Watch Richard Stallman duck and weave

This Q&A with a guy from Groklaw (see here) really provides a good sense of what it’s like to interview Stallman. He’s almost incapable of giving a straight answer to a straight question. He also refuses to tell what’s going on in the GPLv3 committee meetings:

Q: Very well. Free software has achieved considerable success since — in the sixteen years since the GPLv2 was published. GNU/Linux is big business now. Leaving aside Novell for the moment, have you experienced corporate pressure to influence the GPLv3 language?

Richard Stallman: Yes. And in some cases we’ve done what they wanted, and in other cases we’ve refused.

Q: Are there any specific cases you would want to talk about?

Richard Stallman: No.

But wait. I thought these guys were all about freedom, and transparency, and openness? I thought that’s what made the whole process so wonderful, that everyone could see exactly what was going on, at all times. Isn’t that why Linux is the greatest software program ever created? Because everyone can see the sausage being made and criticize every step?

Now suddenly Stallman won’t tell anyone who’s lobbying for what in the GPLv3? Combine this with the recent snarky comments from IBM’s Steve Mills about the FSF and the GPLv3 process and I think you can kind of connect the dots. IBM doesn’t like the way things are going and is leaning on Stallman big time. Stallman won’t dish because there’s still a chance he’ll cave to them and he doesn’t want it known that he buckled to IBM’s demands; instead he’ll claim it was his idea all along, or better yet, something that “the community” wanted.

You know. The “community.” ie, all those people who aren’t sitting in committee meetings and aren’t privy to what’s going on with that “free” software that Richard Stallman controls. Free as in “mine,” I guess, should be the new slogan.