24 March 2015 – Computerworld Portugal

The academic Stefano Zacchiroli advocates the use of a model of federated platforms, in which the servers are managed by users.

The public cloud platforms are moving away more and more computer users real they do, threatening their control over this process, warned the academic Stefano Zacchiroli during the event LibrePlanet 2015 represents, in their opinion, a danger to the freedom of the use of software.

The former leader of the Debian project argues that all major systems “as a service” cause problems on the freedom of the user. “All the different models of cloud services pose the same threat … there is the same pattern of evolution, putting the computer away from the machines of users on remote machines,” he explains.

This is problematic, warns Zacchiroli because everything – from basic applications like email and productivity to consumption of content such as television and the games – comes from “walled gardens”, like Google, Netflix or Steam. In general, people are doing their work in other people’s computers.

“The computer before located in the user belonging machines is happening away from them,” says Zacchiroli. Therefore, this lack of control can put users at the mercy of the holders of these “gardens”.

The FOSS is “make an increasingly futile war for freedom of software “, Zacchiroli says.

Ironically, however, the danger associated with the cloud comes at a time when the movement of free software and open source enjoy unprecedented popularity among many of the suppliers these platforms. Free software is really everywhere: in Internet servers, browsers and mobile devices. But according Zacchiroli, free software and open source, or “free and open source software” (FOSS), is “making an increasingly useless for free software war.”

But more federation …

The picture is not entirely bleak, cautioned. With some changes, the model of cloud can be beneficial for the freedom of software use

Use federated clouds and with users to make available their own equipment and to manage their own software. – Either because own or in partnership with peers – can be a solution. Get yourself would the cloud computing resources, but without giving ultimate control over the part of the computer.

“We need people countercurrent to work in federated solutions rather than centralized solutions” Zacchiroli advocates. For him, projects like FreedomBox – free designed to provide a safe and easy way for people to manage their own email servers software, communications and social networking – should be the norm rather than niche projects, restricted to enthusiasts free software.