch of dangerous US corporation or to yet another global threat to
the world's freedom and autonomy [13].



Please, fix the GCC Steering Committee. Today.

OR, let GNU and FSF to step in, and fix it fairly, for everybody.


Thanks!


Giacomo


[0] https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-March/235091.html

[1] You might like "The Rise of the Meritocracy", Michael Dunlop Young,
    ISBN-13: 978-1138538306  ISBN-10: 1138538302 

[2] https://archive.org/details/protestantethics00webe or, in HTML,
    https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/weber/protestant-ethic/

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_during_World_War_II

[4] https://www.google.com (I do not know were to start! Really! :-D)

[5] most of them: IBM, Google are well known for their contract but I
    cannot collect all samples, I'm sorry. Here is one about Red Hat
https://www.redhat.com/en/about/press-releases/department-defense-enlists-red-hat-help-improve-squadron-operations-and-flight-training

[6] as my experience shows, branding themselves as "the Good Guys(TM)"
    alternative to FSF does not mean actually be trustworthy or credible
    https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-March/235224.html

[7] https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-March/235183.html

[8] because he WAS a Steering Committee member, receiving all exchanges
    in CC and thus providing an actual oversight over the GCC evolution
    in the interests of Free Software
    https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-April/235269.html

[9] 
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/03/31/world/global-vaccine-supply-inequity.html

[10] https://jorgemorais.gitlab.io/justice-for-rms/ but also note the
     corrections the authors of the rms-open-letter had to add to the
     appendix to reduce the legal risk for the subscribers a bit
     (defamation is a crime in many countries, and for sure it is in
     Italy, article 595 of our Penal Code)
     https://rms-open-letter.github.io/appendix

[11] https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-March/235211.html

[12] https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-April/235269.html

[13]
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/03/hackers-backdoor-php-source-code-after-breaching-internal-git-server/

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

From what I have seen, problem has really start from developers
who think they are some hot shot that can make things swing their
way.  That is the real problem in achieving an inclusive community.
It is not about Richard Stallman at all.  He did one of the most
inclusive thing there is, which brute developers inherited to then
screw up.

More progress was done with Richard Stallman than at any later time - the
really important things anyway.

Furthermore, there would not have been any public focused cryptography
if it was not for Richard Stallman.  I can do what I want with GCC without
the current input of some individuals.  Things could move slower, but what the
heck - I'm fine with that!

Regards
Christopher

> Sent: Friday, April 02, 2021 at 10:05 PM
> From: "Giacomo Tesio" <giacomo@tesio.it>
> To: "Thomas Rodgers" <rodgert@appliantology.com>, "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>, "JeanHeyd Meneide" <phdofthehouse@gmail.com>
> Cc: gcc@gcc.gnu.org
> Subject: Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> Hello Thomas, Jonathan, David, Nathan Jean and... everybody. :-)
>
>
> I'm sorry for this long mail that rivals with the original Nathan's
> request, but I wanted to back my request properly.
>
>
> On Wed, 31 Mar 2021 18:25:23 -0700 Thomas Rodgers wrote:
>
> > Not to argue counter to the observation that there is clear bias in
> > terms of large US and EU corporations
>
> Well, to be precise, it's 9 members from US corporations and 2 from
> German corporations. I mean: the bias is not even balanced between US
> and EU! Not even remotely!
>
> And obviously it totally excludes thousands of different interests.
> China, Russia, Brazil, Switzerland, Cuba, Iraq, Palestine...
> I guess you do not need me to continue.  ;-)
>
>
> > Quickly eyeballing the output of -
> >
> >    'git shortlog -s -n --all releases/gcc-9.1.0...master'
> >
> > Seems to show a similar bias in participation.
>
> As I said before, history is always used to justify Power and
> (obviously) Power affects history.
>
> Thanks for proving my point by referring to `git shortlog`! :-D
>
>
> > It reflects the economics of whose willing and able to commit to
> > that work as a full time undertaking.
>
> This is another very interesting argument, Thomas.
>
> Just like the Jeff's one "it's more historical than anything", it looks
> quite neutral on the surface, even obvious as an argument, until you
> look at it "cum grano salis".
>
> Why most contributions to GCC come from employees of large corporations
> from the greatest military power since the fall of the Berlin Wall?
> I know: a very good question that cannot be answered here.
> But for sure, it's not just a matter of fair merits[1]!
>
>
> Yet, the fact you look at the economics to explain power (instead of the
> other way around) proves my other point.
> You are just showing (in absolute good faith!) how your US-priviledge
> blinds you from itself and its dogmatic roots that Weber called "the
> Spirit of Capitalism" [2].
>
> It's not your fault, but it more than a danger to the rest of the world.
> It's sistematic discrimination based on power (that's is expressed and
> enforced through wealth and giustified through "economics" and
> clearly captured by `git log`s).
>
>
>
>
> But from outside your "cultural bubble", we all see that a bunch of
> highly controversial [3][4] US corporations (with long term ties with
> the USA DoD [5]) are kicking out of the GCC Steering Committee their
> only connection with both the FSF and the GNU project.
>
> A member of FSF and GNU that was representing the only non-profit in
> the Steering Committee credibly dedicated to preserve Free Software[6].
>
>
> You just need to read what David wrote:
>
> On Wed, 31 Mar 2021 08:59:41 -0400 David Edelsohn via Gcc wrote:
>
> > GCC SC whose major purpose is to be a buffer between the GCC
> > Community and the Free Software Foundation.
>
> On Wed, 31 Mar 2021 11:23:09 -0400 David Edelsohn via Gcc wrote:
>
> > members of the GCC SC have worked diligently behind the scenes to
> > ensure that GCC and GNU Toolchain development can proceed as smoothly
> > and unhindered as possible.  We have prevented or resolved many
> > conflicts and issues without disturbing the broader community and
> > allow the community to focus on its important tasks and great
> > progress for the toolchain itself.
> > [...]
> > It's like a good manager: regardless of the openness, hopefully the
> > GCC community feels that the GCC SC "has their back", manages the
> > politics, and removes real or potential roadblocks so that the
> > software engineer can focus on being productive.
>
> it is quite evident that the interest represented by the members of the
> Steering Committee while "managing the politics" will align with that
> of their employers (and with their own values and culture).
>
> Please, do not offend our intelligence by pretending otherwise.
>
>
>
> On Thu, 1 Apr 2021 10:23:03 +0100 Jonathan Wakely wrote:
>
> > But if you think simply being American causes the same (or "more
> > severe") image problem, maybe you missed the point of Nathan's
> > original email.
>
> Quite the opposite: I've totally seen the point from the very
> beginning[7]: a Facebook employee from the US asked to the US
> corporate-members of GCC Steering Committee to remove Stallman
> (and FSF and GNU with him) from the Steering Committee.
> And the Steering Committee, did it [8].
>
>
>
> Also, note that I focused on your culture just because you accepted
> the Nathan's request to remove RMS from the GCC Steering Committee
> because of his "are extremely offensive repugnant opinions"[0].
> You did the removal NOW, not years before or years later.
> And you know how this particular timing will be interpreted.
>
>
>
> But I do NOT ignore the geopolitical hazard of a GCC Steering Committee
> whose members are mostly under US legislation while GCC is used to
> compile fundamental software all over the world!
>
> Let's not pretend that we didn't read Thompson reflections on trusting
> trust or, if you need a more recent example, we haven't read about
> Solar Wind supply chain attack or about the backdoor introduced
> in PHP [13]!
>
>
>
> Nor I do ignore the ECONOMICAL hazard to rely on US corporations to "do
> no evil": the world is seeing this VERY well with the Covid vaccines[9].
>
>
>
> So please, if you really want to attract contributors from all over the
> world, fix these geopolitical hazards NOW. Today, literally.
>
>
>
> As I said, it's just as easy as it was to remove Stallman.
> By removing him (and FSF and GNU, with him) NOW, and on Nathan's
> request, you joined a mob based on hearsay[10] and on incidents
> that REALLY look like hatred kids squabbles, where nobody can
> really decide who was right and who was wrong [11].
>
>
> So if you promptly removed Stallman on these weak foundations, you
> should now fix IN THE SAME WAY this huge hazard that severely demage
> (and demaged for decades) not just a US-priviledged minority, but the
> vast majority of peoples around the world using or contributing to GCC.
>
>
> If you will not, if you will "drop the ball on this" as you did
> before on different stuffs [12], it will become evident how it is
> NOT SAFE for peoples outside the US to use, rely or contribute to GCC.
>
>
>
> I'm pretty serious on this.
>
> Maybe I'm not the kind of "new talent" you (and Nathan, or your
> employeers) aim to attract to GCC development, but for sure I feel
> betrayed by your decision to cancel your ties with FSF and GNU.
> All of my efforts to port GCC look now to me as effect of a
> naive and misguided trust in GCC name: GNU Compiler Collection.
>
> I wanted to contribute to a fair and global Free Software, not to a
> bunch of dangerous US corporation or to yet another global threat to
> the world's freedom and autonomy [13].
>
>
>
> Please, fix the GCC Steering Committee. Today.
>
> OR, let GNU and FSF to step in, and fix it fairly, for everybody.
>
>
> Thanks!
>
>
> Giacomo
>
>
> [0] https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-March/235091.html
>
> [1] You might like "The Rise of the Meritocracy", Michael Dunlop Young,
>     ISBN-13: 978-1138538306  ISBN-10: 1138538302
>
> [2] https://archive.org/details/protestantethics00webe or, in HTML,
>     https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/weber/protestant-ethic/
>
> [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust
>     https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_during_World_War_II
>
> [4] https://www.google.com (I do not know were to start! Really! :-D)
>
> [5] most of them: IBM, Google are well known for their contract but I
>     cannot collect all samples, I'm sorry. Here is one about Red Hat
> https://www.redhat.com/en/about/press-releases/department-defense-enlists-red-hat-help-improve-squadron-operations-and-flight-training
>
> [6] as my experience shows, branding themselves as "the Good Guys(TM)"
>     alternative to FSF does not mean actually be trustworthy or credible
>     https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-March/235224.html
>
> [7] https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-March/235183.html
>
> [8] because he WAS a Steering Committee member, receiving all exchanges
>     in CC and thus providing an actual oversight over the GCC evolution
>     in the interests of Free Software
>     https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-April/235269.html
>
> [9]
> https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/03/31/world/global-vaccine-supply-inequity.html
>
> [10] https://jorgemorais.gitlab.io/justice-for-rms/ but also note the
>      corrections the authors of the rms-open-letter had to add to the
>      appendix to reduce the legal risk for the subscribers a bit
>      (defamation is a crime in many countries, and for sure it is in
>      Italy, article 595 of our Penal Code)
>      https://rms-open-letter.github.io/appendix
>
> [11] https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-March/235211.html
>
> [12] https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-April/235269.html
>
> [13]
> https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/03/hackers-backdoor-php-source-code-after-breaching-internal-git-server/
>

