5 ms·

Yes. Writing an article about software freedom without understanding the difference between "free as in speech" and "free as in beer" in 2013 is a bit strange.

by _pmf_ 13y ago

ars 13y ago
This is not an article about software freedom. Did you even read it?
- willvarfar 13y ago
  Any article that starts off quoting RMS talking about software freedom and investigating what he meant is an article about software freedom?
  - ars 13y ago
    Is that a question? Just because he mentions it doesn't make this an article about software freedom. It's a quote, that's all. It's tangentially related, but that's about it.
antocv 13y ago
I believe the confusion comes partly from freedom software almost always being for free/gratis, and in fact was encouraged in the early days of GNU if I am not mistaken. The GNU stance on freedom software seems to be that it should be for free as well and that programmers should make money on activities related to their primary produce. As RMS is driving for GNU/Linux so could we have a drive for freedom software or libre/liberty software to make no mistake what we mean. We can focus later on the discussion of price of software and how to compensate the developers. I guess liberty software is a bit too much to swallow for the enterprise types that back open source. Free software is easier, but still was not easy enough for open source people, or did the open source people deploy their term due to free meaning gratis, so open source could be marketed as non-gratis freedom software?
- willvarfar 13y ago
  Well, actually GNU have never discouraged selling Free software. Its right at the top of the list in the introduction to philosophy on http://www.gnu.org/ http://www.gnu.org/
  - antocv 13y ago
    They havent encouraged it either. I believe in the early days the usage of free was gratis as well, thats the impression I got from the manifesto of RMS. In general my impression is that GNU/Freedom-people avoid the question of compensation.

Yes. Writing an article about software freedom without understanding the difference between "free as in speech" and "free as in beer" in 2013 is a bit strange.

by _pmf_ 13y ago

Yes. Writing an article about software freedom without understanding the difference between "free as in speech" and "free as in beer" in 2013 is a bit strange.

ars 13y ago

This is not an article about software freedom. Did you even read it?

willvarfar 13y ago
Any article that starts off quoting RMS talking about software freedom and investigating what he meant is an article about software freedom?
- ars 13y ago
  Is that a question? Just because he mentions it doesn't make this an article about software freedom. It's a quote, that's all. It's tangentially related, but that's about it.

antocv 13y ago

I believe the confusion comes partly from freedom software almost always being for free/gratis, and in fact was encouraged in the early days of GNU if I am not mistaken. The GNU stance on freedom software seems to be that it should be for free as well and that programmers should make money on activities related to their primary produce. As RMS is driving for GNU/Linux so could we have a drive for freedom software or libre/liberty software to make no mistake what we mean. We can focus later on the discussion of price of software and how to compensate the developers. I guess liberty software is a bit too much to swallow for the enterprise types that back open source. Free software is easier, but still was not easy enough for open source people, or did the open source people deploy their term due to free meaning gratis, so open source could be marketed as non-gratis freedom software?

willvarfar 13y ago
Well, actually GNU have never discouraged selling Free software. Its right at the top of the list in the introduction to philosophy on http://www.gnu.org/ http://www.gnu.org/
- antocv 13y ago
  They havent encouraged it either. I believe in the early days the usage of free was gratis as well, thats the impression I got from the manifesto of RMS. In general my impression is that GNU/Freedom-people avoid the question of compensation.