Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2014 12:30:09 -0400 From: Mike Gerwitz To: tom@github.com, chris@github.com, pj@github.com Cc: support@github.com Subject: Free GitHub's JavaScript Hello everyone, I'm part of the FSF's Free JavaScript Campaign[1], but I would like to be clear that I'm contacting you personally, not on their behalf. While the current focus of the campaign is reddit (for which I'm completing an audit), I would be pleased if we could work with GitHub as well in the future. GitHub is an extremely popular platform for free software developers and harbors a strong community that is very beneficial for free software collaboration and development. While GitHub does provide a flexible API, it is unfortunate that GitHub's website serves proprietary JavaScript, and many features do not work unless JavaScript is enabled. GitHub's competitive advantage is their service. Liberating the JavaScript served to the client will not impact that service---indeed, it would make it more available to free software users and it would demonstrate the power of and commitment to free software on GitHub's part; it would set an excellent example. If GitHub made that JavaScript available in a repository on GitHub, it would also open the door for contributors to improve upon the website; I'm sure they have many great ideas. Tom, you posted this back in 2011:[2] Ok, then what shouldn't I open source? That's easy. Don't open source anything that represents core business value. Much of what the JavaScript code does can be done via the API, or is simple DOM manipulation; if any of it represents a core business value, it can be moved to the server and the client-side JS can make an XHR. I would love to discuss this with you further; I look forward to a response that facilitates that discussion. I would be willing to aid in this process however I can. If you would prefer to talk to the campaigns team at the FSF instead of myself, I work closely with Zak, who can be reached at zak@fsf.org. [J]ust flip that switch on your GitHub repository from private to public and tell the world about your software.[2] Thanks for your time. [1]: https://fsf.org/campaigns/freejs [2]: http://tom.preston-werner.com/2011/11/22/open-source-everything.html Best regards, -- Mike Gerwitz Free Software Hacker | GNU Maintainer http://mikegerwitz.com FSF Member #5804 | GPG Key ID: 0x8EE30EAB