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Jonathan Wakely]

On Fri, 2 Apr 2021 at 11:06, Giacomo Tesio wrote:
> But from outside your "cultural bubble", we all see that a bunch of
> highly controversial [3][4] US corporations (with long term ties with
> the USA DoD [5]) are kicking out of the GCC Steering Committee their
> only connection with both the FSF and the GNU project.

If that's what you think happened, you've not been paying attention to
this thread. The SC just did was they were requested to do by (some
of) the developers of the project.

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Giacomo Tesio]

Dear Jonathan,

everybody can see it...

On Fri, 2 Apr 2021 14:05:10 +0100 Jonathan Wakely wrote:

> On Fri, 2 Apr 2021 at 11:06, Giacomo Tesio wrote:
> > But from outside your "cultural bubble", we all see that a bunch of
> > highly controversial [3][4] US corporations (with long term ties
> > with the USA DoD [5]) are kicking out of the GCC Steering Committee
> > their only connection with both the FSF and the GNU project.  
> 
> If that's what you think happened, you've not been paying attention to
> this thread. 

...I wrote such a long mail, full of references to so many passages of
your mails in these threads... without paying attention to them.

What a lucky guy, I am! :-D


> The SC just did was they were requested to do by (some
> of) the developers of the project.

Yeah, "some of".

In this specific moment, when a global (and well financed) mob is
attacking RMS personally, for anything they can frame as mischief,
you were fine to comply with what "some of the developers" asked.

What about the others?
Did you consider that many of them might be to scared to oppose?



Yet my request is not about Stallman, but about the Steering Committee.

Please fix the huge global hazard that his removal uncovered.


Giacomo

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Saturday, April 03, 2021 at 2:06 AM
> From: "Giacomo Tesio" <giacomo@tesio.it>
> To: "Jonathan Wakely" <jwakely.gcc@gmail.com>
> Cc: "gcc@gcc.gnu.org" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>, "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>
> Subject: Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> Dear Jonathan,
> 
> everybody can see it...
> 
> On Fri, 2 Apr 2021 14:05:10 +0100 Jonathan Wakely wrote:
> 
> > On Fri, 2 Apr 2021 at 11:06, Giacomo Tesio wrote:
> > > But from outside your "cultural bubble", we all see that a bunch of
> > > highly controversial [3][4] US corporations (with long term ties
> > > with the USA DoD [5]) are kicking out of the GCC Steering Committee
> > > their only connection with both the FSF and the GNU project.  
> > 
> > If that's what you think happened, you've not been paying attention to
> > this thread. 
> 
> ...I wrote such a long mail, full of references to so many passages of
> your mails in these threads... without paying attention to them.
> 
> What a lucky guy, I am! :-D
> 
> 
> > The SC just did was they were requested to do by (some
> > of) the developers of the project.
> 
> Yeah, "some of".
> 
> In this specific moment, when a global (and well financed) mob is
> attacking RMS personally, for anything they can frame as mischief,
> you were fine to comply with what "some of the developers" asked.
> 
> What about the others?
> Did you consider that many of them might be to scared to oppose?

Even if you consider those who are not scared, the list clearly outstrips
any legitimacy of the anti-stallman group.  I clearly remember Ludovic Courtès
trying to hamstring all Gnu Maintainers and force them to implement Codes of 
Conduct without any authority whatsoever.  Free Software is about having NO 
Owners.
 
Despite corporations' proliferation of codes of conduct, codes oftentimes 
suffer from numerous weaknesses that undermine the whole thing.

> 
> Yet my request is not about Stallman, but about the Steering Committee.
> 
> Please fix the huge global hazard that his removal uncovered.
> 
> 
> Giacomo
>

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Ian Lance Taylor]

On Fri, Apr 2, 2021 at 3:06 AM Giacomo Tesio <giacomo@tesio.it> wrote:
>
> I'm sorry for this long mail that rivals with the original Nathan's
> request, but I wanted to back my request properly.

This is free software.  If you want to make it better, then make it
better.  The EGCS branch that displaced and became GCC came into
existence because the people involved felt that it would make GCC
better (I was a participant myself, though not a major one).  See
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Compiler_Collection#EGCS_fork for a
few more details.

GCC is a successful free software project, but it is not perfect.  It
has many problems.  Lack of contributor diversity is one of them.  If
I knew how to fix that problem, I would work to fix it.  I personally
do not believe that the membership of the steering committee is a
significant cause of that problem.  But I could be mistaken.  So prove
me wrong.  Do the work.

Ian

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Giacomo Tesio]

Hi Ian, Gerald and GCC all 

On Fri, 2 Apr 2021 14:25:34 -0700 Ian Lance Taylor wrote:

> On Fri, Apr 2, 2021 at 3:06 AM Giacomo Tesio <giacomo@tesio.it> wrote:
> >
> > I'm sorry for this long mail that rivals with the original Nathan's
> > request, but I wanted to back my request properly.  
> 
> This is free software.  If you want to make it better, then make it
> better. [...] So prove me wrong.  Do the work.

Well Ian, I'm glad and honoured to be appointed as a new member of
the GCC Steering Committee [0]!!! :-D

But now what?

I'm still just one Italian hacker: all the huge imbalances that the
removal of the only FSF and GNU member of the Steering Committee
uncovered, are still there!


> The EGCS branch that displaced and became GCC came into
> existence because the people involved felt that it would make GCC
> better (I was a participant myself, though not a major one).  See
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Compiler_Collection#EGCS_fork for a
> few more details.

A very interesting read, thanks!

I didn't know that the Steering Committee was subject to these sort of
power imbalances since 1999! It has been more than twenty years! :-o


> I personally do not believe that the membership of the steering
> committee is a significant cause of that problem.

I would be surprised if you did!

I mean, you are a member of such committee since 2 decades.
And you are from the US. And you work for the biggest threat to
global democracies and to all people's autonomy and freedom!


But that's the fact with priviledge: if you have it, you can't see it.

Yet as a C++ programmer, you will have no difficulty to properly
abstract what Peggy McIntosh described in 1989[1] beyond the cultural
context you share: US-priviledge is to the rest of the world, what
white-priviledge is in the United States. [2]


> But I could be mistaken.  So prove me wrong.

Ok, let's try! ;-)


> This is free software.  If you want to make it better, then make it
> better. [...] So prove me wrong.  Do the work.

This is plain old open source rhetoric.
https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html

The GNU Compiler Collection is a GNU project and Free Software.

I'm not suprised to see this sort of arguments from a FSF-less and
GNU-less Steering Committee (nor from a Google employee[3]).

Indeed it is what scares me so much, what makes me feel unsafe at
contributing to GCC and it is exactly why I asked to fix the GCC
Steering Committee after the removal of RMS.


But you can see how flawed this argument is by comparing it with your
own words: https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-April/235269.html

RMS was actively contributing to the Steering Committee without
contributing a single line of code since years.

So you proved that you (and open source rhetoric) are wrong.


> If I knew how to fix that problem, I would work to fix it.

Really?

Well, let me do my job as a new member of the Steering Committee (:-D)
and solve this problem for you and everybody else.

In my original request[3], I proposed to solve it according to the
recent precedent you established with the removal of Richard Stallman of
Free Software Foundation [4][5], by simply removing enough employees of
corporations ruled under the same legislation, until the global
interests of the different economical regions and populations of the
world are at least more balanced, if not more represented.

But apparently you cannot decide which US-corporation should be thrown.
(indeed US-corporations hold the vast majoirity of SC heads, right now).


So we have two other possible approach:

1) dismantle the Steering Committee and assign its role to a benevolent
   dictator for life from FSF
2) ask to the Chief GNUisance to fix the GNU Compiler Collection's
   Steering Committee

As for me, I'm not attached to power or priviledge: I'm fine with both.
I happily resign from the Steering Committee right now (:-D).


