Notices by Matthew Garrett (mjg59@nondeterministic.computer), page 2

Can someone produce a free software alignment chart where we one one axis we have the four freedoms and on the other we have IP law

(Yes ok there are cases where code is beauty and embodies an idea that could make a grown man cry and:

(1) your code is not that code
(2) you would think nothing of copying the creative aspect of that code if you needed to don't fucking lie to me)

When I write code I am turning a creative idea into a mechanical embodiment of that idea. I am not creating beauty. Every line of code I write is a copy of another line of code I've read somewhere before, lightly modified to meet my needs. My code is not intended to evoke emotion. It does not change people think about the world. The idea→code pipeline in my head is not obviously distinguishable from the prompt->code process in an LLM

Look, coders, we are not writers. There's no way to turn "increment this variable" into life changing prose. The creativity exists outside the code. It always has done and it always will do. Let it go.

Google kindly sending me an earthquake alert 4 minutes after I opened the fridge and was confused why everything was vibrating as a result

Democratising software development inherently means that people are going to develop software in ways you don't like and which seem objectively wrong and welp that's also the argument people made against Linux so, it;s impossible to say if its bad or not

Blog post about my #bsidessf talk on using SSH certificates for git signing: https://codon.org.uk/~mjg59/blog/p/ssh-certificates-and-git-signing/

Every single ACPI vs Device Tree argument needs to start with the observation that I can boot a modern Linux kernel on an arbitrary x86 board from 1998 and it will probably suspend and resume correctly, and I can't do that with an arbitrary Arm board from 2026

@lxo what? The device provides an interface to update the software included in it, and it is intended that this occur after the user purchases the device. It's the extremely clear and plain reading of the language. The guideline doesn't say "It's fine if the user chooses not to do this".

@lxo That's not what RYF says:

"The exception applies to software delivered inside auxiliary and low-level processors and FPGAs, within which software installation is not intended after the user obtains the product"

Hard drive firmware is intended to be installed after the user obtains the product. Vendors routinely ship bug fix and reliability updates and won't provide support unless you install it. Hard drives don't meet the RYF guidelines.

@lxo It's intended that the software be updated and so the exception doesn't apply, and so it needs to be free software to meet RYF. It's not, so doesn't. Sorry, I didn't write the rules.

@lxo the firmware in your WiFi card isn't doing your computing, but RYF insists that the program running there must either be in ROM or free. Why is it different to your hard drive?

@lxo if you're willing to call them programs, why do the four freedoms not apply? At minimum, why do you not deserve the right to know what these programs are actually doing?

@lxo (the program in your hard drive can, by the way, be updated by the vendor - but it's different to the microcode case because it's in mutable storage and never in ROM and so the update is permanent)

@lxo yes, you have come up with an incorrect model in order to avoid admitting you're running non-free code.

@lxo it makes no retroactive difference - it is software, it always was software, all the normal ethical considerations should apply. Now, in the same way that free software published in a book can't be modified in place, there may be practical considerations that would limit exercise if those freedoms - in which case we should argue that implementations that make their exercise easier are preferable to ones that don't

@lxo yes, it's a fantastical example that's intended to demonstrate that your argument is non-sensical. Your position seems to be that if the box is closed then it's not software, but if someone were to figure out how to open it it would become software. That's clearly not how any of this works.

@lxo except it's clearly *not* equivalent to a hardware circuit, that's just an assertion you've made. And in your repeated mentioning of replacing ROMs I'm becoming concerned that you don't actually know much about hardware.

@lxo I'm somewhat bewildered to have an FSF board member say that I should have no ethical expectation to be able to modify GPLed software running on something I own as long as the vendor does a good enough job of nailing the box shut.

@lxo @wouter you encourage users to buy hardware containing software they will never be able to free instead of buying hardware that a sufficiently driven user may be able to free. But even if it's never freed, it is easier in many cases to examine and audit that non-free software if it's loadable and very hard if not impossible if it's embedded in ROM in the device. I have personally done so for various devices I own, and have identified security issues that were rectified by the manufacturer.