16 ms·

Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software (2016)

293 points by pera 8y ago

kazinator 8y ago
> Radical groups in the 1960s had a reputation for factionalism: some organizations split because of disagreements on details of strategy, and the two daughter groups treated each other as enemies despite having similar basic goals and values. That observation could be what inspired that gag in Monty Python's Life of Brian film: the "People's Front of Judea" versus the "Judean People's Front".
- JetSpiegel 8y ago
  I think this is more an general observation on human behaviour, I don't think there's any particular characteristic of 60's groups that led to more factionalism.
- duxup 8y ago
  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcissism_of_small_differences https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcissism_of_small_differen...
jph 8y ago
> When we call software “free,” we mean that it respects the users' essential freedoms What do readers here think about a new name that is more direct, such as "freedom software", or "freedom source", or other names that emphasize the essential freedoms?
- btilly 8y ago
  The phrase "free software" predates "open source" by over a decade. It is of similar vintage to terms like "shareware". Any phrase that you use will require explanation. That said, you also see it called "libre software". Or you see it with the catchphrase, "Think free as in speech, not beer."
  - jodrellblank 8y ago
    For the longest time I had no clue what "free as in speech, not beer" was supposed to mean; even now I don't think it fits very well - free speech is about what you have rights to create and what you have rights to say. That would be like a right to create your own software. Free speech is not about how you can re-use someone else's words, or how someone else's .. proprietary and restrictive speech can lock your data into someone else's ecosystem (see, it's a nonsensical comparison to try and write out). "Freedom respecting software. Think zero restrictions on how you use it, not zero cost". It's not as catchy, but it hints a lot more at what it means. Even "Think free as in freedoms, not price" seems more helpful. But maybe that's because I already know what it means now.
    - badsectoracula 8y ago
      "Free as in speech, not beer" is about what meaning to avoid: the "free" refers to freedom (free speech is about freedom), not price.
      - jodrellblank 8y ago
        At the time, I could see that - "it's not zero cost", but couldn't see what else (relevant) remained once you took that away. How is a kernel or a text editor like speech? Of course speech costs no money? Why is a webserver or a compiler like arguments about shouting fire in a crowded theatre? Free speech is about the person speaking and their interaction with wider society, free software is about the person listening and their interaction with the speaker and with the speech itself. It's mismatched.
        badsectoracula 8y ago
        You focus too much on the "speech" part, it isn't like zero cost software is compared to beer. The "free as in speech" is used to disambiguate between the "price vs freedom" use of "free", not to put any connotation between software and speech. "Free as in speech, not beer" is really a short way to say "when we use the word 'free' here, we do it with the meaning that is used in the phrase 'free speech' as opposed to the meaning used in the phrase 'free beer'".
- _Simon 8y ago
  It depends on what freedom. GPL isn't free; it's handcuffware. It's "freedom" on someone else's terms. BSD is a truly free license whereas GPL is an attempt at an anti-capitalist license model.
  - dvorak365 8y ago
    It’s free in a similar way to how preventing citizens from owning slaves is free.
  - Kim_Bruning 8y ago
    The big difference between BSD and GPL (after all the legalese is said and done) is as follows: * BSD says you have the freedom to swing your fists * GPL says that your freedom to swing your fists ends at the tip of my nose. That's pretty much the difference in practice. That's actually pretty similar to how our capitalist, democratic society works. (we do restrict people's freedoms where they would end up taking away freedom from someone else). Sometimes the one approach is better, sometimes the other. Apply right tool to right job, as needed. Note that it is entirely possible to earn money using free (as in speech) software, and many quite capitalist companies do so. (ps; in my limited experience in hiring expensive lawyers to resolve legal conflicts while capitalisting: the GPL appears to deliver a lot more bang for buck than MIT or BSD. In that limited domain. MIT and BSD can be quite useful in other domains! )
    - millstone 8y ago
      The fist analogy doesn't work at all. BSD licenses do not permit face punching, literally or metaphorically.
  - eeZah7Ux 8y ago
    > It's "freedom" on someone else's terms. It's freedom on my terms too: GPL protects the developer and user community from malicious patents, hostile forks, lock-down attempts, bait-and-switch-to-closed.
    - amarkov 8y ago
- dvorak365 8y ago
  “Civil software” is simple, accurate, sounds good, and is relatively unambiguous. It would get my vote
- pera 8y ago
  I honestly prefer either FLOSS or just libre software, but I guess I'm biased :) https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/floss-and-foss.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/floss-and-foss.html
- colonelpopcorn 8y ago
  Smacks of freedom fries talk that went around during the early 2000's when France wasn't so keen on joining the "Global War on Terror".
- AdmiralAsshat 8y ago
  We already have Free/Libre Open Source Software (FLOSS) which is designed to emphasize such things. I don't think Yet Another Buzzword™ is going to help. It's also worth noting that the issue of "free" versus "freedom" is an English-language-specific confusion and not quite as much of a problem in other languages (cf. German, "gratis" meaning no-cost vs "Freiheit" for freedom). That's partially why Stallman chose to use the Spanish term "libre" to help obviate some of that confusion.
- hathawsh 8y ago
  The word "libre" is gaining momentum now that people are using LibreOffice. The word is working its way into the English language: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/libre https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/libre
  - jcelerier 8y ago
    le plan se déroule comme prévu !
  - icc97 8y ago
    > For instance, in some contexts the French and Spanish word “libre” works well, but people in India do not recognize it at all.
- acover 8y ago
  Community code?
  - DonHopkins 8y ago
    How about "Leftist Code"? You know, for Copyleft! ;)
- eeZah7Ux 8y ago
  "freedom" is an imprecise word. Most people are surprised at hearing it associated to software or books or artwork. "collaborative software" sounds more accurate to me.
  - DonHopkins 8y ago
    Yeah, but as a brand, it sucks. There aren't so many Epic Rock & Roll Anthems about "Collaborative Software". But there is one about "Free Software", though: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sJUDx7iEJw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sJUDx7iEJw
  - JetSpiegel 8y ago
    Windows is also a collaborative piece of software. That term seems ambiguous.
- herogreen 8y ago
  {Emancipating,Respectful,Organic,Common,Empowering, Liberating} software come to mind. But I really like Libre software.
- kashyapc 8y ago
  Since we're bike-shedding, just wanted to mention: "unfettered software". It has a liberating ring to it like none other. :-) Wikipedia even says [+]: Stallman has suggested that the term "unfettered software" would be an appropriate, non-ambiguous replacement, but that he would not push for it because there was too much momentum and too much effort behind the term "free software". [+] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_terms_for_free_software https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_terms_for_free_s...
- diffeomorphism 8y ago
  > "freedom software" Too long, let's call it "free software" for short. It has "free" as the first word which emphasizes the essential freedoms. If you want to refer to non-free, gratis software, the term "freeware" has been common for decades and other languages don't have that annoying ambiguity problem.
sharemywin 8y ago
network effects have nullified alot of the value of "free software." Without "free data" and a "free communication channel," people are as locked in today as they were proprietary software of the 80s
- sharemywin 8y ago
  1. free source 2. open format for import export of data 3. api interface to services. 4. forkable open protocols file formats
- mrybczyn 8y ago
  No, "free as in beer" nullified a lot of the value of "free as in liberty". When is the last time you paid moneys for a software product? You are the product.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - sharemywin 8y ago
    But, if you could easily take your contacts or word docs or reviews etc over to another platform there would probably be more competition and more value would probably be passed to the consumer.
- gowld 8y ago
  The Affero General Public License attacks this problem https://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl-3.0.en.html https://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl-3.0.en.html > The GNU Affero General Public License is a free, copyleft license for software and other kinds of works, specifically designed to ensure cooperation with the community in the case of network server software.
stealthcat 8y ago
Because of limitation of English language, no single word to represent intent of 'free'. Often you need to explain that free as 'free as in free speech', which probably confuses people more.
- MickerNews 8y ago
  Sapir-Whorf in action. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_relativity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_relativity
  - hannasanarion 8y ago
    1. Sapir-Whorf is racist pseudoscience that was never substantiated and was universally rejected from day 1 by everybody but science-illiterate journalists 2. Even if there was substance to it, it's not relevant to this. People have no difficulty understanding what "Free" means when you explain what you mean. Just as in the above sentence you experienced no confusion at all over whether I used "that" in the indicative or grammatical sense.
- ewzimm 8y ago
