4 ms·

I’m surprised Feross was the catalyst here. From his Youtube Instant days always struck me as the type who appreciated and championed FOSS. Seems he decided tha

by ramzyo 7y ago

I’m surprised Feross was the catalyst here. From his Youtube Instant days always struck me as the type who appreciated and championed FOSS. Seems he decided that the F in FOSS might be, erm, “reinterpreted,” much the way the notion of “free” has been by modern web companies.

i80and 7y ago
I'm actually curious: what exactly does the "F" mean to you?
- ramzyo 7y ago
  Thanks for engaging me on this, genuinely appreciate it amidst the torrent of downvotes (would be interested to hear more of the opinions of those who downvoted me). Yeah, good question and something I've been wrestling with a lot myself. I used to think "free" meant monetarily free, but lately (in the last few years, call it aging, I dunno), I've started to subscribe to the notion of "free" as championed by the Free Software Foundation. Here's a good quote that lack's context, but gives a good idea of what my thoughts are "The free software movement campaigns for freedom for the users of computing; it is a movement for freedom and justice." Link here: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.en.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point....
  - Avamander 7y ago
    I wish there'd be a better way to differentiate free (as in freedom) software and free (as in monetary cost).
    - shagie 7y ago
      The alternate naming of "libre software" exists though is not used too much. From https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.en.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.en.html > “Free software” means software that respects users' freedom and community. Roughly, it means that the users have the freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software. Thus, “free software” is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept, you should think of “free” as in “free speech,” not as in “free beer”. We sometimes call it “libre software,” borrowing the French or Spanish word for “free” as in freedom, to show we do not mean the software is gratis.
  - icebraining 7y ago
    Thing is, while the "Free" in "Free Software" is ambiguous, the "F" is FOSS has always meant "free as in freedom". It's not a new interpretation by feross (and I think the downvoters are reacting negatively to that suggestion).
    - ramzyo 7y ago
      Yeah, I think my wording in the original post is to blame here. What I was trying to get across was that Feross has previously been vocal about his belief that his software was both FOSS and monetarily free. Now, he seems to be exploring the possibility that his code can still be FOSS, and monetarily free in concept, but perhaps walks the path Facebook, Google, et. al have that has lead to the much maligned cliche' "if you're not paying, you're the product." How far down that path does one have to go to lose the spirit of FOSS, if at all? Interesting to think about.
      - icebraining 7y ago
        Well, the GNU project itself, and its founder (RMS), who is by any standard a strict follower of that philosophy, thinks that Free Software should be sold - and for as much as one can charge [1]. I'd say that the two are not really on the same path; if anything, they work against each other. [1] https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/selling.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/selling.html
        ramzyo 7y ago
        Interesting, thanks for pointing this out!
ramzyo 7y ago
For more context, in case anyone is wondering what I was trying to communicate amidst the torrent of downvotes. Feross is a meaningful voice in open source. I've admired him for a long time, and still do. He's written some thoughtful posts in the past about FOSS specifically, hence the specificity of my comment (see his post from 2010 here: https://feross.org/stallman-stanford/ https://feross.org/stallman-stanford/). Reading his justification for the "funding" experiment (here: https://feross.org/funding-experiment-recap/ https://feross.org/funding-experiment-recap/), I was struck by the fact that he didn't address an obvious slippery slope in his argument for what he was experimenting with, namely, "For the record, funding had absolutely no tracking, no data collection, and no code from untrusted third parties. It was a console.log with some fancy formatting. Think of it like a newspaper classified ad. We just print it and hope that maybe some folks will see it." I don't knock his attempt at experimentation with funding models for FOSS developers; however, there's an ongoing history lesson we're all living that serves as a cautionary tale for where ad-funded monetization models can go. Considering corporations are largely involved in FOSS today, could the normalization of monetization of FOSS with the wholly positive intentions of rewarding those who have dedicated their time to developing FOSS software, not evolve into a model wherein for-profit companies use this as a backdoor to monetize their FOSS contributions? For example, imagine compiling Kubernetes and getting an ad for Google Cloud services. Or compiling the Linux Kernel with features committed to the kernel source primarily by Google and getting an ad for a Chromebook as part of the boot sequence. Sure this is all a bit dystopian, but I'm surprised someone as thoughtful as Feross didn't address the possible unintended consequences of his experiment, even if his original intentions were in no way nefarious.
- liability 7y ago
  > Think of it like a newspaper classified ad. Consider also the quality of advertising those organizations (newspapers, magazines, etc) submit their readers to in the digital domain. The worst sort. That newspapers printed on paper lack telemetry is not attributable to pure motivations on the part of the publishers. Rather, print newspapers lack telemetry simply because nobody has figured out how to put telemetry in them. Were it's possible, those same organizations eagerly adopt telemetry because of the nature of the economic incentives in the advertising industry.

