[liberationtech] Whatsapp, a Trojan horse for seekers of easy privacy?

[Al Billings]

> On Jan 16, 2015, at 2:07 AM, Rich Kulawiec <rsk at gsp.org> wrote:
> 
>  Open source is not merely ideal, open source
> is MANDATORY.  It is not sufficient, of course, but it is necessary.
> All closed-source software not only may be, but *must be* immediately
> dismissed as unsuitable for use, with prejudice, as it and anyone pushing
> it are both unworthy of any further discussion.  (Except, perhaps, as
> examples of fraud.)

The problem is that I am a practical person who lives in the real world. Telling people “Throw away all of your Apple/Microsoft word processing and often software. Throw away all of your games. Throw away all of the software you bought because you can’t trust any of these.” is going to be met with being ignored or marginalized and with utter derision. There is a reason Stallman is seen as a crazy wing nut and it isn’t just because he eats his own toe jam.

Yes, there are people that will only run open source software. Then there is the other 99.999% of the human race. *Those* are the people that need to be helped.

Al