Software is all around us
and sometimes inside us.
But what happens
when the tools we use
are obeying someone else?
A tool you control
serves your interests,
but if someone else controls it,
they serve their own.
When you can examine tools
to see how they work,
you're able to learn about them,
even modify them
to work differently or better.
When you can share a tool
and its changes,
you help others and, in turn,
they help you.
In fact,
this is how early computing developed.
Everyone could see a program's code
and people shared their work freely
to drive its growth.
Every user was a potential author.
But when companies began
to lock source code away,
it stopped being possible to participate
or even to know what the code was doing.
In response,
hackers formed the GNU project,
to create a computer system
designed to respect
the autonomy of users.
They adopted a copyleft maneuver
and built it into
the GNU General Public License,
a legal structure
that preserves user rights.
In ten short years,
the free software movement
had produced the GNU/Linux system.
Computing that nobody could own,
but anyone could use.
Today it's keeping planes in the air,
stocks trading
and the global Internet running.
We all encounter free software
in invisible ways.
But software freedom
was designed for people.
It's about what shape
the technology we inhabit
will take,
and what kind of society
we use our digital powers to build.
We've still got work to do.
Free Software Foundation
30 years
of propelling user freedom
join us
contribute
learn more
fsf.org
License CC by-sa 4.0 2014
Video by urchn.org
Transcription Benjamin Sonntag