I have been contacted by several people on Discord and Matrix who told me that they were sent creepy messages by the anti-Stallman crowd, calling them to remove their signatures and threatening to stalk them, get them fired etc. I know there are people who are still reluctant to sign, fearing future retaliation.

They are trying to address similar issues here: https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/2460

How do you propose we do it? I don't want to put a scary notice at the top because I think it will do more to scare people away than to responsibly inform them that there might be crazy creepy people trying to stalk them.

I also do not think those threats have any substance, and I do not seriously believe for a moment that anyone will have any IRL problems for signing this letter, and would like to communicate that clearly.

Hey everyone,

As many of you have noticed, you've gotten an email regarding a poll "for a support letter for Galla Mancheva and Susanne Eiswirt". Although it might actually look legitimate, it isn't. I haven't dealt with the FSF ever and especially not with FSFE, so it's almost certainly a spam email. The data was most likely scraped from the letter itself and checked against the email addresses for our GitHub accounts. Don't click any links in the email, as the links might run tracking scripts on your device.

https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/discuss-gnustep/2015-12/msg00168.html

GitHub does things that are quite bad for free software and is
not interested in changing them.

Friends, please, do NOT legitimate the harassers by going after their signatures.
Grant all people the freedom we want for us (and for RMS).

First, you would legitimate the "petition letter" method, and while our letter was a needed defence of RMS and FSF against attackers, we should NOT legitimate these methods.

Second, you would be described as harassers, helping the attackers to pose a victims when they are not.

THIRD and more important: if any idiot that signed our letter actually goes after the signers of the other letter, we should take distance from such conduct. Victims are victims, whatever their opinion, and they deserve our support.

Remember: We are JUST defending Free Software.
Do not, PLEASE, do not behave like the attackers, harassing single persons for their opinions.

NOTE Sorry @rms-support-letter, this is not an issue but I felt urged to spread this after reading #4898.

continuation of https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/848 (issue has since been deleted) in a place where discussion is allowed since the people behind that repository have shown they are unwilling to have one like an adult

Here is a list of locked issues Issue | deleted | reason | notes | archive ------- | --------- | ---------- | ------- | ----------- https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/120 | no | too heated | responded after followup locking | https://archive.is/1lJKy https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/401 | no | no reason | [2] | https://archive.is/990bb https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/667 | yes | no reason | [1] linked https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/672 | yes | no reason https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/676 | yes | no reason | | https://web.archive.org/web/20210324100146/https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/676 https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/696 | yes | no reason https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/756 | yes | no reason https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/794 | yes | no reason | [1] linked | https://archive.is/CM9C1 https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/811 | yes | too heated | [1] linked https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/848 | yes | no reason | I have no interest in discussing this further here. - neilmcgovern https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/909 | no | off topic | | https://archive.is/jnH0H https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/924 | yes | spam https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/939 | no | off topic | asking about a gitlab repository | https://archive.is/tOj7D https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/940 | yes | no reason | asked where to support RMS | https://archive.is/A0yFZ https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/949 | yes | too heated | | https://archive.is/i0lSW https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/951 | yes | | | screenshot https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/970 | yes | no reason | | https://archive.is/pgjW6 https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/1033 | no | off topic | | https://archive.is/yhHeL https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/1136 | no | off topic | | https://archive.is/NbGsP https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/1284 | no | off topic | | https://archive.is/nE4n0 https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/1401 | no | resolved | https://twitter.com/torproject/status/1374754834050654212 | https://archive.is/JqtOW https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/2085 | no | resolved | | https://archive.is/4LTso https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/2250 | yes | | | https://web.archive.org/web/20210326075456/https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/2250 https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/2259 | yes | | | https://web.archive.org/web/20210326080553/https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/2259 https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io#2414 | yes | | | https://archive.is/3nPXN https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io#2427 | yes | | | https://archive.is/qT4SF

[1] https://xkcd.com/1357/

[2] some improvements https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/issues/401 (archive), https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/pull/791 (archive) & https://github.com/rms-open-letter/rms-open-letter.github.io/pull/910 (archive) have been opened to correct the letter and have been rejected with the reasoning that the letter has been signed by too many people that altering would invalidate the the signatures

Here is a list of people in charge of the open letter repository

• @mollydb
• @neilmcgovern
• @ehashman

This list does not exist to encourage harrasment, and I beg you not to go after these people, but rather mirrors my belives from this issue (archive last comment) which I am going to paraphrase again in the case it gets deleted:

• While I believe the opinion of everyone matters I also believe that on certain subjects the opinion of people outside of the subject is inherently of less value

It is best to make your own judgement on the letter and this just stands to document what has happened In no way am I saying that closing, locking or deleting is a bad thing but the people above have not only proven to be that they are unwilling to have a discussion debating points of the letter but are also willingly malicious by citing points that are no longer true or outright lies and being unwilling to append a correction

open letter

stars: 575 fork: 2.1k translated languages: 17 signatures: 2895

support letter

stars: 1.9k fork: 3.8k translated languages: 26 signatures: 4080

The community has spoken. Majority of us want RMS to stay. You don't need to agree with RMS, because this issue is much greater than RMS, they target the free software movement and our freedom of expression. I signed this letter, even though I disagree with RMS on many issues.

