The right to readRichard Stallman
The right to read
30mentions
6recommended by
22HN commenters
2008–2026first – last mentioned
27% recommend73% neutral
Why HN recommends it
Short, widely shared essay framed as a fictional story of a near future where everyday developer activities are criminalized; a concrete thought experiment on copyright, DRM and user freedom. For software rights fans.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
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"The Right to Read" by Richard Stallman[1] is certainly not a novel, but it is a short bit of fiction about cybercrime (or rather, what would happen if certain day-to-day developer activities were made criminal) and is…
on “Ask HN: Recommendations of good cybercrime novels?” ↗> And only "authorized" persons can download IDEs and dev tools. Just in case someone hasn't read it yet, I have to post a link to this classic short story: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.en.html (The Right to Read, by Richard Stallman). (The bogeyman back then was copyright infringement, nowadays it's as you mentioned security and/or privacy.)
on “How the Mac didn’t bring programming to the people” ↗For those who haven't had a chance to read it yet, Richard Stallman's "The Right to Read" from 1997: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.en.html There are some striking thematic parallels with the current state of automotive technology -- in particular Tesla.
on “Tesla will soon downgrade software on the entry-level Model 3” ↗http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html Richard Stallman's "The Right to Read" I find myself wanting to post this link more and more frequently these days.
on “Anti-Piracy Patent Aims to Stop Students from Sharing Textbooks” ↗"The Right to Read" By Richard Stallman http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
on “Orwellianish View of DRM” ↗Richard Stallman's "Right to Read" is worth reading again, because it portrays a very similar scenario.
on “Age Verification on Systemd and Flatpak” ↗Richard Stallman's "Right to Read" from 1999 is worth another read.
on “Colorado moves age checks from websites to operating systems” ↗Richard Stallman's "Right to Read" is disturbingly prescient, as usual.
on “New California law requires age verification for all OS accounts” ↗I remember reading The Right to Read by Richard Stallman, published in 1997 issue of Communications of the ACM and thinking that it was too pessimistic. Society would never accept that kind of new business model. https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
on “Rejection Letter” ↗…think there could be a deeper argument about relating the freedom of thought in the public sphere of literacy to the free software movement, which you can see a glimpse of in Richard Stallman's essay The Right to Read...
on “Ask HN: What are you reading?” ↗Sorry for the somewhat obvious reference, but I thought that The Right to Read by Richard Stallman [1] would probably have predicted something similar. Of course, it had: There were ways, of course, to get around the SPA and Central Licensing. They were themselves illegal.…
on “Nintendo's big piracy case is a sad story” ↗Reminds me of The Right to Read, a short story by Richard Stallman. https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.en.html
on “Philips Hue will soon force users to create an account” ↗Relevant links: • The Right to Read by Richard Stallman, 1997: <https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.en> • The Digital Imprimatur by John Walker, 2003: <https://www.fourmilab.ch/documents/digital-imprimatur/> • The War on General…
on “Android 14's user-profile data bug seems indistinguishable from ransomware” ↗…opposition. Do not give them even an inch, or they'll take a mile. "debugger vendors in 2047 distributed numbered copies only, and only to officially licensed and bonded programmers." - Richard Stallman, The Right to Read, 1997
on “Uncomfortable Questions About Android Developer Verification” ↗A decade ago, I made a joke comment to a friend that you were soon going to need a carry permit to operate a compiler. Richard Stallman's Right to Read (1997) made a similar observation.
on “Fuck Android Developer Verification Program” ↗