Eben Moglen
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Categories: Articles with unsourced statements since May 2007 | All articles with unsourced statements | GNU project | Members of the Free Software Foundation board of directors | American legal academics | GNU people | Columbia University faculty | Yale Law School alumni | Swarthmore College alumni | Copyright scholars | Copyright activists | American lawyers | American bloggers | Living people | Year of birth missing (living people)
Eben Moglen is a professor of law and legal history at Columbia University, and is the founder, Director-Counsel and Chairman of Software Freedom Law Center, whose client list includes numerous pro bono clients, such as the Free Software Foundation.
Professional biographyMoglen started out as a computer programming language designer[1] and then received his bachelor's degree from Swarthmore College in 1980, where he won the Hicks Prize for Literary Criticism. In 1985, he received a master's degree in philosophy and a JD from Yale University. He has held visiting appointments at Harvard University, Tel Aviv University and the University of Virginia since 1987. He was a law clerk to Justice Thurgood Marshall (1986–87 term). He joined the faculty of Columbia Law School in 1987, and was admitted to the New York bar in 1988.[2] He received a Ph.D. in history from Yale University in 1993. Moglen serves as a director of the Public Patent Foundation. Moglen was part of Philip Zimmermann's defense team, when Zimmermann was being investigated over the export of Pretty Good Privacy, a public key encryption system, under US export laws.[3] In 2003 he received the EFF Pioneer Award. In February 2005, he founded the Software Freedom Law Center. Moglen is closely involved with the Free Software Foundation, serving as general counsel since 1994 and board member from 2000 to 2007. As counsel, Moglen was charged with enforcing the GNU General Public License on behalf of the FSF [4], and later became heavily involved with drafting version 3 of the GPL. On April 23, 2007 he announced in a blog post that he would be stepping down from the board of directors of the Free Software Foundation. Moglen stated that after the GPLv3 Discussion Draft 3 had been released, he wanted to devote more time to writing, teaching, and the Software Freedom Law Center.[5] Stances on free software
Moglen says that free software is a fundamental requirement for a democratic and free society in which we are surrounded by and dependent upon technical devices. Only if controlling these devices is open to all via free software, can we balance power equally. Moglen's Metaphorical Corollary to Faraday's Law is the idea that the information appearance and flow between the human minds connected via the Internet works like induction. Hence Moglen's phrase "Resist the resistance!" (i.e. remove anything that inhibits the flow of information).[6] Statements and perspectivesImage:Eben Moglen-20060823.jpg
Moglen at GPL V3 conference in Bangalore, 2006
While speaking in New Delhi, India, in 2006, he remarked: "Anything that is worth copying is worth sharing." His other quotes: "The more we give away, the richer we become." And: "Note how even the smallest encounter with Free Software can make a man cheerful about the future of our judge" (said after hearing a judge of the Allahabad high court, India speak on the subject).[citation needed] Moglen believes the idea of proprietary software is as ludicrous as having "proprietary mathematics" or "proprietary geometry". This would convert the subjects from "something you can learn" into "something you must buy", he has argued. He points out that software is among the "things which can be copied infinitely over and over again, without any further costs".[citation needed] Moglen has criticized what he calls the "reification of selfishness". He has said, "A world full of computers which you can't understand, can't fix and can't use (because it is controlled by inaccessible proprietary software) is a world controlled by machines."[citation needed] He has called on lawyers to help the Free Software movement, saying: "Those who want to share their code can make products and share their work without additional legal risks." He urged his legal colleagues, "It's worth giving up a little in order to produce a sounder ecology for all. Think kindly about the idea of sharing."[citation needed] Moglen has criticized trends which result in "excluding people from knowledge". On the issue of Free Software versus proprietary software, he has argued that "much has been said by the few who stand to lose". Moglen calls for a "sensible respect for both the creators and users" of software code.[citation needed] On the subject of Digital Rights Management, Moglen once said, "We also live in a world in which the right to tinker is under some very substantial threat. This is said to be because movie and record companies must eat. I will concede that they must eat. Though, like me, they should eat less."[7] References
External linksWikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:
 Wikisource has original works written by or about:
 Wikimedia Commons has media related to:
bg:Ибен Моглен ca:Eben Moglen de:Eben Moglen es:Eben Moglen fr:Eben Moglen ko:이벤 모글렌 it:Eben Moglen lb:Eben Moglen hu:Eben Moglen nl:Eben Moglen ja:エベン・モグレン pl:Eben Moglen pt:Eben Moglen ru:Моглен, Эбен sv:Eben Moglen tl:Eben Moglen ta:எபன் மாக்லன் tr:Eben Moglen | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
