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This article is an example of what over ~20 years has steadily turned me away from the FSF. How does this article do any good? At the bottom of the page it say

This article is an example of what over ~20 years has steadily turned me away from the FSF. How does this article do any good? At the bottom of the page it says: "Our mission is to preserve, protect and promote the freedom ..." And yet, they're endlessly stuck dividing the world into smaller and smaller cohorts of purity. It's 15 years since the OSI. Open Source as a term has done more to get FOSS into business than anything else: Open Source is the Heineken of Free Software whose slogan was "reaching the parts that others can't"! And yet, they still don't get it! There is value in being controversial as it makes headlines and spreads the word. But, they're too insular - arguably, at a time when the values of FOSS needs more positive explanation and engagement, given the direction of software and technology today. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_free_and_open-source_software#The_launch_of_Open_Source https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_free_and_open-sourc...

stinkytaco 10y ago
>There is value in being controversial as it makes headlines and spreads the word. But, they're too insular - arguably, at a time when the values of FOSS needs more positive explanation and engagement, given the direction of software and technology today. What direction are you referring to? As I see it, Open Source has won. The shift to cloud based solutions means more people are using at least some open source than ever before, whether it's portions of their browser to massive Linux or BSD server farms, they are engaging with open source. Companies that once sold proprietary systems are moving more and more to open source solutions (e.g. Microsoft). The irony is, of course, that as open source software has won, freedom has actually been damaged.
- slgeorge 10y ago
  I feel like FOSS is growing/winning for developers and shrinking/losing for users. FOSS is used a lot by the major SaaS companies to deliver their solutions, but none of their solutions are themselves FOSS. For example: Google search, Google email (I mean why not?) Facebook E-bay Amazon SalesForce LinkedIN All of these companies now believe in Open Source for developers, and not for users. And I think that division has firmed up over time, a new generation of Web-centric developers have come through. Challenger app developers are highly in favour of FOSS for infrastructure, but I don't think they even consider it for the application [0]. For example, Asana, <and a bunch of stuff I don't use> If anything, I think the steady move towards apps/closed-gardens is a big risk to FOSS as a vision for users, though the vision for developers continues to grow. [0] what everyone is doing may well be rational from their perspective, we've learnt since the 90's that open source is a development methodology not a business model.
  - andrewmcwatters 10y ago
    > I feel like FOSS is growing/winning for developers and shrinking/losing for users. I think this is the top highlight of the thread. If software can become free, businesses will use it as leverage to obtain greater margins.
  - rekado 10y ago
    This is why I find it important to use AGPL3+ for my code. We need more developers who are committed to user freedom and who work not only on free software but specifically software with a strong copyleft.
    - serge2k 10y ago
      Yeah but the FOSS guys decided it would be too hard on companies to make the AGPL provisions part of the GPLv3. I think that makes them hypocrites, but oh well.
  - akvadrako 10y ago
    I feel that the direction things are moving, those two categories of software will eventually be the same thing. FOSS was most prominent at the bottom of the stack, first kernels, then major libraries, then UI engines, toolkits, game engines and so on. Once open source reaches the level of web-app, the users will be directly interacting with a program that's open source from top to bottom. The things on top of that are data, content, support and other things businesses add. Maybe next those will be become open too. Or maybe a new layer of proprietary solutions will emerge above the current stack (VR?), and open source will scramble to catch up.
  - stinkytaco 10y ago
    And this is because the experience for users is no longer in the software. Whether I use Firefox or IE matters little when what I actually want is Google Maps and the massive amount of information it provides me. The FSF needs to shift from free software to focusing on "free (as in freedom) service". Cloud services that respect your freedom and privacy. I don't know how that world would look, but I suspect it will involve heavy government regulation of things like data protection processes and data usage restrictions.
- rekado 10y ago
  > The irony is, of course, that as open source software has won, freedom has actually been damaged. Exactly. This shows one of the core differences between the Free Software movement and Open Source. Little is won when there are more users of Free Software (copyleft or not). The goal is not only to displace proprietary software but freedom-restricting practices involving software. This is one of the reasons why the GPL was updated to version 3.
- Pica_soO 10y ago
  The hugest blow open source received in recent times was Minecraft being bought by Microsoft. Minecraft is/was what personal computers where for the open source community- a chance not to propagate abilities or rights, but a mindset. You can do everything yourself- if you can create it - you can share it with everyone. If they would have added a "Shrink-e-nator" that allowed for complex devices to be shrunken down to one block size and carried around and a GitHub like system to share constructs & turtle programs- it would have been a whole world-wide new generation, growing up with open source. Gone, what a nice, woody sort of word..
  - serge2k 10y ago
    > hugest blow open source received in recent times was Minecraft being bought by Microsoft Minecraft is and always was entirely proprietary and closed. People reverse engineered java bytecode to get what they wanted, but that doesn't make it any less proprietary.
    - Pica_soO 10y ago
      Yes, but the whole community that spawned around it- is a open source community by mentality. People today dont have to setup a OS to get a computer going, they dont have to learn anything, thus many of them never get to know creation, and the joy it brings. Minecraft reintroduced that - lego is programmable matter, and minecraft was programmable matter, and most servers where/are anarchic. Its true it was proprietary, and it should have been wrestled with a real and better open source alternative from that fate. Whoever at microsoft saw this danger growing, and voted for hugging it to death, i draw my hat.
      - stinkytaco 10y ago
        I really think you are overthinking this. Minecraft is a fun game. Legos are fun toys. I don't think either was going to respawn a mass love of computer programming that probably never existed to begin with. People who want to create have always had outlets to do so. I would argue with the introduction of robot toys, raspberry pis and arduinos, that creation has never been more immediate than it currently is.

