Ils sont fous ces Français!

Translating from Goscinny/Uderzo to Hunter S. Thompson: there’s bad craziness going on over in France. Apparently, there’s a move afoot to ban Free Software, and I can only think “Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence”. Malice or incompetence aside, in the unlikely event that this silly thing passes, it could hardly be enforced without building a cyber-police-state of an efficiency and comprehensiveness beyond the wildest dreams of the Beijing regime. If any of my readers are French citizens, you might want to call your local politician’s office or write a letter to your local editor or whatever. Here’s some more from Henry Story, with French-language links. [Update: Gilles Gravier writes: “It’s not all free software that they are trying to ban... Just software that enables distribution of copyrighted material which is not equiped with means of tracing who shares what with whom... Obviously, open-source software makes it easy to remove such tracing means, so is a no-no for SACEM (who are desperately trying to keep alive an old model for making money over artists instead of trying to turn to the future and find new adapted ways).” And now I see that he’s written more on the subject.]