4 ms·

BitTorrent Sync is the wrong foundation for this revolution. It should be open source from top to bottom.

chroem 13y ago
Free software; the term is free software. In other words, software that respects your freedom. Refer to this: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-software-for-freedom.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-software-for-freedom.htm...
- Sir_Cmpwn 13y ago
  And it's not Linux, it's GNU/Linux!
  - chroem 13y ago
    Ordinarily I think Stallman takes that way too far, but in this case the exact motivation behind free software was being described, yet it was still placed under the banner of open source. I think there's a time and a place for both terms, but when you're talking about resisting the NSA, you are (or should be) referring to free software.
  - smnrchrds 13y ago
    That statement would make sense if the distros we are using were mainly just Linux kernel + GNU tools. If we are going to give everyone their deserved credit, we should call it GNU/Linux/KDE/Apache/LibreOffice/... Good thing 4-clause BSD never caught on in the Linux world.
- lukifer 13y ago
  This is a language battle which will never, ever be won, not even with geeks, let own real people. Invent a new term ("liberated software"), or let it go. It is this sort of ideological pedantry that holds back FOSS adoption.
  - Executor 13y ago
    Provide better justification rather than "its my opinion".
    - lukifer 13y ago
      It's a mental "snap-to-grid" problem. The average American hears the word "free", and they immediately think of $0, absent a specific pre-existing linguistic context (free country, free speech, free range). Because software is something that is frequently paid for as a product on a shelf, a non-enthusiast is always going to hear the $0 meaning in their head, even if they've been educated as to its other meaning. At a high layer of abstraction, neural connections work probabilistically, firing in the path most likely to be a useful pattern; hence, most people will tend to assume "free" means "as in beer". However, a new term like "liberated software" will not trip this pre-existing wiring, forcing a new pathway that doesn't have to compete with the conditioning created by a lifetime of marketing messages ("Free Checking! Free Estimate! Free For The First Year!"... etc)
ekianjo 13y ago
Come on, the guy even mentioned himself in the above post "As soon as an open source, stable btsync clone is released I plan on swapping it in.", what's the point of re-emphasizing that point? He obviously knows the issue with btsync but it's fine to start building something on top of it in the meantime, just as a proof of concept.
nodata 13y ago
open source btsync alternative you say? https://github.com/calmh/syncthing https://github.com/calmh/syncthing

Free software; the term is free software. In other words, software that respects your freedom. Refer to this: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-software-for-freedom.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-software-for-freedom.htm...

Sir_Cmpwn 13y ago
And it's not Linux, it's GNU/Linux!
- chroem 13y ago
  Ordinarily I think Stallman takes that way too far, but in this case the exact motivation behind free software was being described, yet it was still placed under the banner of open source. I think there's a time and a place for both terms, but when you're talking about resisting the NSA, you are (or should be) referring to free software.
- smnrchrds 13y ago
  That statement would make sense if the distros we are using were mainly just Linux kernel + GNU tools. If we are going to give everyone their deserved credit, we should call it GNU/Linux/KDE/Apache/LibreOffice/... Good thing 4-clause BSD never caught on in the Linux world.
lukifer 13y ago
This is a language battle which will never, ever be won, not even with geeks, let own real people. Invent a new term ("liberated software"), or let it go. It is this sort of ideological pedantry that holds back FOSS adoption.
- Executor 13y ago
  Provide better justification rather than "its my opinion".
  - lukifer 13y ago
    It's a mental "snap-to-grid" problem. The average American hears the word "free", and they immediately think of $0, absent a specific pre-existing linguistic context (free country, free speech, free range). Because software is something that is frequently paid for as a product on a shelf, a non-enthusiast is always going to hear the $0 meaning in their head, even if they've been educated as to its other meaning. At a high layer of abstraction, neural connections work probabilistically, firing in the path most likely to be a useful pattern; hence, most people will tend to assume "free" means "as in beer". However, a new term like "liberated software" will not trip this pre-existing wiring, forcing a new pathway that doesn't have to compete with the conditioning created by a lifetime of marketing messages ("Free Checking! Free Estimate! Free For The First Year!"... etc)

ekianjo 13y ago

Come on, the guy even mentioned himself in the above post "As soon as an open source, stable btsync clone is released I plan on swapping it in.", what's the point of re-emphasizing that point? He obviously knows the issue with btsync but it's fine to start building something on top of it in the meantime, just as a proof of concept.

nodata 13y ago

open source btsync alternative you say? https://github.com/calmh/syncthing https://github.com/calmh/syncthing