This economy of free code (and here I mean free legal code) doesn’t starve lawyers. Law firms have enough incentive to produce great briefs even though the stuff they build can be taken and copied by anyone else. The lawyer is a craftsman; his or her product is public. Yet the crafting is not charity. Lawyers get paid; the public doesn’t demand such work without price. Instead this economy flourishes, with later work added to the earlier.
We could imagine a legal practice that was different—briefs and arguments that were kept secret; rulings that announced a result but not the reasoning. Laws that were kept by the police but published to no one else. Regulation that operated without explaining its rule.
We could imagine this society, but we could not imagine calling it “free.” Whether or not the incentives in such a society would be better or more efficiently allocated, such a society could not be known as free. The ideals of freedom, of life within a free society, demand more than efficient application. Instead, openness and transparency are the constraints within which a legal system gets built, not options to be added if convenient to the leaders. Life governed by software code should be no less.
Code writing is not litigation. It is better, richer, more productive. But the law is an obvious instance of how creativity and incentives do not depend upon perfect control over the products created. Like jazz, or novels, or architecture, the law gets built upon the work that went before. This adding and changing is what creativity always is. And a free society is one that assures that its most important resources remain free in just this sense.
This book collects the writing of Richard Stallman in a manner that will make its subtlety and power clear. The essays span a wide range, from copyright to the history of the free software movement. They include many arguments not well known, and among these, an especially insightful account of the changed circumstances that render copyright in the digital world suspect. They will serve as a resource for those who seek to understand the thought of this most powerful man—powerful in his ideas, his passion, and his integrity, even if powerless in every other way. They will inspire others who would take these ideas, and build upon them.
I don’t know Stallman well. I know him well enough to know he is a hard man to like. He is driven, often impatient. His anger can flare at friend as easily as foe. He is uncompromising and persistent; patient in both.
Yet when our world finally comes to understand the power and danger of code—when it finally sees that code, like laws, or like government, must be transparent to be free—then we will look back at this uncompromising and persistent programmer and recognize the vision he has fought to make reaclass="underline" the vision of a world where freedom and knowledge survives the compiler. And we will come to see that no man, through his deeds or words, has done as much to make possible the freedom that this next society could have.
We have not earned that freedom yet. We may well fail in securing it. But whether we succeed or fail, in these essays is a picture of what that freedom could be. And in the life that produced these words and works, there is inspiration for anyone who would, like Stallman, fight to create this freedom.
Lawrence Lessig
Lawrence Lessig is a Professor of Law at Harvard Law School, the director of the Edmond J. Safra Foundation Center for Ethics, and the founder of Stanford Law School’s Center for Internet and Society. For much of his career, he focused his work on law and technology, especially as it affects copyright. He is the author of numerous books and has served as a board member of many organizations, including the Free Software Foundation.
Copyright © 2002 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
This foreword was originally published, in 2002, as the introduction to the first edition. This version is part of Free Software, Free Society: Selected Essays of Richard M. Stallman, 2nd ed. (Boston: GNU Press, 2010).
Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire chapter are permitted worldwide, without royalty, in any medium, provided this notice is preserved.
Preface to the Second Edition
The second edition of Free Software, Free Society holds updated versions of most of the essays from the first edition, as well as many new essays published since the first edition.
The essays about software patents are now in one section and those about copyright in another, to set an example of not grouping together these two laws, whose workings and effects on software are totally different.
Another section presents the GNU licenses, with a new introduction written with Brett Smith giving their history and the motives for each of them. One of the essays explains why software projects should upgrade to version 3 of the GNU General Public License.
There is now a section on issues of terminology, since the way we describe an issue affects how people think about it.
The last two sections describe some of the traps free software developers and users face—new ways to lose your freedom, and how to avoid them.
We have also added an index, to complement the appendix on software.
We would like to thank Jeanne Rasata for managing the project, editing the book, formatting the text, and creating the index. Thanks also to Karl Berry for technical assistance with Texinfo, Brett Smith for all other technical help and for valuable feedback, and Rob Myers for formatting the cover.
Part I.
The GNU Project and Free Software
Chapter 1.
The Free Software Definition
We maintain this free software definition to show clearly what must be true about a particular software program for it to be considered free software. From time to time we revise this definition to clarify it. If you would like to review the changes we’ve made, please see the History section, following the definition, at http://gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html.
“Free software” is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept, you should think of “free” as in “free speech,” not as in “free beer.” Free software is a matter of the users’ freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software. More precisely, it means that the program’s users have the four essential freedoms:
• The freedom to run the program, for any purpose (freedom 0).
• The freedom to study how the program works, and change it to make it do what you wish (freedom 1). Access to the source code is a precondition for this.
• The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbor (freedom 2).
• The freedom to distribute copies of your modified versions to others (freedom 3). By doing this you can give the whole community a chance to benefit from your changes. Access to the source code is a precondition for this.
A program is free software if users have all of these freedoms. Thus, you should be free to redistribute copies, either with or without modifications, either gratis or charging a fee for distribution, to anyone anywhere. Being free to do these things means (among other things) that you do not have to ask or pay for permission to do so.
You should also have the freedom to make modifications and use them privately in your own work or play, without even mentioning that they exist. If you do publish your changes, you should not be required to notify anyone in particular, or in any particular way.