Richard M. Stallman talk: «Christchurch, New Zealand - A1 Lecture Theatre (Arts block), University of Canterbury, Ilam. To make a digital society worthy of being included in, we must overcome six menaces to freedom: surveillance, censorship, restricted data formats, proprietary software, software as a service, and the War on Sharing.»

The stories of Echelon, Wikileaks, Snowden and the NSA scandal lead the information society to question the notions of information privacy, transparency, common sense, and the use of personal data for commercial purposes. To be “free”, is it simply the freedom to enjoy without restraint? Freedom of speech? Freedom of opinion or free will? Freedom to use gratis everything we find on the Net?

"Surveillance, censorship, restrictive data formats and software-as-a-service threatened the freedom of IT users, GNU founder and free software activist Richard Stallman claimed..."

"...In my recent public speeches I focused on one value of Free Software: business ethics within digital society. In short, my argument is that since the society has changed to an economy of information, those that write software have the power to control information and therefore control society. Modern societies evolved systems, like democracy, so that big powers could be balanced.

"...There is a battle underway between those who value freedom, and corporations such as Microsoft who wish to profit by taking that freedom away. DRM and absurd licenses are at the heart of that battle. Please join us on the side of freedom by saying NO not just to Windows Vista and other DRM-enabled products, but to proprietary software in general.

Associate members of the Free Software Foundation form a dedicated part of the community: a free software society that supports the ethical cause of computer users' freedom.. If you support the goal of a free software society, please join with your peers around the world in taking this important step.

OK, up until now I am talking about broad principles and governments. The reason I went off in that direction is to make the point that most reasonable people in free countries do understand, accept and support reasonable limitations on free speech. By the strictest definition of the word these examples are all forms of censorship. Censorship, in and of itself, is not evil.

"The Free Society Conference and Nordic Summit (FSCONS) is a meeting place for social change, focused on the future of free software and free society.

"...If we do want free society we also need free content, not only free software. A free society citizen is truly both a receiver of someone else's work and a contributor. But right now most of the contributions to free society are in software development – not necessarily on top of the list of most interesting activities everybody can do..."