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Stallman leads the free software movement, which holds that creating proprietary software in unethical. The open source movement, although sharing some ideals o
by TelmoMenezes 12y ago
Stallman leads the free software movement, which holds that creating proprietary software in unethical. The open source movement, although sharing some ideals of free and open software, does not condemn or oppose proprietary software. Stallman is strongly opposed to the open source movement, and is surely annoyed by the confusion.
What both movements have in common is endless forking followed by awkward merging, combined with a lack of taste for naming things. Thus we get the term FOSS, that combines Free and Open Source Software into an acronym that sounds like something related to sewage processing.
- olalonde 12y agoHe's actually written an article on the topic: http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.h...
- icebraining 12y agoI wouldn't say he's strongly opposed; he says what the open source movement does is good, just that it doesn't go far enough. Unlike what some people believe, rms isn't factionary - he doesn't think that you either commit 100% to the Free Software beliefs or you're the enemy. For him, anyone writing free software is to be lauded, even if they don't do it for the "right" reasons or even they also write proprietary software.
- joshuapants 12y agoYes, I think a lot of people only know of the caricature of Stallman. He has very nuanced views and while he may be personally eccentric he is consistent and usually quite reasonable.