stinkytaco 10y ago

>There is value in being controversial as it makes headlines and spreads the word. But, they're too insular - arguably, at a time when the values of FOSS needs more positive explanation and engagement, given the direction of software and technology today. What direction are you referring to? As I see it, Open Source has won. The shift to cloud based solutions means more people are using at least some open source than ever before, whether it's portions of their browser to massive Linux or BSD server farms, they are engaging with open source. Companies that once sold proprietary systems are moving more and more to open source solutions (e.g. Microsoft). The irony is, of course, that as open source software has won, freedom has actually been damaged.

slgeorge 10y ago
I feel like FOSS is growing/winning for developers and shrinking/losing for users. FOSS is used a lot by the major SaaS companies to deliver their solutions, but none of their solutions are themselves FOSS. For example: Google search, Google email (I mean why not?) Facebook E-bay Amazon SalesForce LinkedIN All of these companies now believe in Open Source for developers, and not for users. And I think that division has firmed up over time, a new generation of Web-centric developers have come through. Challenger app developers are highly in favour of FOSS for infrastructure, but I don't think they even consider it for the application [0]. For example, Asana, <and a bunch of stuff I don't use> If anything, I think the steady move towards apps/closed-gardens is a big risk to FOSS as a vision for users, though the vision for developers continues to grow. [0] what everyone is doing may well be rational from their perspective, we've learnt since the 90's that open source is a development methodology not a business model.
- andrewmcwatters 10y ago
  > I feel like FOSS is growing/winning for developers and shrinking/losing for users. I think this is the top highlight of the thread. If software can become free, businesses will use it as leverage to obtain greater margins.
- rekado 10y ago
  This is why I find it important to use AGPL3+ for my code. We need more developers who are committed to user freedom and who work not only on free software but specifically software with a strong copyleft.
  - serge2k 10y ago
    Yeah but the FOSS guys decided it would be too hard on companies to make the AGPL provisions part of the GPLv3. I think that makes them hypocrites, but oh well.
- akvadrako 10y ago
  I feel that the direction things are moving, those two categories of software will eventually be the same thing. FOSS was most prominent at the bottom of the stack, first kernels, then major libraries, then UI engines, toolkits, game engines and so on. Once open source reaches the level of web-app, the users will be directly interacting with a program that's open source from top to bottom. The things on top of that are data, content, support and other things businesses add. Maybe next those will be become open too. Or maybe a new layer of proprietary solutions will emerge above the current stack (VR?), and open source will scramble to catch up.
- stinkytaco 10y ago
  And this is because the experience for users is no longer in the software. Whether I use Firefox or IE matters little when what I actually want is Google Maps and the massive amount of information it provides me. The FSF needs to shift from free software to focusing on "free (as in freedom) service". Cloud services that respect your freedom and privacy. I don't know how that world would look, but I suspect it will involve heavy government regulation of things like data protection processes and data usage restrictions.
rekado 10y ago
> The irony is, of course, that as open source software has won, freedom has actually been damaged. Exactly. This shows one of the core differences between the Free Software movement and Open Source. Little is won when there are more users of Free Software (copyleft or not). The goal is not only to displace proprietary software but freedom-restricting practices involving software. This is one of the reasons why the GPL was updated to version 3.
Pica_soO 10y ago
The hugest blow open source received in recent times was Minecraft being bought by Microsoft. Minecraft is/was what personal computers where for the open source community- a chance not to propagate abilities or rights, but a mindset. You can do everything yourself- if you can create it - you can share it with everyone. If they would have added a "Shrink-e-nator" that allowed for complex devices to be shrunken down to one block size and carried around and a GitHub like system to share constructs & turtle programs- it would have been a whole world-wide new generation, growing up with open source. Gone, what a nice, woody sort of word..
- serge2k 10y ago
  > hugest blow open source received in recent times was Minecraft being bought by Microsoft Minecraft is and always was entirely proprietary and closed. People reverse engineered java bytecode to get what they wanted, but that doesn't make it any less proprietary.
  - Pica_soO 10y ago
    Yes, but the whole community that spawned around it- is a open source community by mentality. People today dont have to setup a OS to get a computer going, they dont have to learn anything, thus many of them never get to know creation, and the joy it brings. Minecraft reintroduced that - lego is programmable matter, and minecraft was programmable matter, and most servers where/are anarchic. Its true it was proprietary, and it should have been wrestled with a real and better open source alternative from that fate. Whoever at microsoft saw this danger growing, and voted for hugging it to death, i draw my hat.
    - stinkytaco 10y ago
      I really think you are overthinking this. Minecraft is a fun game. Legos are fun toys. I don't think either was going to respawn a mass love of computer programming that probably never existed to begin with. People who want to create have always had outlets to do so. I would argue with the introduction of robot toys, raspberry pis and arduinos, that creation has never been more immediate than it currently is.