  I've seen this often, but I don't think it's true. How about "liberated"? This implies that restrictions did exist at one point, which is true, as copyright is assigned by default and needs to be explicitly liberated in most places. It also reminds people who forget to assign a license of the importance to do so. I'm sure there are other single words that would convey the same message.
  - reificator 8y ago
    As you say liberated software implies a removal of restrictions, but I think it implies it was accomplished by force. I think it would be a good term for someone who believes piracy to be a moral imperative, but I don't think it's a good term for expressing the idea of the author willingly sharing their work. "And the soldiers liberate them, laying mines along their roads." ~Megadeth
- 8y ago
cocacola1 8y ago
He talks about it in the essay, but I think it bears mentioning again that "free software" at first glance implies something apart from what the FSF intends. Is there really no other satisfactory word that could be used that would get the point across with less explanation?
- amarkov 8y ago
  "Software which respects the moral positions of people like those in the Free Software Foundation" seems like an inherently complicated concept, that's not really amenable to a one or two word summary.
chris_engel 8y ago
Honestly, the name is a problem. If you read "free software", you will think of free as in gratis. Nobody thinks about freedom there, because of that its not popular.
ChuckMcM 8y ago
At some point there should be the counter essay which is "Why Free Software Misses the Point of Open Source." There is tremendous value in repairability of things when you can see all of the details of how they are constructed, without having to simultaneously give you permission to manufacture or reproduce those things on your own. I really enjoyed that old televisions and radios included the schematic in the owners manual so that you could repair them down to the component level. It was really nice that the BIOS source code was part of the IBM PC technical manual, it helped you understand what it was expecting when it probed an IO ROM on the ISA bus. Neither of those examples gave you the right to re-distribute your modifications, and yet they were in fact valuable things to have.
- reificator 8y ago
  Devil's advocate though: You have the requisite technical knowledge to do those things. Not everyone does. If someone non-technical's stuff breaks, you can't distribute the changes you've already made yourself. It limits the value of the work you're putting in and it limits the repairability of an item based on the owner's skills. It's a bad analogy but it's as though car repair shops were illegal and you could only repair your own car. Most people would have some pretty junky beat-up cars or they'd be buying new ones every year.
  - ChuckMcM 8y ago
    Car shops are a good example, there is no prevention of repairing other people cars, or their equipment, based on the knowledge from complete schematics / source code. The thing you can't do is make your own version of the thing and sell it. When my parents wireless router breaks, if I had the source code to the system installed on it I could both better understand the documentation to explain it to them, and I could perhaps patch a security problem that caused the breakdown. There should be nothing preventing me from re-distributing the fixes, just as Sams FotoFacts used to distribute radio repair manuals, or the Chilton car maintenance manuals.
    - jopsen 8y ago
youdontknowtho 8y ago
I really disagree with Stalman on this concept because it applies equally to the powerful and the powerless. I may not be putting this eloquently, but the user of the computer could be a huge company using their freedom to build a killing machine. Their are real balances of power that this seems to not address. I'm probably just kind of rambling. I. Not trying to offend anyone. EDIT: I guess what I'm trying to say is that it's taken as a given that this type of free software would somehow address these imbalances of power and I don't think that's the lesson that you could take from the last 20 years.
- ino 8y ago
  There's a license for you, but it's nonfree: https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#JSON https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#JSON
- wongarsu 8y ago
  Free software introduces one balance of power: by drastically reducing switching costs it reduces the power of the software creator. As an example: if I don't like the direction MS is heading with MS Word my only real options are never upgrading or switching to a competitor. That switch would be painful, I would have to learn a new interface, import my files etc. So MS can push a lot of stuff on me, as long as enduring that is less painful than switching to another program. In contrast, if I dislike the direction Libre Office is heading I fork it and selectively merge the changes I like. And if my opinion is shared widely enough my fork might replace the original project. That's also why benevolent dictators are so popular for free software projects: it's efficient, and if the dictator becomes a tyrant someone will just fork. What free software doesn't is prevent the construction of killer robot swarms. But if the killer robot swarm is free software you can fork it and build a killer robot killer swarm :)
  - JetSpiegel 8y ago
    > That's also why benevolent dictators are so popular for free software projects: it's efficient, and if the dictator becomes a tyrant someone will just fork. Just like a blockchain that runs of coffee instead of electricity.
kowdermeister 8y ago
If that's the intent behind "free software" I'd call it "liberty software" or "liberated software". I'm not a native English speaker so it might have things attached I don't know about.
- reificator 8y ago
  Free as in freedom is a very old and established definition of the word. It is also very engrained in the American consciousness. Liberated software sounds like closed source that someone leaked the code for, or just a euphemism for pirated software.
- AceJohnny2 8y ago
  Yes, this is indeed a problem of english semantics, which is why the term "libre software" is sometimes offered as an alternative. "Libre" is a french word that means that part of "free" that free software cares about (ie not the cheap part)
  - elboru 8y ago
    Oh, I thought it came from Spanish, with the same meaning.
    - galactus 8y ago
      It comes from the same latin origin, I don't think we can link it to one language more than to the other.
- heegemcgee 8y ago
  This is actually a "known bug". It is more specifically called "libre" software, and the idiom "Free as in 'beer' versus Free as in 'speech'" comes up to help illustrate the difference in meaning.
- scj 8y ago
  "Liberty software" should be correctly understood by a native English speaker. That being said, it is a bit awkward... I interpret "Liberty ${OBJECT}" as an Americanism[0]. Though, I'd be interested in the perspectives of people outside North America... As someone else pointed out, "liberated software" is past tense, where a previous state is implied. [0] Anecdotal, but take a look at Wikipedia's "Liberty" disambiguation page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberty_(disambiguation) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberty_(disambiguation) most examples of "Liberty ${OBJECT}" are American based.
bitwize 8y ago
The original articulator of open-source values, Eric Raymond, whose essays helped crystallize open source as a "movement", gets free software on a fundamental level. He and Stallman were once close friends, and from his blog posts and comments it seems he and Stallman are in broad agreement on the points of software freedom being good and proprietary lock-in being evil. The reason why open source is a "thing" is to convey these benefits -- these virtues -- to an audience that doesn't think like Richard Stallman. I.e., most of the world. It was an exercise in much-needed marketing for the movement. At the time, no one could out-market Microsoft. Microsoft were licensing Stones songs and lighting up the Empire State building to promote Win32 duct-taped to DOS. Unless free-software hackers had a counterstrategy that didn't sound like a tin-pot revolution organized by bearded, Kaczynski-esque radicals, they would lose and lose big. Criticize Raymond's efforts all you want. 20 years ago Microsoft was making strategic acquisitions to quash the viability of free software; today they're making strategic acquisitions to be at the center of it.
- bunderbunder 8y ago
  Upvoted, but with a caveat I wanted to throw out: > 20 years ago Microsoft was making strategic acquisitions to quash the viability of free software; today they're making strategic acquisitions to be at the center of it. I think you've run afoul of the very confusion RMS is talking about in TFA. They're not buying into free software, they're buying into open source. Most of what MS is doing in the space is using Apache-style licenses. I'm not going to say Microsoft is bought into Free Software until I see VSCode being distributed under the GPL. (It's currently MIT.)
  - amyjess 8y ago
    The Apache license is absolutely a free software license. Even the FSF agrees with that. https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.en.html#apache2 https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.en.html#apache2 > This is a free software license, compatible with version 3 of the GNU GPL.
  - bitwize 8y ago
    Nope. Even Stallman distinguishes between free software, which includes MIT- and Apache-licensed software, and copylefted software, which is the subset of free software that requires changes to be distributed under like terms to the original software itself. Of course RMS and the FSF would much rather you use copylefted software and copyleft licenses such as the GPL. But not doing so is not the inherent submission to evil that using proprietary software is, in their view.
stiangrindvoll 8y ago
Good to see this discussion and the different viewpoints of the matter coming up to the surface from time to time.
Applejinx 8y ago
