stormchaser3000

a poem by stormchaser3000

I am the centre of a web the centre of the world an army at my command as I command death or life

I say the word to the word the world listens to the army my command and yet it is not enough

I need more and more and more

why just this tiny world this sphere is but one

ever so bright the lights in the sky at night should souls be found on such celestial bodies every light, every sky, every life …

shall be mine

power as hunger can never be satisfied

I break thy frail chains which to this world did tie me and to foolishness I do run

war was started. many were lost my power is nothing my mind I have lost

as lights close in I do bow I see now

power is as wind which cannot be got for he who tries shall become as dust

disclaimer: this document is based on my own experience and not the knowledge of a psychological or sociological professional/expert

I have been trying to figure out why on earth people are so incredibly mad at each other. it's possible that I will never fully understand anger because it is not an emotion that I experience very often. All I can say is that it pains me to see people yelling and screaming abusively at each other.

in my years of dealing with arguments on video game servers. I discovered a common trend in how arguments tend to escalate. One of the main things I see is when a person gets mad at someone for something they perceive as wrong and tries to insult them. this is how a lot of arguments get started. The argument then escalates when the insulted person gets offended and angry and tries to insult the insulter. The argument can get bigger and bigger until physical threats of violence and other rather rash things are said.

How do we counteract this? in my experience, when someone tries to insult you and you get mad, it is a good idea to not respond until later when you are not mad. Is it really worth your time to get back at someone who clearly doesn't have the wisdom to realize that it is not a good idea to be rude and insult someone. In my opinion it is better to wait until you have calmed down and are willing to talk it over if necessary.

Another thing you can do is apologize. If you don't know what you did then ask. apologies can go a long way toward making peace. You don't have to be overly apologetic, but make sure that the person who was offended by your actions knows that you didn't mean to offend them.

One of the best ways to prevent an argument is to assume that someone means well by their actions. If you assume that someone means well by their actions and don't get offended, then, in my experience, you are less likely to get mad and say something that could start a major argument.

I have a hard time understanding anger because I don't really get angry at people, But I have seen many arguments on game servers. I hope that this short write up will help some people in some way shape or form with preventing an argument from getting to the point of physical violence. Possibly even preventing the argument in the first place.

if you have read any Linux or FreeBSD news you may have heard the term Open Source. You may also have heard the term Free Software. both terms basically mean that software licensed under compatible licenses should have their code/functionality available to their users, and that the users should be able to redistrubute, modify, and distribute modified versions of the code, but there are differences between the two afformentioned terms.

Let's start with the term Free Software. Free Software is an interesting term because usually when people think of the word “free” they think “free of charge,” however this is not the case with Free Software. The concept of Free Software is actually set of four philisophical and ethical guidelines created by an organization called the Free Software Foundation. These guidelines were created because of a belief that much of the software in existance is licensed in such a way that the users of the software are often treated badly. The reason that the word “free” in “Free Software” does not refer to “free of charge” is because the afformentioned guidelines do not say anything about not being able to charge money for software. the four guidelines (freedoms as they are called by the Free Software Foundation) are listed below:

Freedom 0: the Freedom to run the program.

Freerom 1: the freedom to study and change the program in source code form (the human readable version of the functionality of a program).

Freedom 2: the freedom to distribute exact copies of the program.

Freedom 3: the freedom to distribute modified version of the program.

The concept of Free Software is why we have cool software such as the GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program) or LibreOffice (a Free Software alternative to Microsoft Office). Also, Without Free Software there would be no Open Source.

Open Source is different from Free Software because it is more of a business model then a set of philisophical and ethical guidelines. the idea of Open Source is that a person or business should open up their code so the community can improve it for them. the Open Source Definition (OSD from now on) is a set of guidelines on how businesses can use the community to improve upon their code. It is interesting, however, that the terms Free Software and Open Source tend to overlap. the difference is in what both terms focus on.

Now let's talk about why we should use the term Free Software rather than the term Open Source (most of the time). Free Software is a term that encompases many of the concepts found in the OSD. this means that many of the Open Source licenses are also Free Software licenses. The GPL, the Expat license (MIT), and several other Open Source licenses are examples of licenses that are also compatible with the term Free Software.

When trying to convince a business to use Free Software there is no reason that the argument “the community will make the code better” couldn't be used as it is entirely true. basically you can use the Open Source argument when talking about Free Software as long as you include the philosophical and ethical bits. you could theoretically say something like: “give the users their freedom and in return they will help you to improve your code.” Basically the argument for why a business should use Open Source licenses but with the word freedom thrown in. The point is that the Open Source argument is compatible with the Free Software argument, even in the business world, and you get to throw the philosphical and ethical bits in with it.

The times when you may want to use the term Open Source would probably be when a project uses a license that is not compatible with the Free Software Foundations guidelines. Such licenses include the NASA Open Source Agreement and the Reciprocal Public License. they put restrictions on one or more of the guidelines that the Free Software Foundation uses to define Free Software but they are compatible with the OSD. Software under such licenses can be called Open Source software but not Free Software.

Basically us in the Free Software and Open Source communities should be using the term Free Software because much of the Open Source definition is compatible with Free Software and most Open Source licenses (as far as I can tell) are also Free Software Licenses. now if only we could all get along with each other.

sources:

“Licenses by Name.” News | Open Source Initiative, opensource.org/licenses/alphabetical.

“Philosophy of the GNU Project- GNU Project – Free Software Foundation.” The GNU Operating System and the Free Software Movement, 15 Dec. 2018, www.gnu.org/philosophy/philosophy.html.

“The Open Source Definition.” The Open Source Definition | Open Source Initiative, opensource.org/osd.

“Various Licenses and Comments About Them- GNU Project – Free Software Foundation.” The GNU Operating System and the Free Software Movement, 29 May 2019, www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html.