I really can’t get myself worked up on anything RMS says anymore.
By reading the blogosphere in the week after GCDS, you would think that the only thing that went down there was RMS’s silly comments. While I am a long-time free software user and advocate, I have a hard time staying in tune with the FSF that spends most of it’s time telling us what not to do, what not to use, and generally informs us of the world’s evils. Sitting at the registration desk at GCDS we got a sticker dump from Stallman, besides a “Linux/GNU” sticker, all the stickers informed us about what is crap. This is not how you build a movement.
In the past decade I have seen some fantastic and creative FOSS. While RMS has played a historic role in this movement, it is time to thank him for the tool chain, invite him to keynote, if you must be polite, and move on. Write code, write documentation, compose music, in any platform you choose. But most important, don’t get caught up in this guy’s rhetoric, it’s just not worth it.
Sexism
While it would be convenient to self righteously point fingers at an infrequent keynoter’s sexist joke, the real work needs to be done in the IRC channels, the planets, and mailing lists. With ourselves. We have issues with sexism, big ones.