But to be honest, I think the second option is better.

(Theoretically, adding RMS's oversight back to the Steering Committee
could be a third option, since he would grant the same warranties as
before, but you told he was mostly absent and didn't really followed
the GCC evolution, so now I can't say if having him back would be
enough anymore.)



On Sat, 3 Apr 2021 02:22:08 +0200 (CEST) Gerald Pfeifer wrote:

> On Thu, 1 Apr 2021, Giacomo Tesio wrote:
> > Oh well, sure, but luckily the solution is just as fast and easy as
> > it was to remove RMS: pick just one person for each nationality and
> > remove the others.  
> 
> Why nationalities? That strikes me as a rather specific view focusing
> on one of many attributes (and I believe there's more nationalities
> than you might think, and a bigger variety of backgrounds).

Well, this is a great question Gerald!

After all, you removed RMS, that is American too!

For sure there are different ways to classify people.
Google, for example, revealed that they plan to build FLoCs with
roughtly a thousand persons each, so we can desume they are able to
segment the humanity into a milion of different behavioural groups,
each responding to a particular set of cognitive manipulations
(they call this large-scale automated global threat "AdTech").


So why nationalities?

Well, there are a few good reasons indeed.

To some degree, the people from a nation share the same history and
culture, they study roughly the same topics at school, they share the
same cultural environment and values, they share (on average) the same
geopolitical interests and they benefit from the same power relations.


Moreover they are subject to the same legislation.

And some legislations are more problematic than others, for the people
outside their rules. For example, the European Court of Justice had to
invalidate the Privacy Shield because the US do not let US-corporation
to respect the privacy of non-US people [6].


> > People all over the world, whatever their country, should be sure
> > to be treated fairly and equally by the GCC leaders even if they
> > want to contribute something that does not match the culture or
> > interests you represent.  
> 
> I will argue that is the case as of today and would like to see
> potential counter examples (if any) so that we can address those -or-
> file the point above as FUD.

No Gerard it's not FUD, but probabilistic risk assessment.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Probabilistic_risk_assessment

As you know, risk assessment is based on probability and severity of an
outcome. Let's even assume that the probability of a misbehaviour in
the SC is low (I think you can agree with me that it's not zero), can
you estimate the severity of an espionage attack based on GCC?

For sure, such severity is lower if you live in (or work for) the US[6].
But there are billions of people, millions of companies and hundreds of
Governments relying on software built with GCC!


Give a read at this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosures_(2013%E2%80%93present)

Then look at the GCC vulnerabilities discovered over the years
https://www.cvedetails.com/vulnerability-list.php?vendor_id=72&product_id=960&version_id=&page=1&hasexp=0&opdos=0&opec=0&opov=0&opcsrf=0&opgpriv=0&opsqli=0&opxss=0&opdirt=0&opmemc=0&ophttprs=0&opbyp=0&opfileinc=0&opginf=0&cvssscoremin=5&cvssscoremax=0&year=0&month=0&cweid=0&order=3&trc=8&sha=1983b3d9908d852bd8b1cb5901c82b110579ba01

I still remember the scandal of CVE-2000-1219 [7] and CVE-2008-1367 [8]
but my favourite one is CVE-2015-5276 [9].

After the Snowden's revelations, having in the Steering Committee so
many people working for companies with tight ties with the US
Department of Defense, is a huge risk for everybody outside the US.



Sure: they would always have plausible deniability for every bug, but...

Please, do not waive this global risk as "FUD".
Even if it doesn't affect you, it's a threat for everybody else.


You removed FSF and GNU from the Steering Committee on request of a
Facebook employee and because of RMS's "extremely offensive repugnant
opinions" for some of your fellow citizens.

Now I'm showing you an issue that is way more serious and hugely affects
all people all over the world.

We cannot afford to grant you plausible deniability on this.


You promptly "fixed" the RMS issue. Please fix this too.


Giacomo


[0] Just kidding. ;-)
    Everything else being the same, my presence wouldn't change a dime.

[1]
https://nationalseedproject.org/Key-SEED-Texts/white-privilege-unpacking-the-invisible-knapsack

[2] Indeed Trump was iconic: one of the most rich-white-straight-male
    among US citizens to rule the most priviledged among countries.

[3] Unfortunately, Sinclair's law applies here: "It is difficult to get
    a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not
    understanding it."

[3] https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-April/235285.html

[4] GNU Compiler Collection's SC before FSF's and GNU's member removal
http://web.archive.org/web/20210330171044/https://gcc.gnu.org/steering.html

[5] GNU Compiler Collection's SC after FSF's and GNU's member removal
http://web.archive.org/web/20210331192841/https://gcc.gnu.org/steering.html

[6] I mentioned the US Cloud Act, FISA, PPD 128, E.O. 12333, etc but
    give a look at https://curia.europa.eu/juris/liste.jsf?num=C-311/18

[7] https://www.cvedetails.com/cve/CVE-2000-1219/

[8] https://www.cvedetails.com/cve/CVE-2008-1367/

[9] https://www.cvedetails.com/cve/CVE-2015-5276/

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Jonathan Wakely]

If you have nothing to contribute except these diatribes, please give it a
rest.

If you really think "being American" is a bigger image problem than "being
RMS" then you are part of the problem here.

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Ian Lance Taylor]

On Sat, Apr 3, 2021 at 10:31 AM Giacomo Tesio <giacomo@tesio.it> wrote:
>
> I'm still just one Italian hacker: all the huge imbalances that the
> removal of the only FSF and GNU member of the Steering Committee
> uncovered, are still there!

As far as I can tell, the imbalances you refer to are the fact that
the GCC steering committee has mostly Americans and some Europeans.
And that is fair.

But you have singled out removing RMS (who as David noted was never
really a member of the committee anyhow) as a particular problem.
Let's not forget that RMS is an American.  So the imbalance you
mention was there already.


> > I personally do not believe that the membership of the steering
> > committee is a significant cause of that problem.
>
> I would be surprised if you did!

Fair point.

> I mean, you are a member of such committee since 2 decades.
> And you are from the US. And you work for the biggest threat to
> global democracies and to all people's autonomy and freedom!

Actually I joined the GCC steering committee in 2014.

And you are confusing my employer with my free software work.  In the
time I've been working on GCC I've worked for six different companies.
I don't get a job and then get told to work on free software.  I am a
free software programmer who only takes jobs where I will be working
on free software.


> But that's the fact with priviledge: if you have it, you can't see it.

I'm sure that's largely true.  And I'm well aware that I have enormous
amounts of privilege.

But you write that statement as though it contradicts something that I
said.  It doesn't.


> > But I could be mistaken.  So prove me wrong.
>
> Ok, let's try! ;-)
>
>
> > This is free software.  If you want to make it better, then make it
> > better. [...] So prove me wrong.  Do the work.
>
> This is plain old open source rhetoric.
> https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html

No, it really isn't.

The point of free software is to provide freedom.  In order to do
that, it has to work.  Free software is not just a group of people who
get together to discuss the benefits of free software.  It's a group
of people who build working software that gives freedom to other
people.  That is what we have been doing, in a small way, with GCC.  I
personally have been working on GCC for 30 years now, on and off.

If nobody worked on GCC, nobody would care about it.  People care
about GCC because it is free and because it works.  Both aspects are
critical.


> But you can see how flawed this argument is by comparing it with your
> own words: https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-April/235269.html
>
> RMS was actively contributing to the Steering Committee without
> contributing a single line of code since years.
>
> So you proved that you (and open source rhetoric) are wrong.

I'm sorry, but that doesn't make any sense to me.  I think I was
pretty clear in that e-mail message that RMS was not actively
contributing to the steering committee.

And, even if he was, so what?  I agree that lots of work on GCC and
other free software projects has nothing to do with actual
programming.  When I spoke of doing the work, I didn't mean just
programming.  I meant the work of making GCC successful, which
includes much much more than just writing code.


> > If I knew how to fix that problem, I would work to fix it.
>
> Really?
>
> Well, let me do my job as a new member of the Steering Committee (:-D)
> and solve this problem for you and everybody else.
>
> In my original request[3], I proposed to solve it according to the
> recent precedent you established with the removal of Richard Stallman of
> Free Software Foundation [4][5], by simply removing enough employees of
> corporations ruled under the same legislation, until the global
> interests of the different economical regions and populations of the
> world are at least more balanced, if not more represented.
>
> But apparently you cannot decide which US-corporation should be thrown.
> (indeed US-corporations hold the vast majoirity of SC heads, right now).

I don't understand this argument.  If we remove everybody from the
committee, then it will be more balanced in some sense, but there
won't be anybody on it.  If you want a more balanced committee, then
at some point you have to talk about adding people.

And I do think it would make sense to add more people to the
committee.  Any suggestions?  They should of course be people
reasonably familiar with GCC and with free software, and with
compilers and software development tools.  (And for reasons discussed
elsewhere, RMS is not a good suggestion.)

