Running off with an idea - British party based on Free software foundation??

[ash.rossy]

Right, Let me start by saying, yes, I have 1 post (this one), i joined yesterday and will admit right now, that I'm only 17 years of age. I still hope that at least you'll read this post regardless of all these things.

There are 3 things in my life I could classify as hobbies, in order, this would be computers (from programming, to building), music, and politics. I have been interested and active in all of these since a very young age (computers since I was 4, music, 7 and politics, 5).

I have had various things happen in my life, quite a few I admit I regret, all of these have given me various views on various political decisions. An example of this would be my current situation, I live in a private rented property in Lancashire (near Wigan) with my partner, and although I must pay all my own bills (something I'm struggling with), I still cannot vote on who decides those bills. I'm currently out of work (my partner will be unable to work due to her education), so even though both of us will soon be relying on benefits, we are unable to vote on who decides what we get.

Enough of my life, as that isn't important. more on the idea I wish to run off with.
I took an interest in unix based applications about 6 years ago, trying out a Solaris distribution (and ultimately hating it). A year later I heard about Ubuntu, and fell in love with it. I dual booted with Windows for a few years, but currently have 2 laptops running Ubuntu and a Computer running it. I have tried various Distro's Suse, Fedora (I have an Aspire one), puppy, DSL and suchlike. I prefer debian based distributions, however, and Ubuntu was my first love, so I stuck with that.
I hardly consider myself proficient, but with a little help from these forums (to which I never subscribed till yesterday, admittedly to download a document) I have solved all my problems. My Girlfriend also loves ubuntu, and likes to try various distro's, she is considering programming as a hobby. I buy every "Linux format" magazine out (to support those great guys) and I've managed to get quite a few relatives (my 70 year old grandfather included), to move to ubuntu or at the least, use open source software.

As you can see, I am a strong advocate of open source software. I chose to learn C++ as a language for many reasons, one of which was my desire to understand the linux source code. Yes, i realise it was written in C, but the differences are pretty small between the two.
I believe the open source community to be the most friendly and active community out there, I believe them to fell fairly strongly about open-ness, free speech and equality.

Now, I believe it is impossible for one person on their own to make a difference, but maybe that one person can recruit a few people, who recruit a few more and so on.
I'll be honest, the thought entered my head just a few days ago, and I havn't had the time to flesh it out, to think of what policies can be rewritten with the free software ideas in mind, and how to do it. I know what my personal beliefs are, and I feel strongly about them, however I'm sure all the members of the major parties do not believe in every single thing they stand for, just the vast majority.

I doubt it'd be possible to create a "Free party" in britain, I would certainly not know how to go on about it, in fact, It'd be impossible for me (due to my age), but I would of course like to start a discussion on this.

Would you vote for a party that bases it's beliefs on those of the Free software foundation?
Would you become an active member?
Would you like to see such a party exist?


I don't consider myself extremely knowlegable on politics, but I don't think it'd be impossible for such a party to exist.

And for those who wonder, I support the Green party (due to them publicly supporting open software to stop monopolising), but out of the three majors I agree with Labour the most.

[linuxguymarshall]

I am 14 and not all that familiar with British politics but what do you mean "based off the free software foundation ideas". There are quite a few ideas presented there and want to know what you are talking about.

Try ditching the software portion of it and give me the goals of this party and what the issues are.

[ash.rossy]

I am 14 and not all that familiar with British politics but what do you mean "based off the free software foundation ideas". There are quite a few ideas presented there and want to know what you are talking about.

Try ditching the software portion of it and give me the goals of this party and what the issues are.

Basically, in britain there are various parties, each party have their own views. If they get elected in the general election, they effectively run the country.
By "Based off the free software foundation", I mean the ideas of free speech (We do have that here, but not like in America), everyone can contribute if they wish, everyone has their say in what happens (I can guarantee that if the majority of ubuntu users wanted the next distro to not include ext2 support, it would likely happen), if someone wishes to contribute to society by putting forth an idea, if it is accepted, they can implement it (under supervision). I would make all of our policies open and easily accessible to the public.
I would tell the public Britains problems, and tell them how we plan on solving them. If they can put forth a better way, we shall implement it (providing it conforms to various rules, we wouldn't solve Britains immigration problem by mass genocide for example).
This gives the public the feeling of control over their country, yet makes sure that they do not become drunk with power. At the moment, Labour party says Jump, we have to Jump. Now we decide if we want to jump. There will always be those who won't want to jump, but their voice will also be heard.

I suppose some people would liken this to communism, but It isn't in any way. The vast majority of people who live in a communist country hate it. This is exactly what we oppose.