My concern with free vs. open source software is this: free/libre software assumes the power is with the programmer, to make stuff that does battle with the closed source hordes, and bring justice. Nobody will starve, the good stuff will rise, and bad powers won't win. It's a pretty fantasy and I'd love to live in that world. I use open source (MIT license) because I need the ability to give of myself to others, and because I don't think I have any real power and do risk starving and failing. If I try to make a stand for justice, and push around larger powers, I can be just sort of blackballed and end up marginalized. The solution to that is the situation that's always existed in my industry, the music business. Exploitation. I can only thrive and see my ideas proliferate, if I allow some larger power to exploit me and get most of the benefit from my work. They get to take and not give, they get to make themselves rich at my expense, and if I want to not starve it's a negotiating process as to what crumbs they want to throw, and my weapons are more PR than legal pressure forcing the larger entity to comply. If I can make it seem advantageous to 'shout out' me and my work, by painting it as a PR bonus that doesn't have extra business consequences, I can get more crumbs. What's crumbs to a giant business might be all I would ever need to survive. The relative poverty levels are that wildly disparate. Open source lets me give ideas and code to other small fry like me, and also lets the giant centers of power exploit me in this way: it costs them IP-wise so little to 'give credit' that it's pretty advantageous for them to interact with me. I chose the MIT license for this reason, and hope to establish a good library of cutting-edge audio DSP code that can grow and serve the needs of open source and the true free/libre community. I don't believe anything I can do, can get me enough power as an individual that I could join libre and pressure giant corporations to change their ways. I've written the best wordlength reducer in the world, the best audio distortion algorithm in the world. Doesn't matter. Power is not about performance and meritocracy doesn't exist: the highest-merit solution tied to a restrictive license is a meaningless historical sidenote. I will happily funnel ideas and code to free/libre software, but I won't survive unless I let myself be a lot more exploited, because power is impossible to fight.
- icebraining 8y ago
  It should be noticed that MIT licensed software is Free Software. There's a disagreement in the philosophy, but the problem is proprietary software, not MIT/BSD/Apache/etc.
asdsa5325 8y ago
> When we call software “free,” we mean that it respects the users' essential freedoms What a ridiculous definition.
loeg 8y ago
Religious argument that comes down to preference. Might as well say "Why Emacs misses the point of modal editing." Edit: Downvoters, care to engage at all? Or do you just disagree with the idea that reasonable people might hold a different preference to yours, whichever flavor you prefer?
- klez 8y ago
  I didn't downvote, but I think people disliked your use of the word "religious", as it's sort of a discussion-stopper. To answer your point, the difference is that most people confuse the terms, which have a very different connotation. One is about software quality, the other is about users' freedom (as defined by the fsf). Emacs does not try to appeal to business (or users in general) by using the principles of vim in a more business-friendly connotation, so comparing the issue at hand with "emacs misses the point of modal editing" kind of misses the point, if you will :)
  - loeg 8y ago
    > I think people disliked your use of the word "religious", as it's sort of a discussion-stopper. That's kind of the point. There's no use arguing about it since it's a matter of personal preference — i.e., religion. > Emacs does not try to appeal to business (or users in general) by using the principles of vim in a more business-friendly connotation Open source software does not try to appeal to users by using the principles of the FSF. I don't think this illustrates a problem with the metaphor. They're both fine editors and reflect the preferences of their developers. Ditto different software licenses.
- jodrellblank 8y ago
  The "preference" of whether you submit to a dictator because you have no choice or {nothing here because you have no choice}. Free software is what gives you a choice. Then you can prefer it to proprietary software or not. But replying "it's a preference" to an article trying to explain what free software is and isn't and why it exists, makes no sense. "Why it exists" or "what it means" is not a preference.
zer00eyz 8y ago
For lack of a better term, Stallman is a zealot. For that I can respect and admire him even if his stance isn't always practical. I can look up to his hard line mentality even if I understand why I (and many others) can't follow the same path. He is to open source what monks are to buddhism (ironically both the good parts and some of the bad). With that in mind his lessons are the golden path that many of us should aspire to even if we cannot attain it. When ever I have to confront Stallman I am always left with the same dismal feeling, he's right, he might be an ass(1) but he is still a person(2). 1. https://kottke.org/11/10/richard-stallmans-rider https://kottke.org/11/10/richard-stallmans-rider Yea he's saying please but its still outrageous this article was chosen because it makes the brown M&M's comparison and that apparently had a secondary purpose. There is no secondary purpose for asking for a Parrot, regardless of how politely or how it is caveated. 2. This (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pube5Aynsls https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pube5Aynsls ) is what I go back and watch every time I go through this (difficult) process. It is funny (unexpected) that a man as large as my self can be so nimble... guts, self-awareness, gusto... IDNK what kinds of traits would possess him to do such a thing but it is just fun to watch. The fact he does it with the lap top just makes me giggle.
- zokier 8y ago
  It's fine for rms to be the extremist and zealot. I feel like the problem is that the Free software/copyleft movement is missing strong pragmatic realist leaders and organizations, so the situation is that either you are on the crazy train helmed by rms, or you fall back to the more relaxed open-source world.
  - craigsmansion 8y ago
    > is missing strong pragmatic realist leaders and organizations As far as I'm concerned, that is by design. Even though he is fairly well known, rms is not the pope of Free Software as some seem to think. He's just a guy. You can email him if you want to, if you have questions. He has some very specific ideas about software. He writes essays about that and tries to explain the thought process behind his ideas. You can read those and agree or disagree with these thoughts or not. I think "strong pragmatic realist leaders and organizations" would be harmful to Free Software, because people swayed by such things can ultimately be swayed in the opposite direction once even stronger leaders and organisations with even better marketing pop up. So no, there is no "crazy train helmed by rms" as you, and a lot of others, like to believe. rms is not the one standing in the way of the global victory of "open source." What does stand in the way is dilution and corruption from within. And I think, in that regard, rms could be considered a "leader", and the Free Software movement, and even Open Source by proxy, is lucky to have him.
grosjona 8y ago
I find the GPL 'free software' license to be a lot less 'free' than other kinds of open source licenses in terms of what you are allowed to do as a user of the software. For example, with GPL, you do not have ownership over any derived work that you produce; you are legally forced to share your work with everyone. This is a weapon to allow big corporations to sue small indie developers and startups who are trying to compete with them. The balance of power is asymmetric. Only corporations have the money to legally enforce GPL licenses - Also, the creator of the software is allowed to keep their own derivative work private (because they have copyright) but no one else can (everyone else is bound by copyleft).
- zokier 8y ago
  It is in many ways similar to the notorious JSON license by Crockford that says "The Software shall be used for Good, not Evil.". Except GPL is more explicit on what it considers good and evil. An appropriate analogy would be question is a country free (as in respecting freedoms) if you are not allowed to murder people? Most people would say yes. And it could be even argued that it is more free than country that does allow murdering people, because the limitation on murdering empowers people to exercise their (other) freedoms more freely. Note that I'm don't fully agree on RMS' stance on the matter here, but I think I understand it reasonably well.
  - gowld 8y ago
    https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.en.html https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.en.html “The Software shall be used for Good, not Evil.” This is a restriction on usage and thus conflicts with freedom 0. The restriction might be unenforcible, but we cannot presume that. Thus, the license is nonfree.
- pritambaral 8y ago
  > I find the GPL 'free software' license to be a lot less 'free' than other kinds of open source licenses in terms of what you are allowed to do as a user of the software. Quite the contrary. For users of software, there's no better license than strong copyleft licenses. > with GPL, you do not have ownership over any derived work that you produce This is false. You are free to produce derived works and keep them to yourself, or even to your organization. No need to share source with anyone. If/When you share the derived work, whomever you distribute the derived work to, they are now a user. You have to give to that user the same rights you got: full source code and GPL-provided rights. You do not have to give those out to "everyone", only to those to whom you distribute your derived works. > This is a weapon to allow big corporations to sue small indie developers and startups who are trying to compete with them. The balance of power is asymmetric. Only corporations have the money to legally enforce GPL licenses If not via the law, how can rights possibly be enforced? Also, note that the GPL has been enforced — for better or worse — by individuals against far richer corporations. This is, of course, only because of the fear of the law. > Also, the creator of the software is allowed to keep their own derivative work private (because they have copyright) but no one else can (everyone else is bound by copyleft). As I said above, this is false. Your changes are yours, and you retain copyright on them. Code you didn't write, of course, is not under your copyright; but you still have the full rights granted to you by the GPL to do with them privately as you please.