Ian

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Jonathan Wakely]

On Sun, 4 Apr 2021, 00:46 Ian Lance Taylor via Gcc, <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> wrote:

> On Sat, Apr 3, 2021 at 10:31 AM Giacomo Tesio <giacomo@tesio.it> wrote:
> >
> > But apparently you cannot decide which US-corporation should be thrown.
> > (indeed US-corporations hold the vast majoirity of SC heads, right now).
>

As it clearly says on the steering committee page, appointments are
personal, not based on employer. One SC members just moved job but didn't
lose his SC position, because it's him and not his employer who is on the
committee.


> I don't understand this argument.  If we remove everybody from the
> committee, then it will be more balanced in some sense, but there
> won't be anybody on it.  If you want a more balanced committee, then
> at some point you have to talk about adding people.
>
> And I do think it would make sense to add more people to the
> committee.  Any suggestions?  They should of course be people
> reasonably familiar with GCC and with free software, and with
> compilers and software development tools.



And if you don't allow anybody from big US or German corporations, you're
going to have to keep kicking experienced people off the committee and
replacing them with inexperienced people. That's because experienced,
dedicated contributors tend to get hired to keep working on the project. I
was an unpaid volunteer and maintainer for years before I got hired to work
on GCC. Was I doing good work at first, then became a pawn of evil
business? No, because your arguments are silly (and I don't even think
they're in good faith, I think you're just being a Concern Troll because
you're upset about the removal of RMS).

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Giacomo Tesio]

Ian, 

with all respect with your personal history, your contributions and
choices, I think you are still missing the point.


On April 3, 2021 11:45:23 PM UTC, Ian Lance Taylor <iant@google.com>
wrote:
> But you have singled out removing RMS (who as David noted was never
> really a member of the committee anyhow) as a particular problem.
> Let's not forget that RMS is an American.

Indeed.
It's important to note that I'm not, in any way, arguing against
Americans in GCC (as somebody is trying to frame what I wrote).

I'm scared by the dangerous influence that dangeours US corporations
and a dangerous military nation with a long history of human rights
violations (see Snowden's and Assange's revelations and the ongoing
Assange's trial) HAVE over the GCC development.


It's not just matter of actual backdoors or priviledged access to
zero-days: it's mainly a soft power that can influence development of
GCC by slowing down or fastening certain features, as you explained the
SC did in several occasions (the Nathan's libcody, the plugin framework
and many other that were too subtle to catch from outside the Steering
Committee).

We are all seasoned developers.
We know how this sort of politics can influence software development.

We all know that technology is a prosecution of politics by other means.


>  So the imbalance you mention was there already.

Except that the President of FSF (and Chief GNUissance himself) was
receiving copy of all the communications of the Steering Committee.

I think we do agree that FSF and RMS are really trustworthy when
it comes to protect Free Software interests.

After all, FSF is the most credible no-profit dedicated to this goal.


> And you are confusing my employer with my free software work.

No.

Simply, I work in the field since two decades myself.

Thus, I'm not naive enough to ignore the thousands way your employee
can get huge advantages by having you in the GCC's Steering Committee.

As a small example among many many others, you are using a @google.com
mail address while serving in the Steering Committee.


> > But that's the fact with priviledge: if you have it, you can't see
> > it.
> 
> I'm sure that's largely true.  And I'm well aware that I have enormous
> amounts of privilege.
> 
> But you write that statement as though it contradicts something that I
> said.  It doesn't.

It doesn't contraddict what you said, indeed.

On the contrary, it explains WHY you are debating against an urgent
fix to the GCC Steering Committee on my request, while you had no
problem to promptly remove Stallman on Nathan's request.

You care more about the sensibility of those that share Nathan's values
and interests (that are pretty similar to your own), than about the huge
threat that a Steering Committee deeply influenced and controlled by
US corporations with long ties to the US Department of Defence
constitutea. 


Maybe this will attract more US people (or likely-minded ones), but for
sure, it will pose a huge burden on everybody outside the US to
contribute and even use GCC.

I would NOT feel safe to contribute my port to GCC, right now.
I don't feel safe to even rely on GCC for anything.


> > > This is free software.  If you want to make it better, then make
> > > it better. [...] So prove me wrong.  Do the work.
> >
> > This is plain old open source rhetoric.
> > https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html
> 
> No, it really isn't.
>
> The point of free software is to provide freedom.

True, but naively stated.

Software Freedom is way more than "it works, to free".
And Freedom itself is more than lack of constraints, but autonomy,
agency and self-determination.

What Free Software is (and what it is not) has been clearly defined
here: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/philosophy.html

If it's not what you mean by "free software", I'd suggest you to use
different terms. Maybe "open source" will do.

But let's not replicate 30 years of debate here (and thousands years of
phylosophical debate on freedom) and focus on GNU Compiler Collection.


> > But you can see how flawed this argument is by comparing it with
> > your own words:
> > https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-April/235269.html
> >
> > RMS was actively contributing to the Steering Committee without
> > contributing a single line of code since years.
> >
> > So you proved that you (and open source rhetoric) are wrong.
> 
> I'm sorry, but that doesn't make any sense to me.  I think I was
> pretty clear in that e-mail message that RMS was not actively
> contributing to the steering committee.

You said you involved him in SC discussions.
You said you treated him as a member of the Steering Committee.

Thus he WAS serving as a member of the GCC's Steering Committee.

To me, his oversight on your discussions looked as a serious guarantee
in the protection of interests of the _global_ Free Software movement.


> And, even if he was, so what?  I agree that lots of work on GCC and
> other free software projects has nothing to do with actual
> programming.  When I spoke of doing the work, I didn't mean just
> programming.  I meant the work of making GCC successful, which
> includes much much more than just writing code. [...]
>
> (And for reasons discussed elsewhere, RMS is not a good suggestion.)


Ian, maybe there is a language barrier at work.

Maybe it's a huge cultural mismatch that you are not aware of.


But really, I cannot think of a single man that did MORE work than
Stallman to make GCC successful.

He created Free Software.
He created the GNU Project.
He created GNU Public License.
He created the GNU C Compiler. Literally.
He created a community that improved it for years.
He served for years as a Steering Committee member.

He worked for decades fighting for software freedom all over the world
(often against the interests of the companies you work for)


He laid the foundations of the building, you are improving the roof.
Sure YOUR work is way more visible. And it's useful!

But his work is... foundational. Your is not.


Yet, YOU removed him.
On request of a Facebook employee.



> I don't understand this argument.

I'm sorry, I did my best to explain it.

The RMS removal uncovered an unfair, unbalanced and dangerous influence
of controversial US corporations tied with the US Department of Defence
over GNU Compiler Collection development.

Such influence is ongoing since decades.
And according to you, RMS was not even enough to balance it.


Indeed, while I think that RMS was able to balance it, I _THANK_ you for
his removal since his presence was blinding me and everybody else from
this huge threat. GCC is foundational to so many supply chain.


Yet, I do not have a cancel mob to strumentalize as Nathan did.

And I would never weaponize the real suffering of people, just to attack
a person or a group, as the companies behind the rms-open-letter did.
(because everybody can easily see who sponsor most of the organizations
that signed the letter or wrote similar statements against FSF and RMS).


And I see how some of you are already trying to depict my words and me.


On Sun, 4 Apr 2021 10:22:35 +0100 Jonathan Wakely wrote:

> I don't even think they're in good faith, I think you're just being
> a Concern Troll because you're upset about the removal of RMS

On Sat, 3 Apr 2021 20:33:42 +0100 Jonathan Wakely wrote:

> If you really think "being American" is a bigger image problem than
> "being RMS" then you are part of the problem here.

Jonathan is right: maybe I am part of the problem here.
I'm sorry for that.

I challenge your politics, your interests and your values.
So I have to be "upset" and "in bad faith", right?
I must be cancelled, silenced and forgot.


But let me ask to you all: how many other people you will have to
exclude after Stallman and me, just to prove that you are "inclusive"?


I'll give it a rest, as Jonathan requested.

But I'm sad. I feel betrayed and threaten by the direction GCC took.

Mala tempora currunt, sed peiora parantur. :-(


Giacomo

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Richard Kenner]

> I'm scared by the dangerous influence that dangeours US corporations
> and a dangerous military nation with a long history of human rights
> violations (see Snowden's and Assange's revelations and the ongoing
> Assange's trial) HAVE over the GCC development.

I agree that that's a concern, but the point being made is that the SC
is not relevant to this because they, as a practial matter, have
almost no influence on GCC development.  GCC development is mostly
influenced by those companies that pay people to work on GCC.  It is a
fact that most of these are US corporations.  But the only way to
change that is to encourage companies that are *not* in the US to
contribute too.

> Except that the President of FSF (and Chief GNUissance himself) was
> receiving copy of all the communications of the Steering Committee.

Do we know this as a fact?  I don't know whether that's the case or
not, but I've read this entire thread and have seen no evidence either
way on that issue. In any event, I suspect that the "all communications"
may be less than a few dozen emails a year, although that's only a
guess on my part.

> Thus, I'm not naive enough to ignore the thousands way your employee
> can get huge advantages by having you in the GCC's Steering Committee.

Thousands?  Given how little the SC actually *does*, I find it hard
to come up with any meaningful advantages at all, let alone "huge" ones.

> As a small example among many many others, you are using a @google.com
> mail address while serving in the Steering Committee.

So?  How many emails per year do SC members send on behalf of the SC?
As far as I see, it averages maybe two per year, all of which are
announcements of new or changed maintainers of components of GCC.

