MESSAGE
DATE | 2001-12-08 |
FROM | David Sugar
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SUBJECT | Re: [hangout] Stallman re: Information Producers Initiative
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From owner-hangout-desteny-at-mrbrklyn.com Sat Dec 8 10:10:32 2001 Received: (from mdom-at-localhost) by www2.mrbrklyn.com (8.11.2/8.11.2/SuSE Linux 8.11.1-0.5) id fB8FAQM01207 for hangout-desteny; Sat, 8 Dec 2001 10:10:26 -0500 Received: from andromeda.sys ([65.204.5.82]) by www2.mrbrklyn.com (8.11.2/8.11.2/SuSE Linux 8.11.1-0.5) with ESMTP id fB8FAPY01202 for ; Sat, 8 Dec 2001 10:10:25 -0500 Received: from ostel.com (localhost.localdomain [127.0.0.1]) by andromeda.sys (Postfix) with ESMTP id 6105C1E63A; Sat, 8 Dec 2001 10:12:17 -0500 (EST) Message-ID: <3C122DD0.5040901-at-ostel.com> Date: Sat, 08 Dec 2001 10:12:16 -0500 From: David Sugar User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:0.9.4) Gecko/20010914 X-Accept-Language: en-us MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Jon Britton Cc: hangout-at-nylxs.com Subject: Re: [hangout] Stallman re: Information Producers Initiative References: <3C1061AF.E7678DB2-at-RealMeasures.dyndns.org> <20011207090429.A22739-at-www2.mrbrklyn.com> <20011208100302.B11674-at-breakwindows.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-hangout-at-mrbrklyn.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: David Sugar List: New Yorkers Linux Scene Admin: To unsubscribe send unsubscribename-at-domian.com to hangout-request-at-www2.mrbrklyn.com X-Keywords: X-UID: 19402 Status: RO Content-Length: 2025 Lines: 44
It is true the term "free" is overloaded in English and this is problematic. However "freedom software", which might be closer in intent, is uglier to express. In some languages, like French and Spanish, we have seperate terms for free of cost vs free in rights given, as in gratius vs libre, and the term "Libre Software" vs "Gratius Software" will often be used in Europe to make this distinction clear.
Jon Britton wrote:
>Not sure if it's entirely relevant to the discussion's political nature, >but it might be worth pimping my crusade against "free software". No, I >have nothing against freedom or RMS, its the term "free software" when >it describes binary-only shareware/freeware available to Linux, I object. > >It seems any time something is given away "free"(beer), and available >for free(liberty) unix-clones, it is mistakenly labeled free software. >Obviously, this is not the case, and further yet fuels the fire of the >average user who still thinks "there's no money to be made in free". > >Instead, "no cost" works just fine. A search for "free" on dictionary.com >yields 17 definitions, with only one being remotely close to the monetary >cost of an item...so it isn't exactly an ideal term to begin with. Many of >us understand the use of computers as an educational tool is way more >important than making a profit selling software, but if one chooses to sell >something they've written, they can still give us free software and pay the >rent at the same time. > >I've seen the "free but not Free" comments all over the place, and maybe its >just time to leave free software to what it is. Or, maybe, it would be >better to come up with a new term for the FSF. Maybe the Software Liberation Front. >Or the People's Liberated Software Movement...or just Liberating Software. >Or even "Hey we promise not to screw you on this" Software. I'll accept any. > > > >- Jon >
____________________________ New Yorker Linux Users Scene Fair Use - because it's either fair use or useless....
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