Yes I know that Cuba, the DPRK, and China have their own distros, but they’re pretty specific to the language and networks of those countries. I use linux because it’s free and open source but I use one of those distros that is privately owned and I’m thinking of upgrading to something that is truly communally owned but also has good compatibility with software, especially scientific software. Any good recs please?
Thanks!
You talk like the only right that matters is the right of individuals to make money off the ideas of individuals. I talked here a bit about how ridiculous it is for anything to be considered a product of one single individual and not that of a society, with it’s own history (in this case, that of empire) and the social web of relations. That doesn’t mean that the individuals in who these ideas emerged shouldn’t be talked about, studied, even revered or whatever, but you’ve got to consider the broader context and stop thinking in terms of copyright law, which is extremely limited and doesn’t reflect on reality (it wasn’t made to, just like any type of property).
When you talk about how closed source is inherently bad, I want you to consider the wider context of worldwide US hegemony. It helps for me to visualise this relationship through a metaphor of an ethnic minority family, living in the imperial core (US, UK, Europe, etc.) — they have beloved family recipes (intellectual property) of delicious foods that have been passed down for generations. They only share these prized recipes with their closest family and friends. Otherwise — “if you want to try my food, get to know me”. Now, does that make this family stingy or unwelcoming because they don’t give out their favourite recipe to every stranger?
Oh, look at that some white person with a trust fund just opened a restaurant with an inauthentic take on their family’s food. Someone else just started selling sexualised versions of ethnic minorities’ garb. Wow, this white person just started selling a bad replica of a rug with sacred patterns to a religion of their neighbours. You’ve got to consider that some people live under a white supremacist hegemony that will vacuum up, commodify and sell their cultural products as a matter of inertia. There is a huge difference between open source as in “do whatever you want with this” and “do whatever you want with this, ethically”. For most white people in the imperial core, they wouldn’t know a thing about what it means to be ethical in relation to worldwide US hegemony.
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