bullen 8y ago
So is LGPL = Free Software?
dahart 8y ago
> But software can be said to serve its users only if it respects their freedom. What if the software is designed to put chains on its users? I love that there are people carrying this torch, I just wish the language wasn't so over the top hyperbolic. That would make it easier to join the effort for me. Framing it as a right & wrong moral issue seems ironically Disney-esque in it's inability to acknowledge the gray areas and realities of life. This entire article complains about restricting freedoms without once mentioning funding of any kind. People building non-free software aren't setting out to put chains on people and restrict all freedoms, they're trying to make money, and we all need to make money. I don't know how to write free software all day long and feed my family, and I'd put money on most businesses feeling the same way. If I did know how, I would absolutely do it. Who has experience based and practical advice on funding models that businesses could reasonably adopt for releasing their software as free?
- abdullahkhalids 8y ago
  > I love that there are people carrying this torch, I just wish the language wasn't so over the top hyperbolic. That would make it easier to join the effort for me. Manifestos often have hyperbolic language. See the communist manifesto or a declaration of the independence of cyberspace[1]. That is usually what gets people excited about a movement. [1] https://www.eff.org/cyberspace-independence https://www.eff.org/cyberspace-independence
  - hexane360 8y ago
    I'm starting to think it's a mistake to take on too lukewarm of a movement to try to get widespread appeal. I know this is basically Godwin's law now, but see the difference between Clinton and Trump's (or even Sanders') campaigns.
  - paulie_a 8y ago
    The word manifesto is something you don't want to be associated with. If what you wrote is considered a manifesto, you are probably off base, or simply crazy.
mikece 8y ago
Do proponents of Free Software, on the whole, assert that the concept of intellectual property should not exist?
- insertnickname 8y ago
  No. In fact, copyleft licenses are completely dependent on copyright. Copyleft advocates sometimes claim that copyleft "uses copyright against itself", but this isn't really true. Copyleft uses copyright, but not against copyright. If there was no copyright (all else equal), creative works would be in the public domain, truly free for anyone to use (more or less like the MIT and BSD licensed works today).
  - abdullahkhalids 8y ago
    The language of copyright laws lets content creators stop unauthorized usage/sale of their content. The purpose behind copyright laws is to let copyright owners make money of their content. Copyleft licenses leverage the language of copyright laws to subvert the purpose of copyright laws: copyleft licenses roughly say you are authorized to do whatever you want to do with my content, as long as you let others also do whatever they want with my content.
    - flyingfences 8y ago
      > their content > my content So in other words, yes, proponents of "Free Software" do not, in fact, assert that that the concept of intellectual property should not exist.
      - abdullahkhalids 8y ago
        No, I am using the language of current legal system (which recognized IP) because otherwise I have to establish an alternative context. Again, the language is being used, but the underlying purpose behind the law is not being respected. We can imagine a society where copyright laws don't exist, i.e. content created by someone is not considered their property and others may do what they will with the content in a GPLisque manner. In that society we would never have to use 'my/their content', as there will be no notion of IP in that society.
petermcneeley 8y ago
"the freedom to run it, to study and change it, and to redistribute copies with or without changes" What if my "software" was just an exe that played all the Disney movies? Is free software against copyright laws?
- gowld 8y ago
  > Is free software against copyright laws? Mostly. https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/freedom-or-copyright.en.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/freedom-or-copyright.en.html > To make copyright fit the network age, we should legalize the noncommercial copying and sharing of all published works, and prohibit DRM. But note that "being against copyright" is different from "advocating violating current copyright laws"
  - petermcneeley 8y ago
    Ok i think i understand it just mostly sounds delusional considering the lived reality of capitalism. Perhaps if UBI becomes a thing?
- jodrellblank 8y ago
  Why would "free software" imply that you could ignore other people's copyrights, take other people's non-free work and give it away? If Disney offered you a program to play all their movies, you could say "I refuse to use their black-box proprietary movie player, I will only use a free software video player that I can inspect, to make sure it isn't scanning my computer for copyrighted Disney movies and reporting everything it finds back to Disneyland, and one I can recompile to put the video stream into the background of my transparent terminal because I'm not watching dozens of hours of movies unless I can work at the same time". That's the kind of thing it's supporting.
  - petermcneeley 8y ago
    I understand the nature of the problem. Its everywhere ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17237792 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17237792 ) I just think lived reality is more complex than a moralizing ideology. Something you understand: quote "Open Source" (as if it's a single movement) didn't win in creating desirable, accessible, commercial or beautiful software. It 'won' in the worst possible way - big companies like Amazon and Facebook took the work, hid it in their datacenters behind their paywalls, and use it to extract money from people. Nobody has any more freedom with their data and their computing because Facebook uses PHP, than they would have on a proprietary desktop OS. "you can have an open source OS and browser which connects you to a restrictive interface where your data is under someone else's control" is a lose for all of us.
yarrel 8y ago
The GitHub purchase demonstrates once again that rms is right.
jancsika 8y ago
> Any activity that promotes the word “open” tends to extend the curtain that hides the ideas of the free software movement. This is the end of one paragraph. So...from whom is the curtain "hiding" these ideas? It must be from the audience for the conferences that have the word "open" in them. That means that a substantial part of the audience does not consist of "open source advocates." At least not in the sense of people who heard the open source vs. free software debate and knowingly chose against free software. If that were the case, then RMS wouldn't be talking about the curtain "hiding" anything-- rather he'd be talking about "open" conferences merely serving the desires of people who know about free software but don't agree with it and instead chose open source. Therefore-- one would think-- it's in the best interest of free software advocates to attend such conferences and communicate their message clearly and effectively to the substantial part of the audience who doesn't know about free software. Who knows-- they could even play a prank by redefining open source to its literal meaning, then explaining it as a subset of the free software development process. That would put the onus on open source advocates to argue against open source as a subset of free software. But to do that they'd have to reference the very features of free software they wanted to ignore! I think there was once a word for such playful cleverness... Anyhow, on to the beginning of the next paragraph: > Thus, free software activists are well advised to decline to work on an activity that calls itself “open.” Hm, I can't seem to remember the word for that "playful cleverness." Well, it was from a long, long time ago... Edit: clarification
dorp 8y ago
One can be developed without donations, one can't. See GNU, they haven't ever been able to sell software as a product.
numerobis 8y ago
There seems to be a lot of confusion here about what open source means. In practical terms, open source and free software imply the same freedoms for the users, including the rights to change and redistribute the source code. The more common terminology for proprietary software whose source is available is source-available. See the wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_software#Open-source_versus_source-available https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_software#Open-sour...
nurettin 8y ago
So many arguments start because they use the term "free" instead of "freed".
aalexgabi 8y ago
As some here did point out free software as Richard Stallman and GNU foundation use the term is a specific set of freedoms and limitations. These freedoms and limitations are arguable depending on many factors and they are not what everybody considers free software. While I can understand the need for those limitations in order to promote some ideas and practices, I am not happy that they stand for free software as an absolute and at the same time the GPL license limits freedom in two aspects: - You cannot distribute copies (modified or not) without attributing the work to the original author - You cannot distribute copies (modified or not) with less permissions than the original license Some people can argue that the GPL license actually limits your freedom while the UNLICENSE license gives you more freedom. And here is my question: If I work on a patch or feature and I put my time and effort into it, is it ethical to get rewarded for my effort? How can I sell the modified version without closing the source or changing the license? That at least until I get the money back for my invested time. And this point for me is where non free software will get ahead, simply because they are able to get paid for the the developers time and will always have more resources than free software projects.