Of course, The party would have a basis on technology, I personally am in favour of internet in every home (a new scheme the government are considering), I oppose the fact that they want to create a great firewall of britain, to limit P2P traffic. I'm sure that there are a few people here who prefer to use bittorrent to download their latest ubuntu distro, this would potentially stop that from happening in britain. If I could, I would publicly promote linux and it's variants, and denounce Microsoft (microsoft in particular as even apple have made various components of OSX open) as a monopoly of closed source software. The many, many users of their software do not have the slightest control over the software, and I can guarrantee that windows would be a better OS if this was the case.

Most people in the UK know what they want. Think how many people disagree with the privatisation of northen rock. Many people think that's a factor in the reccession. If the public decided to not make it private, then maybe we wouldn't be in as bad a recession. I'm sure that there are a lot of people out there who know more of the effects of say, closing our borders for a year to solve the immigration problem, than the few people that decide if that happens.

As an example, the british nationalist party, recently got elected in the manchester local elections. not because most of manchester believe in their values, but because they publicly made a comment about the excess of immigrants in the area. People in manchester know that's a problem, so voted for BNP because they believe they could solve the problem. If the public had the capabilities to tell Labour "There's too many immigrants in Manchester", then perhaps labour could listen, and do something about it. Or maybe not.

Not to mention, a party of programmers and technology users can address the latest issues, quickly and with good knowledge. After all, Programming (good programming that is), is a very difficult subject, and only the smartest individuals can become good at it. Currently in the UK, I believe anybody with a little knowledge of politics and a view, can be prime minister. Look at the US, they got sick of someone who thought the internet was "a series of tubes", and elected someone who actually knew a little more of what was happening and how the world works.

[gn2]

The Tories are pro open source too.

http://www.conservatives.com/News/News_stories/2009/01/Improving_IT_procurement_and_encouraging_open_sour ce_software.aspx

[ash.rossy]

I wasn't aware of that, need to do some research!
I don't change my views easily, and still stick by the green party, but as far as the major 3 go, I'll take a better look at the tories and decide if They're better to stick by than Labour.

[SuperSonic4]

"Think how many people disagree with the privatisation of northen rock"

Methinks you meant nationalisation? Unless you meant demutualisation ages ago in the Thatcher/Major era?

Politics in this country is summed up pretty well by a line from Won't get fooled again by the Who: Meet the new boss, Same as the old boss

I personally am a liberal so my vote usually goes Lib Dem. It would be good to see campaigns to have FOSS in schools and in the public sector but I do not believe in voting for one policy parties (like the greens and, much as the media would have us think otherwise, unlike the BNP)

I would also believe you're overstating the reasons why people voted BNP, it is more likely they voted BNP as a protest vote or out of disillusion with the Labour party (which is where most of their votes came from) and the other main parties because of expenses. The public do believe there are too many immigrants but Labour rarely listen to the public anymore.

Our system itself is fundamentally flawed though - first past the post does not work, it's best function is to give a relatively stable government and prevent a small party gaining more power than it should. Note also that any bill must get a majority in Parliament (I'm not sure what powers the Lords have to stop it) to pass into law and this means that if there is a hung parliament/small majority decision making becomes harder.

Communism is the shared ownership of everything, the connotations of it being repressive come from both the Cold War and the abuse of it under Stalin and Mao in particular.

@gn2 : the opposition are always pro-anything until they get into power.

[linuxguymarshall]

I wouldn't choose my political party based off of their use or non-use of open source software.

[ash.rossy]

I'm not saying choose labour if they use FOSS, I'm saying choose labour if they adopt the ideas of FOSS into their policies and actions.

I agree that our system is flawed, No matter who get's in power, for a long time labour will still have a massive influence.

I realise communism isn't as bad as people say it is, but again, I do not understand it completely.
I provide the ideas, and put my bits in, people who know more about politics can provide the nuts and bolts :)

[gn2]

@gn2 : the opposition are always pro-anything until they get into power.

That's usually because once they are in government they come up aginst the Sir Humphrey Applebys of this world.

[Hobgoblin]

Another one-policy party, just what we need. :rolleyes:

Woe betide us if any of these minority parties ever get into power. The government has to run the whole show, not just the bits it has an interest in.

[KIAaze]

Another one-policy party, just what we need. :rolleyes:

Woe betide us if any of these minority parties ever get into power. The government has to run the whole show, not just the bits it has an interest in.

The green parties started out as minority parties too. But thanks to them, even big parties now have to include environmentally-friendly policies in their programs.
Small parties may not win elections, but their existence is a way to make more people aware of certain issues.
Maybe the pirate parties will have the same effect.

[KiwiNZ]

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