OPINION:
   Free Software Foundation Must Die

   Contributed by JZ
   osOpinion.com
   July 13, 2001

   Don't get me wrong. I believe in the GPL and a need for free software, but I believe the Free Software Foundation
   (FSF) causes great harm to the free software community.

   The problem is that the FSF has no technical perspective. Lacking perspective and not being able to appreciate or
   understand the current technology trends is not a crime -- unless you're the FSF. This organization has tremendous
   influence that translates directly into the community's scarce resources.

   When a project receives the foundation's approval, it results in much effort being poured into that project. In theory
   this might be a good thing, except the foundation has a knack for approving technologically unsound projects. That
   lack of perspective combined with influence has cost the community millions of lost man-hours. And that is
   inexcusable.

   No More GNOME

   GNOME is the worse thing that ever happened to the free software community. It's not just that GNOME is inferior from
   a technical point of view -- a modern desktop written in C using GTK on top of a bloated protocol like CORBA? -- but
   that it's a massive and unneeded duplication of effort.

   From a user's perspective, GNOME is out-classed by KDE. KDE is more functional, scalable and polished. Some say a
   six-month gap exists between KDE and GNOME. However, that's a myth. KDE exhibits superior technologies such as KParts
   (e.g. Konqueror) and KDE-Java that GNOME will not match within a year.

   KDE has rough spots, but it's still being packaged and deployed as a complete desktop offering on a growing scale.

   Fill in the Gaps

   From a developer's perspective, the gap grows. KDE's design decisions have allowed its developers to reap the benefits
   of elegant object-oriented design so that creating KDE/Qt applications is easy, while creating GNOME applications is
   hard. If you've used the horrible attempt to graft OO onto C that is GTK, you should be familiar with the horrible
   code that gets generated.

   Some might argue that because Qt was not under a free license in the past, the community needed a truly free desktop
   environment. However, what the community needed was a free and functionally superior replacement for Windows, i.e.
   KDE.

   Even if KDE was not completely free -- in the most extreme meaning of the word -- it's clear that a largely free
   desktop environment helps the community so much (as KDE has done) that it would warrant a compromise. What's important
   is that the code is free and that others can use it to its full potential.

   What has been the result of this lack of perspective? Two incompatible desktop environments, one of which is grounded
   on dubious foundations as well as millions of valuable programmer man-hours that would probably have been better spent
   elsewhere. Those who argue that GNOME should exist purely to offer competition and choice fail to see that Windows
   offers all of the competition and choice the community needs. GNOME is a waste, and the FSF must shoulder some of the
   blame.

   Misplaced Support

   The latest and most disastrous act of the FSF was approving DotGNU. By announcing its support for such a misguided
   project, the FSF is again guilty of the crime of misleading the community.

   The case against Microsoft's .NET and its free cousin DotGNU is easy to make. It's easy because neither exists. .NET
   is heavily beta and if it ever gains true stability (something only a select few MS products ever achieve), this won't
   happen until at least mid-2002. The ETA for DotGNU is much greater. You're looking at a two-year development process.

   The technical case against .NET and its ilk is that, like with KDE and GNOME, it is an inferior and redundant
   technology. Any sort of proprietary/binary Web service is doomed because of the continuing meteoric rise and the
   technical superiority of XML. XML messaging -- the general model of machines exchanging packets of XML data to
   communicate data like calendar and credit card information -- is far superior to the RPC nature of .NET.

   Coming Up Short

   The only thing worse than the technical shortcomings of .NET is that the FSF failed to appreciate them. What .NET
   represents -- an Internet "platform," read: digital glue -- is necessary. To let Microsoft control this digital glue
   and then support this control is a complete failure of leadership. The digital glue is coming, and the Internet
   computer will happen, but it will not be millions of computers talking through the .NET API. It will be millions of
   computers exchanging packets of XML.

   Some might say that .NET is here now and XML standards are not. But standards are in the future only because people
   let them stay there. The FSF, instead of foolishly approving .NET, should support the groups that are developing the
   standards that are sure to replace .NET.

   The FSF needs to get its act together, and it must do so as soon as possible. [end-nfn.gif]

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   Author's background:
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   JZ is just a coder. He does it for money, he does it for fun, and he does it for free.