Richard Stallman

"I have always believed that freedom is worth fighting for."

"Every line of free software is a blow against tyranny."

"The world needs free software more than it needs proprietary profit."

"I will continue to fight for software freedom until my last breath."

"Software should be free not because of charity, but because freedom is a prerequisite for human dignity in the digital age."

"The question of whether machines can think is less interesting than the question of whether we should want them to."

"When we call software 'free,' we mean freedom, not price. Think of free speech, not free beer."

"Copyright should serve the public interest, but today it mostly serves corporate interests at the expense of freedom."

"Proprietary software is a way for one company to exercise power over users who have no choice but to obey."

"The existence of a problem does not automatically mean that solving it is good. We must consider the cost of the solution."

"I consider that the golden rule requires that if I like a program I must share it with other people who like it."

"Free software is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept, you should think of 'free' as in 'free speech.'"

"Being able to read code is important for understanding what a program actually does, versus what it claims to do."

"We have the right to read, and that includes the right to understand what our devices are doing."

"The spread of surveillance technology represents one of the greatest threats to human freedom of our time."

"When someone learns to program, they are learning a way of thinking about problems and solutions."

"Digital rights are human rights. We must protect the freedom of our digital citizens."

"Intellectual property is a dangerous concept that grants monopolies over ideas themselves."

"Progress requires questioning the assumptions that everyone else has accepted as permanent."

"The goal of software development should be to serve users, not to control them."

"A society that respects privacy and freedom is one worth building, even if it costs more."

"Education is the most powerful tool for spreading understanding and preventing ignorance."

"We should teach children how to think, not what to think. Technology is just a tool for learning."

"The commercialization of knowledge has led to a crisis in creativity and innovation."

"True independence requires understanding the tools you depend on and having the freedom to modify them."

"Patents on software are like patents on mathematics—they restrict human thought itself."

"We must distinguish between the map and the territory, between what we say about technology and what technology actually does."

"The price of freedom is eternal vigilance, especially in the digital realm."

"Sharing is not theft; it is the foundation of human cooperation and culture."

"When source code is hidden, it becomes a form of censorship that harms both users and society."