Who is the other side of the conversation you mention in your first paragraph?
It seems incredibly reductive to state that using proprietary software, in any way, somehow makes a FOSS project send an implicit message that it... I don't know what you meant, but, disrespects its users?
Did I disrespect the users of FOSS projects I worked on by using Windows / Visual Studio?
>Did I disrespect the users of FOSS projects I worked on by using Windows / Visual Studio?
No, what you do on your own computer is your business. No one else has to use your proprietary setup. Other people do have to use your Slack channels to talk to you, which is an endorsement and enticement to run proprietary software.
While free software for Windows is better than proprietary software for Windows (because it could conceivably be ported to free software on other platforms), it is not (in of itself) practically free because you need to use proprietary software (Windows and system libraries) to use it.
If that program only worked on Windows, then you should not recommend its use unless that person were already using Windows. If there are Free alternatives, you should recommend them instead; you'd otherwise be forcing users to use proprietary software to communicate with you.
In the case of IRC, it doesn't matter if there's a Free Windows client, because there are plenty of alternatives.
- I use Slack as the communication platform for said project for XYZ reasons
How do you suggest I word the README for my project? Do I tell/advise people to try other, less functional software if that software is subjectively more "open" than mine? Would my project somehow be "better" if I run all of my own infrastructure for it -- chat, bug tracking, etc -- using only FOSS software on FOSS hardware in my basement?
I mean, the logical conclusion here is that no FOSS project is really a FOSS project unless Richard Stallman could look at it and say "sure, morally, I have no problem using that project", right?
(This is off the path of the blog post in question, but I'm really interested in this sub-conversation.)
If there is no way to contact you without using free software, I would probably just make a fork of your project. If you can't just sit in an IRC channel on freenode or just post an email I can use, then I don't understand why you are a maintainer of a free software project. Sure, use Slack if you wish, but don't force me to use it if I want to contact you.
I imagine that many maintainers who don't necessarily feel as dogmatic about free software hold the belief that "if you wish to contact me, you will use the tool I say." I've certainly "maintained" projects that are free software that I had no real desire of spending much time on, so if someone had a question it better come the way that I want, otherwise I can just ignore it. It's not a very kind or classy position, but I think a lot of people feel this way.
You don't need to run your own infrastructure---you just need to use services that are compatible with free software.
This highlights the difference between "open source" and free software: by using and recommending Slack, you make a statement that the freedoms of those who would collaborate with your project are not important. In general, projects that identify with the free software philosophy or the "open source" development methodology can collaborate with either community just fine---there are shared interests and goals. But if you use a freedom-denying service, then you cripple a community of contributors.
It does not matter if RMS personally says that he is okay with a particular project---the four freedoms are clear and basic; we don't need his personal endorsement. Further, just because you use Slack, that doesn't mean that your project is less free than another---if it's free software, then it's free software. But the community surrounding your project is shaped by your actions. And if the pressure is great enough, there may be no choice but for free software users to fork the project, and perhaps hope for better collaboration in the future.
So there's the issue of software being "open", as in being able to see the source code. Then there's the part about who is running the software.
Do you personally feel more safe, or better, whatever the adjective you want to use would be... about logging in to a remote server that uses software you can read the source for versus software you can't read the source for?
It seems like a sticky problem because even if Freenode purports to be open, and you can read the source code of what software they say they use, you can't actually see the source code powering their service, right? Like you can't just SSH to the boxes, and look at the source and say "ok, they haven't messed with anything, so I'm ok signing into their servers".
Like, you could see the very JavaScript running in your browser. You downloaded it, it's running locally. You can't see the backend, though. You can't tell how your data is being used. That's the thing that feels scarier to me, although admittedly, I use plenty of services based on closed source software as well as open source software, and it doesn't really give me too much pause.
I guess I just don't really understand the fervor around the "openness" aspect if you're not actually the one running the service. You're still at the mercy of a service operator who could be eroding the "freedom" you think you have.
> It seems like a sticky problem because even if Freenode purports to be open, and you can read the source code of what software they say they use, you can't actually see the source code powering their service, right?
I'm not sure how hard it would be, but conceivably you could join freenode and host your own ircd? I think the federation part (and ability to migrate/self-host) is the most important part here.
I don't think it makes much sense to bever let other projects/org run part of your infrastructure - the key point is that those organisations are open (so you can join Debian and take over an orphaned package you use, or you can run your own email and federate with others that use email).
IRC vs Slack is a bit one-sided, as IRC has some real problems at the protocol level - jabber/xmpp and Matrix are probably more sensible alternatives. But even then I don't think the main point is that everyone should do all the work of hosting all their infrastructure - just that it's goid to choose an infrastructure with as little lock-in as possible - and infrastructure that one can easily contribute to (eg: submit a patch for ircd or one of the bots etc).
> Do you personally feel more safe, or better, whatever the adjective you want to use would be... about logging in to a remote server that uses software you can read the source for versus software you can't read the source for?
Ah, sorry, I see where the confusion is. This is a different issue entirely:
It's desirable for the program running on the server to be Free so that I could run my own (if I chose to do so), and therefore be in control of my own computing. For example, I run my own GNU Social instance.
It seems incredibly reductive to state that using proprietary software, in any way, somehow makes a FOSS project send an implicit message that it... I don't know what you meant, but, disrespects its users?
Did I disrespect the users of FOSS projects I worked on by using Windows / Visual Studio?