> On the contrary, it explains WHY you are debating against an urgent
> fix to the GCC Steering Committee on my request, while you had no
> problem to promptly remove Stallman on Nathan's request.

Again, the position taken was that RMS was never *on* the SC to begin
with.

> You said you involved him in SC discussions.
> You said you treated him as a member of the Steering Committee.

You're missing the point here.  The role of the SC is to act as the
official maintainer of GCC.  The official maintainer of a GNU project
coordinates things with the GNU project (a tautology).  RMS is indeed
involved in those communications (which I suspect are quite rare), but
as a representative of the GNU project, *not* of the GCC SC.

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Giacomo Tesio]

Thanks Kenner...

On April 4, 2021 1:49:57 PM UTC, kenner@vlsi1.ultra.nyu.edu wrote:
> > I'm scared by the dangerous influence that dangeours US corporations
> > and a dangerous military nation with a long history of human rights
> > violations (see Snowden's and Assange's revelations and the ongoing
> > Assange's trial) HAVE over the GCC development.
> 
> I agree that that's a concern

... at least this is a step forward. :-)

> but the point being made is that the SC is not relevant to this
> because they, as a practial matter, have almost no influence on GCC
> development.

Yet enough to slow down certain developments such as Nathan's libcody
or the plugin framework.

> GCC development is mostly influenced by those companies that pay
> people to work on GCC.  It is a fact that most of these are US
> corporations.  But the only way to change that is to encourage
> companies that are *not* in the US to contribute too.

False: it's not the only way.

You can also put trustworthy and credible observers to protect the
interests of the global Free Software movement.

Stallman serving in the Steering Committee, had such function.

So far, what I've read in these threads makes me doubt he was actually
paying attention to GCC, but if the SC workload was as light as you
say, I'm reasaured he probably was.


> > Except that the President of FSF (and Chief GNUissance himself) was
> > receiving copy of all the communications of the Steering Committee.
> 
> Do we know this as a fact?  

Ian wrote so in his response to Nathan.
https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-April/235269.html


> > You said you involved him in SC discussions.
> > You said you treated him as a member of the Steering Committee.
> 
> You're missing the point here.  The role of the SC is to act as the
> official maintainer of GCC.  The official maintainer of a GNU project
> coordinates things with the GNU project (a tautology).  RMS is indeed
> involved in those communications (which I suspect are quite rare), but
> as a representative of the GNU project, *not* of the GCC SC.

What I have to say for you to understand that I'm NOT arguing here for
RMS?

The removal of Stallman revealed a huge issue in GCC.
Maybe you can't see it. Maybe you don't want to see it.
But it's evident to any seasoned programmer outside the US.

It's like when you fix an UI glitch and you uncover a terrible
consinstency bug causing a severe data corruption that is ongoing on
your database and that the glitch was hiding.

I did not request to put back the UI glitch.

I asked to fix the Steering Committee.


Don't you want to? Fine!

Everybody can draw their conclusion.


Giacomo

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Richard Kenner]

> Yet enough to slow down certain developments such as Nathan's libcody
> or the plugin framework.

The SC had no role in that, as was discussed here.

> You can also put trustworthy and credible observers to protect the
> interests of the global Free Software movement.

How is an "observer" going to influence which people are willing to
spend their time developing software and how much time they're willing
spend?  As a practical matter, the direction of any Free Software project
is dictated by those who actually work on it from day to day and who pays
for their time, not by groups like the SC or the maintainers.

> > > Except that the President of FSF (and Chief GNUissance himself) was
> > > receiving copy of all the communications of the Steering Committee.
> > 
> > Do we know this as a fact?  
> 
> Ian wrote so in his response to Nathan.
> https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-April/235269.html

That says he was "involved in SC discussions", which to me, means that
he *didn't* get a copy of all their communications.  If somebody says
they're a member of the XYZ committee and "involved Bob in our
discussions", to me, that means that Bob is *not* in the committee and
doesn't get all committee communications, but that they chose to
involve him in some of their discussions.

> The removal of Stallman revealed a huge issue in GCC.
> Maybe you can't see it. Maybe you don't want to see it.
> But it's evident to any seasoned programmer outside the US.

I just don't see it as a "removal".  RMS is still in charge of the GNU
project.  That means that he, at some level, is involved in every GNU
project, including GCC.  As a practical matter, that involvement was
very slight and still is.  I don't see any change whatsoever in the
day-to-day operations of GCC.

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Monday, April 05, 2021 at 1:10 AM
> From: "Giacomo Tesio" <giacomo@tesio.it>
> To: "Ian Lance Taylor" <iant@google.com>
> Cc: "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>, "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>
> Subject: Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> Ian,
>
> with all respect with your personal history, your contributions and
> choices, I think you are still missing the point.
>
>
> On April 3, 2021 11:45:23 PM UTC, Ian Lance Taylor <iant@google.com>
> wrote:
> > But you have singled out removing RMS (who as David noted was never
> > really a member of the committee anyhow) as a particular problem.
> > Let's not forget that RMS is an American.
>
> Indeed.
> It's important to note that I'm not, in any way, arguing against
> Americans in GCC (as somebody is trying to frame what I wrote).
>
> I'm scared by the dangerous influence that dangeours US corporations
> and a dangerous military nation with a long history of human rights
> violations (see Snowden's and Assange's revelations and the ongoing
> Assange's trial) HAVE over the GCC development.
>
>
> It's not just matter of actual backdoors or priviledged access to
> zero-days: it's mainly a soft power that can influence development of
> GCC by slowing down or fastening certain features, as you explained the
> SC did in several occasions (the Nathan's libcody, the plugin framework
> and many other that were too subtle to catch from outside the Steering
> Committee).
>
> We are all seasoned developers.
> We know how this sort of politics can influence software development.
>
> We all know that technology is a prosecution of politics by other means.
>
>
> >  So the imbalance you mention was there already.
>
> Except that the President of FSF (and Chief GNUissance himself) was
> receiving copy of all the communications of the Steering Committee.
>
> I think we do agree that FSF and RMS are really trustworthy when
> it comes to protect Free Software interests.
>
> After all, FSF is the most credible no-profit dedicated to this goal.
>
>
> > And you are confusing my employer with my free software work.

It is acceptable to do free software work, irrespective of the actions
of your employer.  Although one realises that there could be greater
scrutiny on your work.  People would be entitled to question certain
actions and dig deeper than usual because of conflicts of interests
or allegiances that have previously been documented in other cases.

For instance the Chaos Computer Club France (CCCF) was a fake hacker
organisation under the command of Directorate of Territorial Surveillance
and the Armed Forces of the French Government.

> No.
>
> Simply, I work in the field since two decades myself.
>
> Thus, I'm not naive enough to ignore the thousands way your employee
> can get huge advantages by having you in the GCC's Steering Committee.
>
> As a small example among many many others, you are using a @google.com
> mail address while serving in the Steering Committee.

It is a personal decision and choice what type of computing or services one
uses.  That does net stop anybody developing free software.

Although the best way is to lead "by example", it is a mistake to demand that
one you cannot do any work within a committee if you do not set a strict policy
for everything one does.  Similarly, it is a mistake to  disengage Richard Stallman because of personal views that he may hold.  One could for instance take the extreme
position towards Stallman by stating that it is wrong to use boycott all free software
that have ever been produced as a result of his work, because of his behaviour.
For instance, it was a mistake for MIT to remove all online courses on physics that
he had done.  This is equivalent to censorship, banning, and book burning in Nazi
Germany.  Only idiots or evil beings do such things.

