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Comment by superb_dev | Hacker News Reader

> Notepad++ This guy thinks his text editor is a political statement rather than just a damn text editor, which makes him hard to trust even if I agree with most of his views. I can't have some wannabe activist deciding to erase all my students' computers because they happen to live in the wrong state or country.

Has notepad++ erased someone’s computer before? I did some quick googling and didn’t find much.

It seems really weird to bring this up if there hasn’t actually been any problems. Especially given the line that follows:

> Each of these have caused me weeks, months, or years of support problems because of their stupid decisions.

The truth is, programming is an expression and often a very political one (see open source). I’m immediately suspicious of the motives of anyone who says project authors shouldn’t talk about their beliefs

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All I think Notepad++ did was criticize Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in its release notes. I guess it rubbed this guy the wrong way.

Ranking risks from more to less likely,

1. An expected development of this sort of political message is blocking access to the tool's website to users from some countries, either by the website owners or by the relevant authorities.

2. Wiping people's files as part of open-source-as-political-message is less common, but not unheard of: https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/big-sabotage-...

3. Using or even advertising Notepad++ in Russia is probably not dangerous yet. Don't know about China.

No, in the software itself he put political messages. There was a bunch of anti-China ones (for Uyghurs, Taiwan, Hong Kong), for Snowden, and for support to Charlie Hebdo after the terror attack. In some cases it opened a new document with the message for example.

I probably wouldn’t have put the messages in a document, but I support this

No, it has had political statements for like a decade at least.

It is about SW. Wanna do politics ? Quit SW, go get voted.

Why do you think the two are wholly separate? If software is just a job and not an art for you then I get wanting to keep “clean”. The software you build is 100% an expression of your beliefs.

I would never build software for a defense contractor, or any other myriad of nasty things engineers are hired to do.

In a similar vane, if my work has given me a platform (ex: a popular open source project) then it would be a waste if I didn’t use that platform like Notepad++ is doing. (Though I’d probably restrict messages to the download page)

I strongly agree.

sorry but how is open source a political statement exactly? it can be a choice for a host of different reasons besides political activism

I think the FSF bent of open source is easier to identify as explicitly political because it tries to force developers to do something they may or may not want (disclose source code). There's some anti-corporate messaging there, because it's hard to make money from software if it's free[0], and that's a political view others may not share.

[0] I do know the suggestion to sell support for software rather than selling software itself but that's a political view as well, trying to persuade businesses to earn money one way rather than another.

The Open Source name was specifically invented to distance itself from the polarizing political aspects of the Free Software movement.

https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point....

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