293 points by pera 8y ago

> Radical groups in the 1960s had a reputation for factionalism: some organizations split because of disagreements on details of strategy, and the two daughter groups treated each other as enemies despite having similar basic goals and values. That observation could be what inspired that gag in Monty Python's Life of Brian film: the "People's Front of Judea" versus the "Judean People's Front".

JetSpiegel 8y ago
I think this is more an general observation on human behaviour, I don't think there's any particular characteristic of 60's groups that led to more factionalism.
duxup 8y ago
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcissism_of_small_differences https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcissism_of_small_differen...

jph 8y ago

> When we call software “free,” we mean that it respects the users' essential freedoms What do readers here think about a new name that is more direct, such as "freedom software", or "freedom source", or other names that emphasize the essential freedoms?

btilly 8y ago
The phrase "free software" predates "open source" by over a decade. It is of similar vintage to terms like "shareware". Any phrase that you use will require explanation. That said, you also see it called "libre software". Or you see it with the catchphrase, "Think free as in speech, not beer."
- jodrellblank 8y ago
  For the longest time I had no clue what "free as in speech, not beer" was supposed to mean; even now I don't think it fits very well - free speech is about what you have rights to create and what you have rights to say. That would be like a right to create your own software. Free speech is not about how you can re-use someone else's words, or how someone else's .. proprietary and restrictive speech can lock your data into someone else's ecosystem (see, it's a nonsensical comparison to try and write out). "Freedom respecting software. Think zero restrictions on how you use it, not zero cost". It's not as catchy, but it hints a lot more at what it means. Even "Think free as in freedoms, not price" seems more helpful. But maybe that's because I already know what it means now.
  - badsectoracula 8y ago
    "Free as in speech, not beer" is about what meaning to avoid: the "free" refers to freedom (free speech is about freedom), not price.
    - jodrellblank 8y ago
      At the time, I could see that - "it's not zero cost", but couldn't see what else (relevant) remained once you took that away. How is a kernel or a text editor like speech? Of course speech costs no money? Why is a webserver or a compiler like arguments about shouting fire in a crowded theatre? Free speech is about the person speaking and their interaction with wider society, free software is about the person listening and their interaction with the speaker and with the speech itself. It's mismatched.
      - badsectoracula 8y ago
        You focus too much on the "speech" part, it isn't like zero cost software is compared to beer. The "free as in speech" is used to disambiguate between the "price vs freedom" use of "free", not to put any connotation between software and speech. "Free as in speech, not beer" is really a short way to say "when we use the word 'free' here, we do it with the meaning that is used in the phrase 'free speech' as opposed to the meaning used in the phrase 'free beer'".
_Simon 8y ago
It depends on what freedom. GPL isn't free; it's handcuffware. It's "freedom" on someone else's terms. BSD is a truly free license whereas GPL is an attempt at an anti-capitalist license model.
- dvorak365 8y ago
  It’s free in a similar way to how preventing citizens from owning slaves is free.
- Kim_Bruning 8y ago
  The big difference between BSD and GPL (after all the legalese is said and done) is as follows: * BSD says you have the freedom to swing your fists * GPL says that your freedom to swing your fists ends at the tip of my nose. That's pretty much the difference in practice. That's actually pretty similar to how our capitalist, democratic society works. (we do restrict people's freedoms where they would end up taking away freedom from someone else). Sometimes the one approach is better, sometimes the other. Apply right tool to right job, as needed. Note that it is entirely possible to earn money using free (as in speech) software, and many quite capitalist companies do so. (ps; in my limited experience in hiring expensive lawyers to resolve legal conflicts while capitalisting: the GPL appears to deliver a lot more bang for buck than MIT or BSD. In that limited domain. MIT and BSD can be quite useful in other domains! )
  - millstone 8y ago
    The fist analogy doesn't work at all. BSD licenses do not permit face punching, literally or metaphorically.
- eeZah7Ux 8y ago
  > It's "freedom" on someone else's terms. It's freedom on my terms too: GPL protects the developer and user community from malicious patents, hostile forks, lock-down attempts, bait-and-switch-to-closed.
  - amarkov 8y ago
dvorak365 8y ago
“Civil software” is simple, accurate, sounds good, and is relatively unambiguous. It would get my vote
pera 8y ago
I honestly prefer either FLOSS or just libre software, but I guess I'm biased :) https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/floss-and-foss.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/floss-and-foss.html
colonelpopcorn 8y ago
Smacks of freedom fries talk that went around during the early 2000's when France wasn't so keen on joining the "Global War on Terror".
AdmiralAsshat 8y ago
We already have Free/Libre Open Source Software (FLOSS) which is designed to emphasize such things. I don't think Yet Another Buzzword™ is going to help. It's also worth noting that the issue of "free" versus "freedom" is an English-language-specific confusion and not quite as much of a problem in other languages (cf. German, "gratis" meaning no-cost vs "Freiheit" for freedom). That's partially why Stallman chose to use the Spanish term "libre" to help obviate some of that confusion.
hathawsh 8y ago
The word "libre" is gaining momentum now that people are using LibreOffice. The word is working its way into the English language: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/libre https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/libre
- jcelerier 8y ago
  le plan se déroule comme prévu !
- icc97 8y ago
  > For instance, in some contexts the French and Spanish word “libre” works well, but people in India do not recognize it at all.
acover 8y ago
Community code?
- DonHopkins 8y ago
  How about "Leftist Code"? You know, for Copyleft! ;)
eeZah7Ux 8y ago
"freedom" is an imprecise word. Most people are surprised at hearing it associated to software or books or artwork. "collaborative software" sounds more accurate to me.
- DonHopkins 8y ago
  Yeah, but as a brand, it sucks. There aren't so many Epic Rock & Roll Anthems about "Collaborative Software". But there is one about "Free Software", though: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sJUDx7iEJw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sJUDx7iEJw
- JetSpiegel 8y ago
  Windows is also a collaborative piece of software. That term seems ambiguous.
herogreen 8y ago
{Emancipating,Respectful,Organic,Common,Empowering, Liberating} software come to mind. But I really like Libre software.
kashyapc 8y ago
Since we're bike-shedding, just wanted to mention: "unfettered software". It has a liberating ring to it like none other. :-) Wikipedia even says [+]: Stallman has suggested that the term "unfettered software" would be an appropriate, non-ambiguous replacement, but that he would not push for it because there was too much momentum and too much effort behind the term "free software". [+] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_terms_for_free_software https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_terms_for_free_s...
diffeomorphism 8y ago
> "freedom software" Too long, let's call it "free software" for short. It has "free" as the first word which emphasizes the essential freedoms. If you want to refer to non-free, gratis software, the term "freeware" has been common for decades and other languages don't have that annoying ambiguity problem.

sharemywin 8y ago

network effects have nullified alot of the value of "free software." Without "free data" and a "free communication channel," people are as locked in today as they were proprietary software of the 80s

sharemywin 8y ago
1. free source 2. open format for import export of data 3. api interface to services. 4. forkable open protocols file formats
mrybczyn 8y ago
No, "free as in beer" nullified a lot of the value of "free as in liberty". When is the last time you paid moneys for a software product? You are the product.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- sharemywin 8y ago
  But, if you could easily take your contacts or word docs or reviews etc over to another platform there would probably be more competition and more value would probably be passed to the consumer.
gowld 8y ago
The Affero General Public License attacks this problem https://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl-3.0.en.html https://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl-3.0.en.html > The GNU Affero General Public License is a free, copyleft license for software and other kinds of works, specifically designed to ensure cooperation with the community in the case of network server software.

stealthcat 8y ago

Because of limitation of English language, no single word to represent intent of 'free'. Often you need to explain that free as 'free as in free speech', which probably confuses people more.

