On Jun 2, 2006, at 7:35 PM, K.S. Bhaskar wrote:

We who communicate in English are handicapped by the fact that "free" 

has two different meanings, whereas in Spanish, "gratis" and "libré" are 

distinct words.  FLOSS is not free as in gratis.  FLOSS is free as in 

libré.  Internet Explorer is gratis.  Mozilla Firefox is libré.  


I think we are all educated enough to know that the word free has multiple sense in English. In fact, one of the main reasons I don't particularly like the acronyms FOSS and FLOSS is not that they aren't technically correct, but that they come across as condescending. I will grant, however, that many advocates of open source products have chosen to focus on free in the financial/monetary sense of the term. But even then, it can easily become tiresome to hear again and again that the word is meant in the sense of not bound or encumbered.

Gregory Woodhouse

Metaphors be with you.


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