Such is the reputation of Dr Stallman that over 200 people came along to this event on 23^rd August, and a lengthy queue formed afterwards for autographs and photos with this celebrity of the software world, taking us well past the time we had promised Leeds Met's Rosebowl security team we would be finished.

Dr Stallman founded the GNU operating system in 1983, with the aim that GNU would be 100% free software. To quote from www.gnu.org: "Free software" is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept, you should think of "free" as in "free speech," not as in "free beer."

Dr Stallman also founded the Free Software Foundation which campaigns for free software ideals and organises activist campaigns against threats to user freedoms - for example  Windows, Apple, DRM - products that many of us use every day.

This was an alternative perspective to most of the events in and around Leeds which we go to, which often focus on the benefits of exploiting technology.  Dr Stallman argued that our use of technology means we give up our right 'to be left alone'.  Ask yourself  if, 20 years ago, you had been asked to carry a device that tells people your whereabouts at all times,  would you have said yes? And yet so many of us carry mobile phones. Personally I do this for all of the positive reasons that come with mobile phones, it was thought-provoking to consider the alternative perspective.

Dr Stallman challenged us to consider how far we are from having the same rights in cyberspace as we do in the physical world. For instance, when governments  were perusing Wikileaks, many global brands discontinued services to Wikileaks - Amazon withdrew services and major payment methods blocked donations. Dr Stallman argues that these services are provided  but can also be denied, so are in effect provided "on sufferance".

There was no shortage of questions from the Leeds audience, with topics ranging from the recent riots, through to whether access to the web is a human right. An audience member   requested advice on how to earn a living as a  software developer without 'doing evil'.  He answered them all, some with a  curt "no" or "you're wrong"  - moving straight on to the next question.  Interesting!  As some  tweeters commented, he's had many years to develop and perfect his arguments, making him a robust defender of his point of view.

Dr Stallman's lecture was a thought-provoking and alternative perspective on the way we use technology, challenging many of the things we take for granted, or perhaps don't choose to question. Our favourite gadgets are wittily referred to as 'iBad's and 'Swindle's  which take away our right to free software.

The evening concluded with an auction for this rather cute gnu, which apparently gets on very well with penguins. Overall the evening raised £450 for the Free Software Foundation from donations and book sales.

We'd like to thank Dr Stallman for his very though-provoking talk, and James Holden from the West Yorkshire Linux User Group for inviting Dr Stallman to Leeds. There's much more to this debate which has only been superficially introduced in this post. You can find out more about Dr Stallman on his blog - but you wont find him on Twitter or Facebook.

Update 9/9/2011 You can see a video of Dr Stallman's talk thanks to Imran Ali who filmed the event P.S We may be in the bad books for working with Apple, but we do run WordPress, PHP, Android and Rails training too.

Linda Broughton 30th August 2011