[Fsf-friends] Statement of FSF India board on recent incidents

[renuka prasad]

On Sat, Nov 29, 2008 at 1:55 PM, Vikram Vincent <vincentvikram at gmail.com>wrote:

> Greetings,
> From http://www.gnu.org.in/board-statement-on-recent-issues
>
> <quote>
> * *
>
> *9. Are the members of the Director Board of FSF India elected? *
>
> <snip> As mentioned in the answer to an earlier question, FSF India is not
> a mass movement and is not a democratic organisation. The purpose of FSF
> India, as of FSF, is to provide guidance to the Free Software movement. This
> purpose could be easily defeated if it is made into an elected body.
>
> </quote>
> India is considered one of the biggest democracies in the world and the
> Free Software Movement is for the democratisation of technology and
> knowledge. However, the namesake of FSF in India ie., FSF-India, whose role
> is to lead the Free Software Movement has clearly defined itself as
> undemocratic.
>
> Let us take things objectively to analyse, debate and come to some sort of
> an understanding.
>
> Democracy, transparency and openness are considered the pillars of the free
> software movement. We talk about free(or open) standards, free knowledge,
> etc.. and then we hear "Democracy? That is only for theory."
> How can one ensure democratisation of knowledge if one is undemocratic?
>

Dont know this information is relevant but i felt this might be a useful
information

Quoting from RMS's Essays :
Chapter 20: Free Software : Freedom and Cooperation
paragraph 3: ( please understand the context in which this assay was written
and then this  paragraph will be clear)
   In this respect, free software is a new mechanism for democracy to
operate. Pro-
fessor Lessig, now at Stanford, noted that code functions as a kind of law.
Whoever gets to write the code that just about everybody uses for all
intents and purposes is writing the laws that run people's lives. With free
software, these laws get written in a democratic way. Not the classical form
of democracy–we don't have a big election and say, "Everybody vote which way
should this feature be done." [audience laughs] Instead we say, basically,
those of you who want to work on implementing
the feature this way, do it. And if you want to work on implementing the
feature
that way, do it. And, it gets done one way or the other, you know? And so,
if a lot of people want it this way, it'll get done this way. In this way,
everybody contributes
to the social decision by simply taking steps in the direction that he wants
to go.
   And you're free to take as many steps, personally, as you want to take. A
business
is free to commission as many steps as they find useful to take. And after
you add
all these things up, that says which direction the software goes.


>
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