MickerNews 8y ago
Sapir-Whorf in action. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_relativity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_relativity
- hannasanarion 8y ago
  1. Sapir-Whorf is racist pseudoscience that was never substantiated and was universally rejected from day 1 by everybody but science-illiterate journalists 2. Even if there was substance to it, it's not relevant to this. People have no difficulty understanding what "Free" means when you explain what you mean. Just as in the above sentence you experienced no confusion at all over whether I used "that" in the indicative or grammatical sense.
ewzimm 8y ago
I've seen this often, but I don't think it's true. How about "liberated"? This implies that restrictions did exist at one point, which is true, as copyright is assigned by default and needs to be explicitly liberated in most places. It also reminds people who forget to assign a license of the importance to do so. I'm sure there are other single words that would convey the same message.
- reificator 8y ago
  As you say liberated software implies a removal of restrictions, but I think it implies it was accomplished by force. I think it would be a good term for someone who believes piracy to be a moral imperative, but I don't think it's a good term for expressing the idea of the author willingly sharing their work. "And the soldiers liberate them, laying mines along their roads." ~Megadeth
8y ago

cocacola1 8y ago

He talks about it in the essay, but I think it bears mentioning again that "free software" at first glance implies something apart from what the FSF intends. Is there really no other satisfactory word that could be used that would get the point across with less explanation?

amarkov 8y ago
"Software which respects the moral positions of people like those in the Free Software Foundation" seems like an inherently complicated concept, that's not really amenable to a one or two word summary.

chris_engel 8y ago

Honestly, the name is a problem. If you read "free software", you will think of free as in gratis. Nobody thinks about freedom there, because of that its not popular.

ChuckMcM 8y ago

At some point there should be the counter essay which is "Why Free Software Misses the Point of Open Source." There is tremendous value in repairability of things when you can see all of the details of how they are constructed, without having to simultaneously give you permission to manufacture or reproduce those things on your own. I really enjoyed that old televisions and radios included the schematic in the owners manual so that you could repair them down to the component level. It was really nice that the BIOS source code was part of the IBM PC technical manual, it helped you understand what it was expecting when it probed an IO ROM on the ISA bus. Neither of those examples gave you the right to re-distribute your modifications, and yet they were in fact valuable things to have.

reificator 8y ago
Devil's advocate though: You have the requisite technical knowledge to do those things. Not everyone does. If someone non-technical's stuff breaks, you can't distribute the changes you've already made yourself. It limits the value of the work you're putting in and it limits the repairability of an item based on the owner's skills. It's a bad analogy but it's as though car repair shops were illegal and you could only repair your own car. Most people would have some pretty junky beat-up cars or they'd be buying new ones every year.
- ChuckMcM 8y ago
  Car shops are a good example, there is no prevention of repairing other people cars, or their equipment, based on the knowledge from complete schematics / source code. The thing you can't do is make your own version of the thing and sell it. When my parents wireless router breaks, if I had the source code to the system installed on it I could both better understand the documentation to explain it to them, and I could perhaps patch a security problem that caused the breakdown. There should be nothing preventing me from re-distributing the fixes, just as Sams FotoFacts used to distribute radio repair manuals, or the Chilton car maintenance manuals.
  - jopsen 8y ago

youdontknowtho 8y ago

I really disagree with Stalman on this concept because it applies equally to the powerful and the powerless. I may not be putting this eloquently, but the user of the computer could be a huge company using their freedom to build a killing machine. Their are real balances of power that this seems to not address. I'm probably just kind of rambling. I. Not trying to offend anyone. EDIT: I guess what I'm trying to say is that it's taken as a given that this type of free software would somehow address these imbalances of power and I don't think that's the lesson that you could take from the last 20 years.

ino 8y ago
There's a license for you, but it's nonfree: https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#JSON https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#JSON
wongarsu 8y ago
Free software introduces one balance of power: by drastically reducing switching costs it reduces the power of the software creator. As an example: if I don't like the direction MS is heading with MS Word my only real options are never upgrading or switching to a competitor. That switch would be painful, I would have to learn a new interface, import my files etc. So MS can push a lot of stuff on me, as long as enduring that is less painful than switching to another program. In contrast, if I dislike the direction Libre Office is heading I fork it and selectively merge the changes I like. And if my opinion is shared widely enough my fork might replace the original project. That's also why benevolent dictators are so popular for free software projects: it's efficient, and if the dictator becomes a tyrant someone will just fork. What free software doesn't is prevent the construction of killer robot swarms. But if the killer robot swarm is free software you can fork it and build a killer robot killer swarm :)
- JetSpiegel 8y ago
  > That's also why benevolent dictators are so popular for free software projects: it's efficient, and if the dictator becomes a tyrant someone will just fork. Just like a blockchain that runs of coffee instead of electricity.

kowdermeister 8y ago

If that's the intent behind "free software" I'd call it "liberty software" or "liberated software". I'm not a native English speaker so it might have things attached I don't know about.

reificator 8y ago
Free as in freedom is a very old and established definition of the word. It is also very engrained in the American consciousness. Liberated software sounds like closed source that someone leaked the code for, or just a euphemism for pirated software.
AceJohnny2 8y ago
Yes, this is indeed a problem of english semantics, which is why the term "libre software" is sometimes offered as an alternative. "Libre" is a french word that means that part of "free" that free software cares about (ie not the cheap part)
- elboru 8y ago
  Oh, I thought it came from Spanish, with the same meaning.
  - galactus 8y ago
    It comes from the same latin origin, I don't think we can link it to one language more than to the other.
heegemcgee 8y ago
This is actually a "known bug". It is more specifically called "libre" software, and the idiom "Free as in 'beer' versus Free as in 'speech'" comes up to help illustrate the difference in meaning.
scj 8y ago
"Liberty software" should be correctly understood by a native English speaker. That being said, it is a bit awkward... I interpret "Liberty ${OBJECT}" as an Americanism[0]. Though, I'd be interested in the perspectives of people outside North America... As someone else pointed out, "liberated software" is past tense, where a previous state is implied. [0] Anecdotal, but take a look at Wikipedia's "Liberty" disambiguation page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberty_(disambiguation) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberty_(disambiguation) most examples of "Liberty ${OBJECT}" are American based.

bitwize 8y ago

The original articulator of open-source values, Eric Raymond, whose essays helped crystallize open source as a "movement", gets free software on a fundamental level. He and Stallman were once close friends, and from his blog posts and comments it seems he and Stallman are in broad agreement on the points of software freedom being good and proprietary lock-in being evil. The reason why open source is a "thing" is to convey these benefits -- these virtues -- to an audience that doesn't think like Richard Stallman. I.e., most of the world. It was an exercise in much-needed marketing for the movement. At the time, no one could out-market Microsoft. Microsoft were licensing Stones songs and lighting up the Empire State building to promote Win32 duct-taped to DOS. Unless free-software hackers had a counterstrategy that didn't sound like a tin-pot revolution organized by bearded, Kaczynski-esque radicals, they would lose and lose big. Criticize Raymond's efforts all you want. 20 years ago Microsoft was making strategic acquisitions to quash the viability of free software; today they're making strategic acquisitions to be at the center of it.

bunderbunder 8y ago
Upvoted, but with a caveat I wanted to throw out: > 20 years ago Microsoft was making strategic acquisitions to quash the viability of free software; today they're making strategic acquisitions to be at the center of it. I think you've run afoul of the very confusion RMS is talking about in TFA. They're not buying into free software, they're buying into open source. Most of what MS is doing in the space is using Apache-style licenses. I'm not going to say Microsoft is bought into Free Software until I see VSCode being distributed under the GPL. (It's currently MIT.)
- amyjess 8y ago
  The Apache license is absolutely a free software license. Even the FSF agrees with that. https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.en.html#apache2 https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.en.html#apache2 > This is a free software license, compatible with version 3 of the GNU GPL.
- bitwize 8y ago
  Nope. Even Stallman distinguishes between free software, which includes MIT- and Apache-licensed software, and copylefted software, which is the subset of free software that requires changes to be distributed under like terms to the original software itself. Of course RMS and the FSF would much rather you use copylefted software and copyleft licenses such as the GPL. But not doing so is not the inherent submission to evil that using proprietary software is, in their view.

stiangrindvoll 8y ago

Good to see this discussion and the different viewpoints of the matter coming up to the surface from time to time.