> > > But that's the fact with priviledge: if you have it, you can't see
> > > it.
> >
> > I'm sure that's largely true.  And I'm well aware that I have enormous
> > amounts of privilege.
> >
> > But you write that statement as though it contradicts something that I
> > said.  It doesn't.
>
> It doesn't contraddict what you said, indeed.
>
> On the contrary, it explains WHY you are debating against an urgent
> fix to the GCC Steering Committee on my request, while you had no
> problem to promptly remove Stallman on Nathan's request.
>
> You care more about the sensibility of those that share Nathan's values
> and interests (that are pretty similar to your own), than about the huge
> threat that a Steering Committee deeply influenced and controlled by
> US corporations with long ties to the US Department of Defence
> constitutea.
>
>
> Maybe this will attract more US people (or likely-minded ones), but for
> sure, it will pose a huge burden on everybody outside the US to
> contribute and even use GCC.
>
> I would NOT feel safe to contribute my port to GCC, right now.
> I don't feel safe to even rely on GCC for anything.
>
>
> > > > This is free software.  If you want to make it better, then make
> > > > it better. [...] So prove me wrong.  Do the work.
> > >
> > > This is plain old open source rhetoric.
> > > https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html
> >
> > No, it really isn't.
> >
> > The point of free software is to provide freedom.
>
> True, but naively stated.
>
> Software Freedom is way more than "it works, to free".
> And Freedom itself is more than lack of constraints, but autonomy,
> agency and self-determination.
>
> What Free Software is (and what it is not) has been clearly defined
> here: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/philosophy.html
>
> If it's not what you mean by "free software", I'd suggest you to use
> different terms. Maybe "open source" will do.
>
> But let's not replicate 30 years of debate here (and thousands years of
> phylosophical debate on freedom) and focus on GNU Compiler Collection.
>
>
> > > But you can see how flawed this argument is by comparing it with
> > > your own words:
> > > https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-April/235269.html
> > >
> > > RMS was actively contributing to the Steering Committee without
> > > contributing a single line of code since years.
> > >
> > > So you proved that you (and open source rhetoric) are wrong.
> >
> > I'm sorry, but that doesn't make any sense to me.  I think I was
> > pretty clear in that e-mail message that RMS was not actively
> > contributing to the steering committee.
>
> You said you involved him in SC discussions.
> You said you treated him as a member of the Steering Committee.
>
> Thus he WAS serving as a member of the GCC's Steering Committee.
>
> To me, his oversight on your discussions looked as a serious guarantee
> in the protection of interests of the _global_ Free Software movement.
>
>
> > And, even if he was, so what?  I agree that lots of work on GCC and
> > other free software projects has nothing to do with actual
> > programming.  When I spoke of doing the work, I didn't mean just
> > programming.  I meant the work of making GCC successful, which
> > includes much much more than just writing code. [...]
> >
> > (And for reasons discussed elsewhere, RMS is not a good suggestion.)
>
>
> Ian, maybe there is a language barrier at work.
>
> Maybe it's a huge cultural mismatch that you are not aware of.
>
>
> But really, I cannot think of a single man that did MORE work than
> Stallman to make GCC successful.
>
> He created Free Software.
> He created the GNU Project.
> He created GNU Public License.
> He created the GNU C Compiler. Literally.
> He created a community that improved it for years.
> He served for years as a Steering Committee member.
>
> He worked for decades fighting for software freedom all over the world
> (often against the interests of the companies you work for)
>
>
> He laid the foundations of the building, you are improving the roof.
> Sure YOUR work is way more visible. And it's useful!
>
> But his work is... foundational. Your is not.
>
>
> Yet, YOU removed him.
> On request of a Facebook employee.
>
>
>
> > I don't understand this argument.
>
> I'm sorry, I did my best to explain it.
>
> The RMS removal uncovered an unfair, unbalanced and dangerous influence
> of controversial US corporations tied with the US Department of Defence
> over GNU Compiler Collection development.
>
> Such influence is ongoing since decades.
> And according to you, RMS was not even enough to balance it.
>
>
> Indeed, while I think that RMS was able to balance it, I _THANK_ you for
> his removal since his presence was blinding me and everybody else from
> this huge threat. GCC is foundational to so many supply chain.
>
>
> Yet, I do not have a cancel mob to strumentalize as Nathan did.
>
> And I would never weaponize the real suffering of people, just to attack
> a person or a group, as the companies behind the rms-open-letter did.
> (because everybody can easily see who sponsor most of the organizations
> that signed the letter or wrote similar statements against FSF and RMS).
>
>
> And I see how some of you are already trying to depict my words and me.
>
>
> On Sun, 4 Apr 2021 10:22:35 +0100 Jonathan Wakely wrote:
>
> > I don't even think they're in good faith, I think you're just being
> > a Concern Troll because you're upset about the removal of RMS
>
> On Sat, 3 Apr 2021 20:33:42 +0100 Jonathan Wakely wrote:
>
> > If you really think "being American" is a bigger image problem than
> > "being RMS" then you are part of the problem here.
>
> Jonathan is right: maybe I am part of the problem here.
> I'm sorry for that.
>
> I challenge your politics, your interests and your values.
> So I have to be "upset" and "in bad faith", right?
> I must be cancelled, silenced and forgot.
>
>
> But let me ask to you all: how many other people you will have to
> exclude after Stallman and me, just to prove that you are "inclusive"?
>
>
> I'll give it a rest, as Jonathan requested.
>
> But I'm sad. I feel betrayed and threaten by the direction GCC took.
>
> Mala tempora currunt, sed peiora parantur. :-(
>
>
> Giacomo
>

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Ian Lance Taylor]

On Sun, Apr 4, 2021 at 6:11 AM Giacomo Tesio <giacomo@tesio.it> wrote:
>
> with all respect with your personal history, your contributions and
> choices, I think you are still missing the point.

This conversation is going on circles.  You do not seem to hear what I
am saying, and you are telling me that I am not hearing what you are
saying.  There doesn't seem to be much point to continuing.

I'll just reply to one minor point.


> Thus, I'm not naive enough to ignore the thousands way your employee
> can get huge advantages by having you in the GCC's Steering Committee.

My employer truly doesn't care whether I am on the GCC steering
committee.  My employer no longer uses GCC.  It uses LLVM.

(Now you can spin that into a conspiracy theory that I am somehow
taking Google's direction to leverage my membership on the GCC
steering committee to slow down GCC development.)

Ian

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[David Edelsohn]

As we have expressed, the GCC Steering Committee doesn't micromanage
the development of GCC.  The technical decisions are made by the
Release Managers and the various maintainers.  But if you want to play
nationality bingo, let's play and see what we find, shall we?

The three GCC Release Managers are from Czechia, Germany and the UK.
GCC is proud to have an overabundance of world-class Czech developers
who make amazing contributions to the project and maintain various
critical components.

The four stewards (maintainers) of GDB are from Brazil, France, Israel
and the US.

The two stewards (maintainers) of Binutils are from Australia and the UK.

The GLIBC project stewards are from Brazil, Canada, Czechia, Germany,
Russia, the UK, and the US, with frequent release management by a
developer in India.

Also, all of the appointments of stewards, release managers, and
maintainers are personal appointments.  We don't represent our
nationalities. We don't represent our countries.  We don't represent
our continents. We don't represent our companies; these are not
positions allocated to particular companies.  We don't represent
constituencies, but we bring experience and perspective from various
constituencies as human beings with diverse backgrounds.

These projects have thrived for the past 20+ years under the guidance
of a diverse set of developers as a testament to the benefits of Free
Software.  There always are opportunities for improvement and we
welcome constructive suggestions.

