"As the advocates of open source draw new users into our community, we free software activists have to work even more to bring the issue of freedom to those new users' attention. We have to say, “It's free software and it gives you freedom!”—more and louder than ever."
Full story »
http://www.personalbee.com –
Category: Philosophy Tags:
- Login to post comments
dehumanizer
16 years 27 weeks 20 hours 34 sec ago
Luckily, freedom is not something
Luckily, freedom is not something to be defined by RMS.
boottux
16 years 25 weeks 3 days 12 hours ago
I can only hope that the lack of
I can only hope that the lack of commentary about this article on a site devoted to free software can only mean that everyone agrees with Richard Stallman.
spikeb
16 years 25 weeks 3 days 11 hours ago
true in my case
true in my case
motters
16 years 25 weeks 15 hours 42 min ago
I don't really have a problem with
I don't really have a problem with using the term "open source", and as Stallman says in the article it might be better if some more unambiguous term were used for free software, since the average computer user (or IT manager) just assumes this refers to cost rather than freedom.
IMHO the best argument which Stallman gives is that unless users realize that it's about freedom rather than cost they may well switch back to proprietary software if it's handed out gratis.
You could use terms such as "freedom promoting software" or "freedom preserving software", but I guess these are rather a mouthfull compared to the more catchy "free".