After significant thought on the matter, and given how Molly has refused to address public inquiries, it is my proposal that a mirror of her open letter against RMS and the FSF be created to gather signatures for her removal from various organizations that she has associated with this criminal act.

I recommend this with hesitation, as, I do not want to see the same tactics she is using spring from my suggestion -- libel, cyberstalking, harassment are inexcusable. She should not be threatened -- it would only embolden her and give her ammunition to spin around into justification.

But, if her stance will be that her open letter is not in violation of the law or in codes of conduct or other policies on Github, Gnome Foundation, then perhaps an open letter demanding her removal with as many signatures might be advantageous to have exist as this develops.

Sometimes it is the canceler who should be canceled, and, I believe this is one of those situations.

Currently we have Matrix as our central point of bridges. However, @kompowiec proposed on #6651 that we should use IRC as the central point instead, for the following reasons:

Well, I think it is worth combing than to divide. IRC is a good starting point for bridging the other protocols because:

• is simple protocol and easy to implemented

• works everywhere

• it's a IEFT standard

• backward compatibility - my xmpp server don't use biboumi, just something else, but still works. Meanwhile bridge with matrix to IRC break occasionally due to protocol changes

What do you guys think?

$ find _data/signed -type f -iname *.yaml | xargs md5sum | sort | awk '{if (a[$1]) { print $1, a[$1], $2 } else {a[$1]=$2}}'
7b800a5c1e5122b5dc2f4036d2b7db6c _data/signed/anon72.yaml _data/signed/hexherhide666.yaml

Deletions and additions seem to be alternating. https://github.com/rms-support-letter/rms-support-letter.github.io/commits/master/_data/signed/anon72.yaml

rel: https://github.com/rms-support-letter/rms-support-letter.github.io/issues/4134

On #general-2 it was mentioned there is a need for an easier way to add signatures à la change.org. I should be able to bang something out this weekend with Flask and Heroku.

Brain dump

Some of my thoughts on how to best approach this.

UI/UX

All that is needed is:

• A brief description of what is being signed.
• Two text boxes for the name and a link to social media / website / email ...
• Confirm button.

Storage

We could either:

• Somehow directly commit files to / create PRs on this repo.
• Store the signatures somewhere and export them periodically.

Heroku offers PostgreSQL which we can use for storage.

Reviewing / confirming signatures

This can be either done manually or via email. I don't know if forcing the use of email is desirable though.

Heroku supports sending emails from apps though I haven't looked much at the options.

There was a proposal by @CrazyPython I'm copying: make a site called "diverse-free-software" as an addition to Stallmansupport to:

• show the diversity of the movement
• show who signed our letter
• even quote stuff like Molly's "Stallman has never made me feel uncomfortable"

In my opinion, it can help, because some people ignore "stallmansupport.org" just because it's called that way. It will help a bit, because more people will know what we actually do and thing, showing we're a side that's more accepting to other people and their opinions.

While the situation died down, some negativity remains and it can help put out the fires.

Things are calming down, but we have two communities from now on. One denounces RMS, other doesn't. There's still little communication and there's a bit of conflict when somebody doesn't want to listen to you.

The fact many don't know the situation can potentially hurt RMS at a later date. FSF is almost broken, and it's probably broken because it relied on sponsorship money. The fact our letter only had appeared only in some news is strange, as well.

What can we do from now on to mend and improve things? Should we act at all? I propose an open discussion on that matter.

Free software means that the users have the freedom to run, edit, contribute to, and share the software.

FSF have been defending the rights of all software users for the past 35 years.

Donate directly or become an associate member today to help FSF for many more.

Learn more about the Philosophy of free software: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/philosophy.html

For existing members and incoming donators, you may add affiliation like name: (FSF associate member).

After merging a lot of pull requests, I know there are a lot of people leaving a memo on why they sign. Maybe we can extract them via GitHub's CLI tool. Those messages go into void after signing, how about we collect them?

Examples: https://github.com/rms-support-letter/rms-support-letter.github.io/pull/3824 https://github.com/rms-support-letter/rms-support-letter.github.io/pull/3823

It is not urgent or critical, but it may be interesting to see they what they said :)