I wish I could say I was more shocked or disappointed to read the statement from the Free Software Foundation today. But I'm not. I was surprised, a little, when I saw people starting to talk about it, I didn't have any idea what the FSF's next move would be or when it would come. So, the timing was a little bit of a surprise, is all.
Based on what has gone before, though, I wasn't expecting much, whatever it was and whenever it came. I was a little hopeful, but only a little, and thus was a little disappointed, but only a little. I was prepared to write the FSF off as soon as I learned of RMS's return. The last chance it had with me was the year and a half since RMS's resignation. When they reappointed him, they blew it. Not in how they presented it, but that they did it at all.
Signing the open letter calling for his removal and the board's resignation was my last little hopeful action with regard to the FSF. Other people remained invested in the FSF's potential redemption, in spite of the shadow cast by RMS's continued prominence over it, and I felt I owed it to them not to give up entirely, not just then, not just yet.
But that's that. Time for something else. These sorts of things, ending long associations, never resolve easily, and rarely well. It won't be a quick, clean break for me or for the others who see this as I do. But it is an end.