Applejinx 8y ago

My concern with free vs. open source software is this: free/libre software assumes the power is with the programmer, to make stuff that does battle with the closed source hordes, and bring justice. Nobody will starve, the good stuff will rise, and bad powers won't win. It's a pretty fantasy and I'd love to live in that world. I use open source (MIT license) because I need the ability to give of myself to others, and because I don't think I have any real power and do risk starving and failing. If I try to make a stand for justice, and push around larger powers, I can be just sort of blackballed and end up marginalized. The solution to that is the situation that's always existed in my industry, the music business. Exploitation. I can only thrive and see my ideas proliferate, if I allow some larger power to exploit me and get most of the benefit from my work. They get to take and not give, they get to make themselves rich at my expense, and if I want to not starve it's a negotiating process as to what crumbs they want to throw, and my weapons are more PR than legal pressure forcing the larger entity to comply. If I can make it seem advantageous to 'shout out' me and my work, by painting it as a PR bonus that doesn't have extra business consequences, I can get more crumbs. What's crumbs to a giant business might be all I would ever need to survive. The relative poverty levels are that wildly disparate. Open source lets me give ideas and code to other small fry like me, and also lets the giant centers of power exploit me in this way: it costs them IP-wise so little to 'give credit' that it's pretty advantageous for them to interact with me. I chose the MIT license for this reason, and hope to establish a good library of cutting-edge audio DSP code that can grow and serve the needs of open source and the true free/libre community. I don't believe anything I can do, can get me enough power as an individual that I could join libre and pressure giant corporations to change their ways. I've written the best wordlength reducer in the world, the best audio distortion algorithm in the world. Doesn't matter. Power is not about performance and meritocracy doesn't exist: the highest-merit solution tied to a restrictive license is a meaningless historical sidenote. I will happily funnel ideas and code to free/libre software, but I won't survive unless I let myself be a lot more exploited, because power is impossible to fight.

icebraining 8y ago
It should be noticed that MIT licensed software is Free Software. There's a disagreement in the philosophy, but the problem is proprietary software, not MIT/BSD/Apache/etc.

asdsa5325 8y ago

> When we call software “free,” we mean that it respects the users' essential freedoms What a ridiculous definition.

loeg 8y ago

Religious argument that comes down to preference. Might as well say "Why Emacs misses the point of modal editing." Edit: Downvoters, care to engage at all? Or do you just disagree with the idea that reasonable people might hold a different preference to yours, whichever flavor you prefer?

klez 8y ago
I didn't downvote, but I think people disliked your use of the word "religious", as it's sort of a discussion-stopper. To answer your point, the difference is that most people confuse the terms, which have a very different connotation. One is about software quality, the other is about users' freedom (as defined by the fsf). Emacs does not try to appeal to business (or users in general) by using the principles of vim in a more business-friendly connotation, so comparing the issue at hand with "emacs misses the point of modal editing" kind of misses the point, if you will :)
- loeg 8y ago
  > I think people disliked your use of the word "religious", as it's sort of a discussion-stopper. That's kind of the point. There's no use arguing about it since it's a matter of personal preference — i.e., religion. > Emacs does not try to appeal to business (or users in general) by using the principles of vim in a more business-friendly connotation Open source software does not try to appeal to users by using the principles of the FSF. I don't think this illustrates a problem with the metaphor. They're both fine editors and reflect the preferences of their developers. Ditto different software licenses.
jodrellblank 8y ago
The "preference" of whether you submit to a dictator because you have no choice or {nothing here because you have no choice}. Free software is what gives you a choice. Then you can prefer it to proprietary software or not. But replying "it's a preference" to an article trying to explain what free software is and isn't and why it exists, makes no sense. "Why it exists" or "what it means" is not a preference.

zer00eyz 8y ago

For lack of a better term, Stallman is a zealot. For that I can respect and admire him even if his stance isn't always practical. I can look up to his hard line mentality even if I understand why I (and many others) can't follow the same path. He is to open source what monks are to buddhism (ironically both the good parts and some of the bad). With that in mind his lessons are the golden path that many of us should aspire to even if we cannot attain it. When ever I have to confront Stallman I am always left with the same dismal feeling, he's right, he might be an ass(1) but he is still a person(2). 1. https://kottke.org/11/10/richard-stallmans-rider https://kottke.org/11/10/richard-stallmans-rider Yea he's saying please but its still outrageous this article was chosen because it makes the brown M&M's comparison and that apparently had a secondary purpose. There is no secondary purpose for asking for a Parrot, regardless of how politely or how it is caveated. 2. This (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pube5Aynsls https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pube5Aynsls ) is what I go back and watch every time I go through this (difficult) process. It is funny (unexpected) that a man as large as my self can be so nimble... guts, self-awareness, gusto... IDNK what kinds of traits would possess him to do such a thing but it is just fun to watch. The fact he does it with the lap top just makes me giggle.

zokier 8y ago
It's fine for rms to be the extremist and zealot. I feel like the problem is that the Free software/copyleft movement is missing strong pragmatic realist leaders and organizations, so the situation is that either you are on the crazy train helmed by rms, or you fall back to the more relaxed open-source world.
- craigsmansion 8y ago
  > is missing strong pragmatic realist leaders and organizations As far as I'm concerned, that is by design. Even though he is fairly well known, rms is not the pope of Free Software as some seem to think. He's just a guy. You can email him if you want to, if you have questions. He has some very specific ideas about software. He writes essays about that and tries to explain the thought process behind his ideas. You can read those and agree or disagree with these thoughts or not. I think "strong pragmatic realist leaders and organizations" would be harmful to Free Software, because people swayed by such things can ultimately be swayed in the opposite direction once even stronger leaders and organisations with even better marketing pop up. So no, there is no "crazy train helmed by rms" as you, and a lot of others, like to believe. rms is not the one standing in the way of the global victory of "open source." What does stand in the way is dilution and corruption from within. And I think, in that regard, rms could be considered a "leader", and the Free Software movement, and even Open Source by proxy, is lucky to have him.

grosjona 8y ago

I find the GPL 'free software' license to be a lot less 'free' than other kinds of open source licenses in terms of what you are allowed to do as a user of the software. For example, with GPL, you do not have ownership over any derived work that you produce; you are legally forced to share your work with everyone. This is a weapon to allow big corporations to sue small indie developers and startups who are trying to compete with them. The balance of power is asymmetric. Only corporations have the money to legally enforce GPL licenses - Also, the creator of the software is allowed to keep their own derivative work private (because they have copyright) but no one else can (everyone else is bound by copyleft).

zokier 8y ago
It is in many ways similar to the notorious JSON license by Crockford that says "The Software shall be used for Good, not Evil.". Except GPL is more explicit on what it considers good and evil. An appropriate analogy would be question is a country free (as in respecting freedoms) if you are not allowed to murder people? Most people would say yes. And it could be even argued that it is more free than country that does allow murdering people, because the limitation on murdering empowers people to exercise their (other) freedoms more freely. Note that I'm don't fully agree on RMS' stance on the matter here, but I think I understand it reasonably well.
- gowld 8y ago
  https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.en.html https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.en.html “The Software shall be used for Good, not Evil.” This is a restriction on usage and thus conflicts with freedom 0. The restriction might be unenforcible, but we cannot presume that. Thus, the license is nonfree.
pritambaral 8y ago
> I find the GPL 'free software' license to be a lot less 'free' than other kinds of open source licenses in terms of what you are allowed to do as a user of the software. Quite the contrary. For users of software, there's no better license than strong copyleft licenses. > with GPL, you do not have ownership over any derived work that you produce This is false. You are free to produce derived works and keep them to yourself, or even to your organization. No need to share source with anyone. If/When you share the derived work, whomever you distribute the derived work to, they are now a user. You have to give to that user the same rights you got: full source code and GPL-provided rights. You do not have to give those out to "everyone", only to those to whom you distribute your derived works. > This is a weapon to allow big corporations to sue small indie developers and startups who are trying to compete with them. The balance of power is asymmetric. Only corporations have the money to legally enforce GPL licenses If not via the law, how can rights possibly be enforced? Also, note that the GPL has been enforced — for better or worse — by individuals against far richer corporations. This is, of course, only because of the fear of the law. > Also, the creator of the software is allowed to keep their own derivative work private (because they have copyright) but no one else can (everyone else is bound by copyleft). As I said above, this is false. Your changes are yours, and you retain copyright on them. Code you didn't write, of course, is not under your copyright; but you still have the full rights granted to you by the GPL to do with them privately as you please.