Thanks, David


On Sat, Apr 3, 2021 at 1:33 PM Giacomo Tesio <giacomo@tesio.it> wrote:
>
> Hi Ian, Gerald and GCC all
>
> On Fri, 2 Apr 2021 14:25:34 -0700 Ian Lance Taylor wrote:
>
> > On Fri, Apr 2, 2021 at 3:06 AM Giacomo Tesio <giacomo@tesio.it> wrote:
> > >
> > > I'm sorry for this long mail that rivals with the original Nathan's
> > > request, but I wanted to back my request properly.
> >
> > This is free software.  If you want to make it better, then make it
> > better. [...] So prove me wrong.  Do the work.
>
> Well Ian, I'm glad and honoured to be appointed as a new member of
> the GCC Steering Committee [0]!!! :-D
>
> But now what?
>
> I'm still just one Italian hacker: all the huge imbalances that the
> removal of the only FSF and GNU member of the Steering Committee
> uncovered, are still there!
>
>
> > The EGCS branch that displaced and became GCC came into
> > existence because the people involved felt that it would make GCC
> > better (I was a participant myself, though not a major one).  See
> > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Compiler_Collection#EGCS_fork for a
> > few more details.
>
> A very interesting read, thanks!
>
> I didn't know that the Steering Committee was subject to these sort of
> power imbalances since 1999! It has been more than twenty years! :-o
>
>
> > I personally do not believe that the membership of the steering
> > committee is a significant cause of that problem.
>
> I would be surprised if you did!
>
> I mean, you are a member of such committee since 2 decades.
> And you are from the US. And you work for the biggest threat to
> global democracies and to all people's autonomy and freedom!
>
>
> But that's the fact with priviledge: if you have it, you can't see it.
>
> Yet as a C++ programmer, you will have no difficulty to properly
> abstract what Peggy McIntosh described in 1989[1] beyond the cultural
> context you share: US-priviledge is to the rest of the world, what
> white-priviledge is in the United States. [2]
>
>
> > But I could be mistaken.  So prove me wrong.
>
> Ok, let's try! ;-)
>
>
> > This is free software.  If you want to make it better, then make it
> > better. [...] So prove me wrong.  Do the work.
>
> This is plain old open source rhetoric.
> https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html
>
> The GNU Compiler Collection is a GNU project and Free Software.
>
> I'm not suprised to see this sort of arguments from a FSF-less and
> GNU-less Steering Committee (nor from a Google employee[3]).
>
> Indeed it is what scares me so much, what makes me feel unsafe at
> contributing to GCC and it is exactly why I asked to fix the GCC
> Steering Committee after the removal of RMS.
>
>
> But you can see how flawed this argument is by comparing it with your
> own words: https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-April/235269.html
>
> RMS was actively contributing to the Steering Committee without
> contributing a single line of code since years.
>
> So you proved that you (and open source rhetoric) are wrong.
>
>
> > If I knew how to fix that problem, I would work to fix it.
>
> Really?
>
> Well, let me do my job as a new member of the Steering Committee (:-D)
> and solve this problem for you and everybody else.
>
> In my original request[3], I proposed to solve it according to the
> recent precedent you established with the removal of Richard Stallman of
> Free Software Foundation [4][5], by simply removing enough employees of
> corporations ruled under the same legislation, until the global
> interests of the different economical regions and populations of the
> world are at least more balanced, if not more represented.
>
> But apparently you cannot decide which US-corporation should be thrown.
> (indeed US-corporations hold the vast majoirity of SC heads, right now).
>
>
> So we have two other possible approach:
>
> 1) dismantle the Steering Committee and assign its role to a benevolent
>    dictator for life from FSF
> 2) ask to the Chief GNUisance to fix the GNU Compiler Collection's
>    Steering Committee
>
> As for me, I'm not attached to power or priviledge: I'm fine with both.
> I happily resign from the Steering Committee right now (:-D).
>
>
> But to be honest, I think the second option is better.
>
> (Theoretically, adding RMS's oversight back to the Steering Committee
> could be a third option, since he would grant the same warranties as
> before, but you told he was mostly absent and didn't really followed
> the GCC evolution, so now I can't say if having him back would be
> enough anymore.)
>
>
>
> On Sat, 3 Apr 2021 02:22:08 +0200 (CEST) Gerald Pfeifer wrote:
>
> > On Thu, 1 Apr 2021, Giacomo Tesio wrote:
> > > Oh well, sure, but luckily the solution is just as fast and easy as
> > > it was to remove RMS: pick just one person for each nationality and
> > > remove the others.
> >
> > Why nationalities? That strikes me as a rather specific view focusing
> > on one of many attributes (and I believe there's more nationalities
> > than you might think, and a bigger variety of backgrounds).
>
> Well, this is a great question Gerald!
>
> After all, you removed RMS, that is American too!
>
> For sure there are different ways to classify people.
> Google, for example, revealed that they plan to build FLoCs with
> roughtly a thousand persons each, so we can desume they are able to
> segment the humanity into a milion of different behavioural groups,
> each responding to a particular set of cognitive manipulations
> (they call this large-scale automated global threat "AdTech").
>
>
> So why nationalities?
>
> Well, there are a few good reasons indeed.
>
> To some degree, the people from a nation share the same history and
> culture, they study roughly the same topics at school, they share the
> same cultural environment and values, they share (on average) the same
> geopolitical interests and they benefit from the same power relations.
>
>
> Moreover they are subject to the same legislation.
>
> And some legislations are more problematic than others, for the people
> outside their rules. For example, the European Court of Justice had to
> invalidate the Privacy Shield because the US do not let US-corporation
> to respect the privacy of non-US people [6].
>
>
> > > People all over the world, whatever their country, should be sure
> > > to be treated fairly and equally by the GCC leaders even if they
> > > want to contribute something that does not match the culture or
> > > interests you represent.
> >
> > I will argue that is the case as of today and would like to see
> > potential counter examples (if any) so that we can address those -or-
> > file the point above as FUD.
>
> No Gerard it's not FUD, but probabilistic risk assessment.
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Probabilistic_risk_assessment
>
> As you know, risk assessment is based on probability and severity of an
> outcome. Let's even assume that the probability of a misbehaviour in
> the SC is low (I think you can agree with me that it's not zero), can
> you estimate the severity of an espionage attack based on GCC?
>
> For sure, such severity is lower if you live in (or work for) the US[6].
> But there are billions of people, millions of companies and hundreds of
> Governments relying on software built with GCC!
>
>
> Give a read at this:
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosures_(2013%E2%80%93present)
>
> Then look at the GCC vulnerabilities discovered over the years
> https://www.cvedetails.com/vulnerability-list.php?vendor_id=72&product_id=960&version_id=&page=1&hasexp=0&opdos=0&opec=0&opov=0&opcsrf=0&opgpriv=0&opsqli=0&opxss=0&opdirt=0&opmemc=0&ophttprs=0&opbyp=0&opfileinc=0&opginf=0&cvssscoremin=5&cvssscoremax=0&year=0&month=0&cweid=0&order=3&trc=8&sha=1983b3d9908d852bd8b1cb5901c82b110579ba01
>
> I still remember the scandal of CVE-2000-1219 [7] and CVE-2008-1367 [8]
> but my favourite one is CVE-2015-5276 [9].
>
> After the Snowden's revelations, having in the Steering Committee so
> many people working for companies with tight ties with the US
> Department of Defense, is a huge risk for everybody outside the US.
>
>
>
> Sure: they would always have plausible deniability for every bug, but...
>
> Please, do not waive this global risk as "FUD".
> Even if it doesn't affect you, it's a threat for everybody else.
>
>
> You removed FSF and GNU from the Steering Committee on request of a
> Facebook employee and because of RMS's "extremely offensive repugnant
> opinions" for some of your fellow citizens.
>
> Now I'm showing you an issue that is way more serious and hugely affects
> all people all over the world.
>
> We cannot afford to grant you plausible deniability on this.
>
>
> You promptly "fixed" the RMS issue. Please fix this too.
>
>
> Giacomo
>
>
> [0] Just kidding. ;-)
>     Everything else being the same, my presence wouldn't change a dime.
>
> [1]
> https://nationalseedproject.org/Key-SEED-Texts/white-privilege-unpacking-the-invisible-knapsack
>
> [2] Indeed Trump was iconic: one of the most rich-white-straight-male
>     among US citizens to rule the most priviledged among countries.
>
> [3] Unfortunately, Sinclair's law applies here: "It is difficult to get
>     a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not
>     understanding it."
>
> [3] https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-April/235285.html
>
> [4] GNU Compiler Collection's SC before FSF's and GNU's member removal
> http://web.archive.org/web/20210330171044/https://gcc.gnu.org/steering.html
>
> [5] GNU Compiler Collection's SC after FSF's and GNU's member removal
> http://web.archive.org/web/20210331192841/https://gcc.gnu.org/steering.html
>
> [6] I mentioned the US Cloud Act, FISA, PPD 128, E.O. 12333, etc but
>     give a look at https://curia.europa.eu/juris/liste.jsf?num=C-311/18
>
> [7] https://www.cvedetails.com/cve/CVE-2000-1219/
>
> [8] https://www.cvedetails.com/cve/CVE-2008-1367/
>
> [9] https://www.cvedetails.com/cve/CVE-2015-5276/

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee (was: Remove RMS...)

[Jonathan Wakely]

On Thu, 1 Apr 2021, 01:05 Giacomo Tesio, <giacomo@tesio.it> wrote:

>
> People all over the world, whatever their country, should be sure to be
> treated fairly and equally by the GCC leaders even if they want to
> contribute something that does not match the culture or interests you
> represent.
>


Everybody is welcome to send patches for GCC. The steering committee
doesn't decide what people work on, and they don't approve patches.

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee (was: Remove RMS...)

[Jonathan Wakely]

On Thu, 1 Apr 2021 at 10:13, Jonathan Wakely wrote:
>
>
>
> On Thu, 1 Apr 2021, 01:05 Giacomo Tesio, <giacomo@tesio.it> wrote:
>>
>>
>> People all over the world, whatever their country, should be sure to be
>> treated fairly and equally by the GCC leaders even if they want to
>> contribute something that does not match the culture or interests you
>> represent.
>
>
>
> Everybody is welcome to send patches for GCC. The steering committee doesn't decide what people work on, and they don't approve patches.

I don't think "the West" creates the same perceptual problem for
potential new contributors as Nathan explained in his original email.
Of course more diversity in the GCC community and the SC is needed.
But if you think simply being American causes the same (or "more
severe") image problem, maybe you missed the point of Nathan's
original email.

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee (was: Remove RMS...)

[Gerald Pfeifer]

On Thu, 1 Apr 2021, Giacomo Tesio wrote:
> Oh well, sure, but luckily the solution is just as fast and easy as
> it was to remove RMS: pick just one person for each nationality and
> remove the others.

Why nationalities? That strikes me as a rather specific view focusing on 
one of many attributes (and I believe there's more nationalities than you 
might think, and a bigger variety of backgrounds).

> People all over the world, whatever their country, should be sure to 
> be treated fairly and equally by the GCC leaders even if they want to
> contribute something that does not match the culture or interests you
> represent.

I will argue that is the case as of today and would like to see potential 
counter examples (if any) so that we can address those -or- file the point
above as FUD.

Note that contributions are generally reviewed and accepted by our group 
of maintainers per the MAINTAINERS file (not the steering commitee) and 
releases driven by our release managers.

Gerald

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Andrea Corallo]

Giacomo Tesio <giacomo@tesio.it> writes:

> Hi David, thanks for sharing!
>
> On Wed, 31 Mar 2021 14:27:29 -0400 David Edelsohn via Gcc wrote:
>
>> In 2012 RMS was added to the GCC Steering Committee web page
>> based on his role in the GNU Project [...]
>> we are removing him from the page.
>
> I have to admit that I had never carefully observed the list of members
> of the GCC steering committee. As I explained before in this thread,
> the presence of Stallman gave me enough reassurance that GCC would have
> honoured the values of Free Software.
>
> As I said, enough to chose to port GCC to Jehanne instead of another
> C compiler, in the hope to contribute back the port upstream, to GNU.
>
>
> But now that I'm comparing the old web page [1] and the new one [2],
> I realized something entirely new to me.
>
>
> 10 out of 13 members of the GCC steering committee work either for
> American corporations (8), their subsidiaries (1) or an American 
> University (1) recently covered by the press in India [3].
> Also, 4 of these work for the same corporation (IBM / Red Hat).
>
> The other 3 are from German GmbH (2) or from a Nederlands public agency.
>
[...]

Hi Giacomo,

thanks for your mail.

Unfortunately I think is clear at this points what's the "Open Source"
corporates position on this affair.