by ramzyo 7y ago

i80and 7y ago

I'm actually curious: what exactly does the "F" mean to you?

ramzyo 7y ago
Thanks for engaging me on this, genuinely appreciate it amidst the torrent of downvotes (would be interested to hear more of the opinions of those who downvoted me). Yeah, good question and something I've been wrestling with a lot myself. I used to think "free" meant monetarily free, but lately (in the last few years, call it aging, I dunno), I've started to subscribe to the notion of "free" as championed by the Free Software Foundation. Here's a good quote that lack's context, but gives a good idea of what my thoughts are "The free software movement campaigns for freedom for the users of computing; it is a movement for freedom and justice." Link here: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.en.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point....
- Avamander 7y ago
  I wish there'd be a better way to differentiate free (as in freedom) software and free (as in monetary cost).
  - shagie 7y ago
    The alternate naming of "libre software" exists though is not used too much. From https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.en.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.en.html > “Free software” means software that respects users' freedom and community. Roughly, it means that the users have the freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software. Thus, “free software” is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept, you should think of “free” as in “free speech,” not as in “free beer”. We sometimes call it “libre software,” borrowing the French or Spanish word for “free” as in freedom, to show we do not mean the software is gratis.
- icebraining 7y ago
  Thing is, while the "Free" in "Free Software" is ambiguous, the "F" is FOSS has always meant "free as in freedom". It's not a new interpretation by feross (and I think the downvoters are reacting negatively to that suggestion).
  - ramzyo 7y ago
    Yeah, I think my wording in the original post is to blame here. What I was trying to get across was that Feross has previously been vocal about his belief that his software was both FOSS and monetarily free. Now, he seems to be exploring the possibility that his code can still be FOSS, and monetarily free in concept, but perhaps walks the path Facebook, Google, et. al have that has lead to the much maligned cliche' "if you're not paying, you're the product." How far down that path does one have to go to lose the spirit of FOSS, if at all? Interesting to think about.
    - icebraining 7y ago
      Well, the GNU project itself, and its founder (RMS), who is by any standard a strict follower of that philosophy, thinks that Free Software should be sold - and for as much as one can charge [1]. I'd say that the two are not really on the same path; if anything, they work against each other. [1] https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/selling.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/selling.html
      - ramzyo 7y ago
        Interesting, thanks for pointing this out!

ramzyo 7y ago

For more context, in case anyone is wondering what I was trying to communicate amidst the torrent of downvotes. Feross is a meaningful voice in open source. I've admired him for a long time, and still do. He's written some thoughtful posts in the past about FOSS specifically, hence the specificity of my comment (see his post from 2010 here: https://feross.org/stallman-stanford/ https://feross.org/stallman-stanford/). Reading his justification for the "funding" experiment (here: https://feross.org/funding-experiment-recap/ https://feross.org/funding-experiment-recap/), I was struck by the fact that he didn't address an obvious slippery slope in his argument for what he was experimenting with, namely, "For the record, funding had absolutely no tracking, no data collection, and no code from untrusted third parties. It was a console.log with some fancy formatting. Think of it like a newspaper classified ad. We just print it and hope that maybe some folks will see it." I don't knock his attempt at experimentation with funding models for FOSS developers; however, there's an ongoing history lesson we're all living that serves as a cautionary tale for where ad-funded monetization models can go. Considering corporations are largely involved in FOSS today, could the normalization of monetization of FOSS with the wholly positive intentions of rewarding those who have dedicated their time to developing FOSS software, not evolve into a model wherein for-profit companies use this as a backdoor to monetize their FOSS contributions? For example, imagine compiling Kubernetes and getting an ad for Google Cloud services. Or compiling the Linux Kernel with features committed to the kernel source primarily by Google and getting an ad for a Chromebook as part of the boot sequence. Sure this is all a bit dystopian, but I'm surprised someone as thoughtful as Feross didn't address the possible unintended consequences of his experiment, even if his original intentions were in no way nefarious.

liability 7y ago
> Think of it like a newspaper classified ad. Consider also the quality of advertising those organizations (newspapers, magazines, etc) submit their readers to in the digital domain. The worst sort. That newspapers printed on paper lack telemetry is not attributable to pure motivations on the part of the publishers. Rather, print newspapers lack telemetry simply because nobody has figured out how to put telemetry in them. Were it's possible, those same organizations eagerly adopt telemetry because of the nature of the economic incentives in the advertising industry.