[OSI] [ESR] Open Source Iniciative bans co-founder, Eric S. Raymond.

[Zenaan Harkness]

Great post!


> <https://lunduke.com/posts/2020-03-9-b>
> 
> Open Source Initiative bans co-founder, Eric S Raymond
>  Mar 9, 2020
> 
> Last week, Eric S Raymond (often known as ESR
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_S._Raymond>, author of The Cathedral
> and the Bazaar <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cathedral_and_the_Bazaar>,
> and co-founder of the Open Source Intiative
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Source_Initiative>) was banned from the
> Open Source Intiative (the “OSI”).
> 
> Specifically, Raymond was banned from the mailing lists used to organize
> and communicate with the OSI.
> 
> For an organization to ban their founder from communicating with the group
> (such as via a mailing list) is a noteworthy move.
> 
> At a time when we have seen other founders (of multiple Free and Open
> Source related initiatives) pushed out of the organizations they founded
> (such as with Richard Stallman being compelled to resign from the Free
> Software Foundation, or the attempts to remove Linus Torvalds from the
> Linux Kernel – both of which happened within the last year) it seems worth
> taking a deeper look at what, specifically, is happening with the Open
> Source Initiative.
> 
> I don't wish to tell any of you what you should think about this
> significant move. As such I will simply provide as much of the relevant
> information as I can, show the timeline of events, and reach out to all
> involved parties for their points of view and comments.
> 
> Raymond made the following statement, on February 27, 2020, on his personal
> blog <http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=8609>:
> 
> “I – OSI’s co-founder and its president for its first six years – was
> kicked off their lists for being too rhetorically forceful in opposing
> certain recent attempts to subvert OSD clauses 5 and 6. This despite the
> fact that I had vocal support from multiple list members who thanked me for
> being willing to speak out.
> 
> It shouldn’t be news to anyone that there is an effort afoot to change – I
> would say corrupt – the fundamental premises of the open-source culture.
> Instead of meritocracy and “show me the code”, we are now urged to behave
> so that no-one will ever feel uncomfortable.
> 
> The effect – the intended effect – is to diminish the prestige and autonomy
> of people who do the work – write the code – in favor of self-appointed
> tone-policers. In the process, the freedom to speak necessary truths even
> when the manner in which they are expressed is unpleasant is being
> gradually strangled.
> 
> And that is bad for us. Very bad. Both directly – it damages our
> self-correction process – and in its second-order effects. The habit of
> institutional tone policing, even when well-intentioned, too easily slides
> into the active censorship of disfavored views.”
...
o

The more such censorious self righteousness (as has been exercised against Torvalds, Stallman, now ESR, and many others) is given air time and publicity, the better - the true intentions of "petty nazis" or "snowflakes" or "liberal censors" or "exclude to include" hypocrites, is a good thing to expose and the sooner real people, not the moronic NPCs causing these problems, will learn to get a handle on communication, power, and the holding of authority.

Lessons being learned ...