A weak and malleable FSF and Free Software community is to many a very
comfortable situation.  Excluding RMS leveraging cancel culture proved
to be the perfect strategy.  Cancel culture is extremely powerful, it
induces strong emotions and participation on people in good faith,
freedom of speech and rationality go quickly in background (reminds me
something of the past).

Fighting against that often proves to be a desperate task, this is
really just the perfect storm.

Those who loses is just us, a divided and weaker movement.

Regards

  Andrea

Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Monday, April 05, 2021 at 1:10 AM
> From: "Giacomo Tesio" <giacomo@tesio.it>
> To: "Ian Lance Taylor" <iant@google.com>
> Cc: "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>, "Nathan Sidwell" <nathan@acm.org>
> Subject: Re: RMS removed from the GCC Steering Committee
>
> Ian,
>
> with all respect with your personal history, your contributions and
> choices, I think you are still missing the point.
>
>
> On April 3, 2021 11:45:23 PM UTC, Ian Lance Taylor <iant@google.com>
> wrote:
> > But you have singled out removing RMS (who as David noted was never
> > really a member of the committee anyhow) as a particular problem.
> > Let's not forget that RMS is an American.
>
> Indeed.
> It's important to note that I'm not, in any way, arguing against
> Americans in GCC (as somebody is trying to frame what I wrote).
>
> I'm scared by the dangerous influence that dangeours US corporations
> and a dangerous military nation with a long history of human rights
> violations (see Snowden's and Assange's revelations and the ongoing
> Assange's trial) HAVE over the GCC development.
>
>
> It's not just matter of actual backdoors or priviledged access to
> zero-days: it's mainly a soft power that can influence development of
> GCC by slowing down or fastening certain features, as you explained the
> SC did in several occasions (the Nathan's libcody, the plugin framework
> and many other that were too subtle to catch from outside the Steering
> Committee).
>
> We are all seasoned developers.
> We know how this sort of politics can influence software development.
>
> We all know that technology is a prosecution of politics by other means.
>
>
> >  So the imbalance you mention was there already.
>
> Except that the President of FSF (and Chief GNUissance himself) was
> receiving copy of all the communications of the Steering Committee.
>
> I think we do agree that FSF and RMS are really trustworthy when
> it comes to protect Free Software interests.
>
> After all, FSF is the most credible no-profit dedicated to this goal.
>
>
> > And you are confusing my employer with my free software work.

It is acceptable to do free software work, irrespective of the actions
of your employer.  Although one realises that there could be greater
scrutiny on your work.  People would be entitled to question certain
actions and dig deeper than usual because of conflicts of interests
or allegiances that have previously been documented in other cases.

For instance the Chaos Computer Club France (CCCF) was a fake hacker
organisation under the command of Directorate of Territorial Surveillance
and the Armed Forces of the French Government.

> No.
>
> Simply, I work in the field since two decades myself.
>
> Thus, I'm not naive enough to ignore the thousands way your employee
> can get huge advantages by having you in the GCC's Steering Committee.
>
> As a small example among many many others, you are using a @google.com
> mail address while serving in the Steering Committee.

It is a personal decision and choice what type of computing or services one
uses.  That does net stop anybody developing free software.

Although the best way is to lead "by example", it is a mistake to demand that
one you cannot do any work within a committee if you do not set a strict policy
for everything one does.  Similarly, it is a mistake to  disengage Richard Stallman because of personal views that he may hold.  One could for instance take the extreme
position towards Stallman by stating that it is wrong to use boycott all free software
that have ever been produced as a result of his work, because of his behaviour.


For instance, it was a mistake for MIT to remove all online courses on physics that
he had done.  This is equivalent to censorship, banning, and book burning in Nazi
Germany.  Only idiots or evil beings do such things.

I was discussing the case of Walter Lewin in the previous paragraph.

> > > But that's the fact with priviledge: if you have it, you can't see
> > > it.
> >
> > I'm sure that's largely true.  And I'm well aware that I have enormous
> > amounts of privilege.
> >
> > But you write that statement as though it contradicts something that I
> > said.  It doesn't.
>
> It doesn't contraddict what you said, indeed.
>
> On the contrary, it explains WHY you are debating against an urgent
> fix to the GCC Steering Committee on my request, while you had no
> problem to promptly remove Stallman on Nathan's request.
>
> You care more about the sensibility of those that share Nathan's values
> and interests (that are pretty similar to your own), than about the huge
> threat that a Steering Committee deeply influenced and controlled by
> US corporations with long ties to the US Department of Defence
> constitutea.
>
>
> Maybe this will attract more US people (or likely-minded ones), but for
> sure, it will pose a huge burden on everybody outside the US to
> contribute and even use GCC.
>
> I would NOT feel safe to contribute my port to GCC, right now.
> I don't feel safe to even rely on GCC for anything.
>
>
> > > > This is free software.  If you want to make it better, then make
> > > > it better. [...] So prove me wrong.  Do the work.
> > >
> > > This is plain old open source rhetoric.
> > > https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html
> >
> > No, it really isn't.
> >
> > The point of free software is to provide freedom.
>
> True, but naively stated.
>
> Software Freedom is way more than "it works, to free".
> And Freedom itself is more than lack of constraints, but autonomy,
> agency and self-determination.
>
> What Free Software is (and what it is not) has been clearly defined
> here: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/philosophy.html
>
> If it's not what you mean by "free software", I'd suggest you to use
> different terms. Maybe "open source" will do.
>
> But let's not replicate 30 years of debate here (and thousands years of
> phylosophical debate on freedom) and focus on GNU Compiler Collection.
>
>
> > > But you can see how flawed this argument is by comparing it with
> > > your own words:
> > > https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2021-April/235269.html
> > >
> > > RMS was actively contributing to the Steering Committee without
> > > contributing a single line of code since years.
> > >
> > > So you proved that you (and open source rhetoric) are wrong.
> >
> > I'm sorry, but that doesn't make any sense to me.  I think I was
> > pretty clear in that e-mail message that RMS was not actively
> > contributing to the steering committee.
>
> You said you involved him in SC discussions.
> You said you treated him as a member of the Steering Committee.
>
> Thus he WAS serving as a member of the GCC's Steering Committee.
>
> To me, his oversight on your discussions looked as a serious guarantee
> in the protection of interests of the _global_ Free Software movement.
>
>
> > And, even if he was, so what?  I agree that lots of work on GCC and
> > other free software projects has nothing to do with actual
> > programming.  When I spoke of doing the work, I didn't mean just
> > programming.  I meant the work of making GCC successful, which
> > includes much much more than just writing code. [...]
> >
> > (And for reasons discussed elsewhere, RMS is not a good suggestion.)
>
>
> Ian, maybe there is a language barrier at work.
>
> Maybe it's a huge cultural mismatch that you are not aware of.
>
>
> But really, I cannot think of a single man that did MORE work than
> Stallman to make GCC successful.
>
> He created Free Software.
> He created the GNU Project.
> He created GNU Public License.
> He created the GNU C Compiler. Literally.
> He created a community that improved it for years.
> He served for years as a Steering Committee member.
>
> He worked for decades fighting for software freedom all over the world
> (often against the interests of the companies you work for)
>
>
> He laid the foundations of the building, you are improving the roof.
> Sure YOUR work is way more visible. And it's useful!
>
> But his work is... foundational. Your is not.
>
>
> Yet, YOU removed him.
> On request of a Facebook employee.
>
>
>
> > I don't understand this argument.
>
> I'm sorry, I did my best to explain it.
>
> The RMS removal uncovered an unfair, unbalanced and dangerous influence
> of controversial US corporations tied with the US Department of Defence
> over GNU Compiler Collection development.
>
> Such influence is ongoing since decades.
> And according to you, RMS was not even enough to balance it.
>
>
> Indeed, while I think that RMS was able to balance it, I _THANK_ you for
> his removal since his presence was blinding me and everybody else from
> this huge threat. GCC is foundational to so many supply chain.
>
>
> Yet, I do not have a cancel mob to strumentalize as Nathan did.
>
> And I would never weaponize the real suffering of people, just to attack
> a person or a group, as the companies behind the rms-open-letter did.
> (because everybody can easily see who sponsor most of the organizations
> that signed the letter or wrote similar statements against FSF and RMS).
>
>
> And I see how some of you are already trying to depict my words and me.
>
>
> On Sun, 4 Apr 2021 10:22:35 +0100 Jonathan Wakely wrote:
>
> > I don't even think they're in good faith, I think you're just being
> > a Concern Troll because you're upset about the removal of RMS
>
> On Sat, 3 Apr 2021 20:33:42 +0100 Jonathan Wakely wrote:
>
> > If you really think "being American" is a bigger image problem than
> > "being RMS" then you are part of the problem here.
>
> Jonathan is right: maybe I am part of the problem here.
> I'm sorry for that.
>
> I challenge your politics, your interests and your values.
> So I have to be "upset" and "in bad faith", right?
> I must be cancelled, silenced and forgot.
>
>
> But let me ask to you all: how many other people you will have to
> exclude after Stallman and me, just to prove that you are "inclusive"?
>
>
> I'll give it a rest, as Jonathan requested.
>
> But I'm sad. I feel betrayed and threaten by the direction GCC took.
>
> Mala tempora currunt, sed peiora parantur. :-(
>
>
> Giacomo
>