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I suppose they're "non-free" in the sense that very few websites provide access to their server-side source & dbs. However, the are a couple of caveats that mak

I suppose they're "non-free" in the sense that very few websites provide access to their server-side source & dbs. However, the are a couple of caveats that make them free (in a sense) in my opinion. 1. All final content is free (images, videos, html, css, js/json), an anology would be if in a closed src game you had access to use/download all the 3D models, music, dialogs, voice overs etc. 2. For the vast majority of websites, all the server-side stuff (the "non-free") is built on free / open source technologies, i.e. Apache, postgres, redis, java, ruby, all the frameworks, etc. 3. Information about the web / its technologies on the web is ridiculously ubiqitous, the amount of open/free knowledge, documentation, and resources is for all practical purposes limitless. so this makes reverse engineering or understanding virtually any website a much simpler task than non web based software, for instance, ERP systems such as SAP which are closed source and fully proprietary. So you are right, however, there's a lot of openess and freedom in the majority "non-free" medium of web software.

lotyrin 14y ago
1. Only if they're licensed as such, or we're willing to completely disregard IP (which would be very bad). 2. That's nice, and in some cases successful web software causes significant contribution to FOSS (many examples from Facebook), but there's nothing preventing the same from client-side software (id Software's engines for instance). 3. I'd say this is also true for many client-side technologies. However, the SaaS model allows developers to take advantage of GPL code without an obligation to contribute back, as the y aren't shipping any derivatives of the code, simply providing network access to it. (Whether that's good or bad is left to the reader.) Many people complain about SaaS for it's strengthened ability to create vendor lock-in, but for non-technical users it's effectively the same. (It doesn't matter of the data's stored on your computer or in a remote database if you don't know how to open it.)

lotyrin 14y ago

1. Only if they're licensed as such, or we're willing to completely disregard IP (which would be very bad). 2. That's nice, and in some cases successful web software causes significant contribution to FOSS (many examples from Facebook), but there's nothing preventing the same from client-side software (id Software's engines for instance). 3. I'd say this is also true for many client-side technologies. However, the SaaS model allows developers to take advantage of GPL code without an obligation to contribute back, as the y aren't shipping any derivatives of the code, simply providing network access to it. (Whether that's good or bad is left to the reader.) Many people complain about SaaS for it's strengthened ability to create vendor lock-in, but for non-technical users it's effectively the same. (It doesn't matter of the data's stored on your computer or in a remote database if you don't know how to open it.)