bullen 8y ago

So is LGPL = Free Software?

dahart 8y ago

> But software can be said to serve its users only if it respects their freedom. What if the software is designed to put chains on its users? I love that there are people carrying this torch, I just wish the language wasn't so over the top hyperbolic. That would make it easier to join the effort for me. Framing it as a right & wrong moral issue seems ironically Disney-esque in it's inability to acknowledge the gray areas and realities of life. This entire article complains about restricting freedoms without once mentioning funding of any kind. People building non-free software aren't setting out to put chains on people and restrict all freedoms, they're trying to make money, and we all need to make money. I don't know how to write free software all day long and feed my family, and I'd put money on most businesses feeling the same way. If I did know how, I would absolutely do it. Who has experience based and practical advice on funding models that businesses could reasonably adopt for releasing their software as free?

abdullahkhalids 8y ago
> I love that there are people carrying this torch, I just wish the language wasn't so over the top hyperbolic. That would make it easier to join the effort for me. Manifestos often have hyperbolic language. See the communist manifesto or a declaration of the independence of cyberspace[1]. That is usually what gets people excited about a movement. [1] https://www.eff.org/cyberspace-independence https://www.eff.org/cyberspace-independence
- hexane360 8y ago
  I'm starting to think it's a mistake to take on too lukewarm of a movement to try to get widespread appeal. I know this is basically Godwin's law now, but see the difference between Clinton and Trump's (or even Sanders') campaigns.
- paulie_a 8y ago
  The word manifesto is something you don't want to be associated with. If what you wrote is considered a manifesto, you are probably off base, or simply crazy.

mikece 8y ago

Do proponents of Free Software, on the whole, assert that the concept of intellectual property should not exist?

insertnickname 8y ago
No. In fact, copyleft licenses are completely dependent on copyright. Copyleft advocates sometimes claim that copyleft "uses copyright against itself", but this isn't really true. Copyleft uses copyright, but not against copyright. If there was no copyright (all else equal), creative works would be in the public domain, truly free for anyone to use (more or less like the MIT and BSD licensed works today).
- abdullahkhalids 8y ago
  The language of copyright laws lets content creators stop unauthorized usage/sale of their content. The purpose behind copyright laws is to let copyright owners make money of their content. Copyleft licenses leverage the language of copyright laws to subvert the purpose of copyright laws: copyleft licenses roughly say you are authorized to do whatever you want to do with my content, as long as you let others also do whatever they want with my content.
  - flyingfences 8y ago
    > their content > my content So in other words, yes, proponents of "Free Software" do not, in fact, assert that that the concept of intellectual property should not exist.
    - abdullahkhalids 8y ago
      No, I am using the language of current legal system (which recognized IP) because otherwise I have to establish an alternative context. Again, the language is being used, but the underlying purpose behind the law is not being respected. We can imagine a society where copyright laws don't exist, i.e. content created by someone is not considered their property and others may do what they will with the content in a GPLisque manner. In that society we would never have to use 'my/their content', as there will be no notion of IP in that society.

petermcneeley 8y ago

"the freedom to run it, to study and change it, and to redistribute copies with or without changes" What if my "software" was just an exe that played all the Disney movies? Is free software against copyright laws?

gowld 8y ago
> Is free software against copyright laws? Mostly. https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/freedom-or-copyright.en.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/freedom-or-copyright.en.html > To make copyright fit the network age, we should legalize the noncommercial copying and sharing of all published works, and prohibit DRM. But note that "being against copyright" is different from "advocating violating current copyright laws"
- petermcneeley 8y ago
  Ok i think i understand it just mostly sounds delusional considering the lived reality of capitalism. Perhaps if UBI becomes a thing?
jodrellblank 8y ago
Why would "free software" imply that you could ignore other people's copyrights, take other people's non-free work and give it away? If Disney offered you a program to play all their movies, you could say "I refuse to use their black-box proprietary movie player, I will only use a free software video player that I can inspect, to make sure it isn't scanning my computer for copyrighted Disney movies and reporting everything it finds back to Disneyland, and one I can recompile to put the video stream into the background of my transparent terminal because I'm not watching dozens of hours of movies unless I can work at the same time". That's the kind of thing it's supporting.
- petermcneeley 8y ago
  I understand the nature of the problem. Its everywhere ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17237792 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17237792 ) I just think lived reality is more complex than a moralizing ideology. Something you understand: quote "Open Source" (as if it's a single movement) didn't win in creating desirable, accessible, commercial or beautiful software. It 'won' in the worst possible way - big companies like Amazon and Facebook took the work, hid it in their datacenters behind their paywalls, and use it to extract money from people. Nobody has any more freedom with their data and their computing because Facebook uses PHP, than they would have on a proprietary desktop OS. "you can have an open source OS and browser which connects you to a restrictive interface where your data is under someone else's control" is a lose for all of us.

yarrel 8y ago

The GitHub purchase demonstrates once again that rms is right.

jancsika 8y ago

> Any activity that promotes the word “open” tends to extend the curtain that hides the ideas of the free software movement. This is the end of one paragraph. So...from whom is the curtain "hiding" these ideas? It must be from the audience for the conferences that have the word "open" in them. That means that a substantial part of the audience does not consist of "open source advocates." At least not in the sense of people who heard the open source vs. free software debate and knowingly chose against free software. If that were the case, then RMS wouldn't be talking about the curtain "hiding" anything-- rather he'd be talking about "open" conferences merely serving the desires of people who know about free software but don't agree with it and instead chose open source. Therefore-- one would think-- it's in the best interest of free software advocates to attend such conferences and communicate their message clearly and effectively to the substantial part of the audience who doesn't know about free software. Who knows-- they could even play a prank by redefining open source to its literal meaning, then explaining it as a subset of the free software development process. That would put the onus on open source advocates to argue against open source as a subset of free software. But to do that they'd have to reference the very features of free software they wanted to ignore! I think there was once a word for such playful cleverness... Anyhow, on to the beginning of the next paragraph: > Thus, free software activists are well advised to decline to work on an activity that calls itself “open.” Hm, I can't seem to remember the word for that "playful cleverness." Well, it was from a long, long time ago... Edit: clarification

dorp 8y ago

One can be developed without donations, one can't. See GNU, they haven't ever been able to sell software as a product.

numerobis 8y ago

There seems to be a lot of confusion here about what open source means. In practical terms, open source and free software imply the same freedoms for the users, including the rights to change and redistribute the source code. The more common terminology for proprietary software whose source is available is source-available. See the wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_software#Open-source_versus_source-available https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_software#Open-sour...

nurettin 8y ago

So many arguments start because they use the term "free" instead of "freed".

aalexgabi 8y ago

As some here did point out free software as Richard Stallman and GNU foundation use the term is a specific set of freedoms and limitations. These freedoms and limitations are arguable depending on many factors and they are not what everybody considers free software. While I can understand the need for those limitations in order to promote some ideas and practices, I am not happy that they stand for free software as an absolute and at the same time the GPL license limits freedom in two aspects: - You cannot distribute copies (modified or not) without attributing the work to the original author - You cannot distribute copies (modified or not) with less permissions than the original license Some people can argue that the GPL license actually limits your freedom while the UNLICENSE license gives you more freedom. And here is my question: If I work on a patch or feature and I put my time and effort into it, is it ethical to get rewarded for my effort? How can I sell the modified version without closing the source or changing the license? That at least until I get the money back for my invested time. And this point for me is where non free software will get ahead, simply because they are able to get paid for the the developers time and will always have more resources than free software projects.