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Linux itself is niche in the consumer space (not counting Android, Steam Deck and such)... fully-libre distros are ultra-niche. An average user migrating to Lin
by Santosh83 5y ago
Linux itself is niche in the consumer space (not counting Android, Steam Deck and such)... fully-libre distros are ultra-niche. An average user migrating to Linux is very unlikely to even come across them, so most of the arguments made in the article don't apply in practice. As for technically aware users, again, nothing stops them from nuking their Parabola install and replacing it with Ubuntu in less time than it would take to write this article.
Let niche projects be. They serve people who seek them out. They don't aspire for the general case, and this rant is misplaced. Seems to be motivated by Stallman hate, frankly.
- sascha_sl 5y agoStallman is a symptom of a much larger problem with the FSF, and not because he's a creep. (well, also, because it drove contributors away, but that's aside the point) The FSF is irrelevant in discussions about FOSS, because they are absolutely unwilling to compromise. They purport to being a movement, but they do everything in their power to stay as small and elitist as possible. Like recommending extremely niche distros that will provide a bad experience on 99% of computers you run it on (and insecure on 100%). So there are plenty of reasons to write this article that have nothing to do with RMS. We could've had effective software freedom advocacy, but all we got was elitist entitled bickering about how everyone else is unethical and interviews full of FSF spokespeople nitpicking to a degree most people will roll their eyes and move on immediately. I guess that's mostly RMS, and he simply doesn't have the charisma to pull it off well.
- erik_seaberg 5y agoSomeone has to compromise on an imperfect solution that works now. Someone else has to keep pushing the boundaries of what can be done without compromise, and that’s what the FSF is suited for.
- Bancakes 5y agoGPLv3 is already more lenient than necessary in dealing with binaries. What more compromises do you want? Heavens forbid Linux goes the BSD route.