Dear all, We had a discussion today with RMS about the this thread. As many people pointed in the thread he also expressed pushing a new term will make policy circles more ambiguous . See his detailed response below
Anivar Aravind Moving Republic ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Richard Stallman <[email protected]> Date: Wed, Sep 8, 2010 at 12:00 AM Subject: Conceptual clarity about public software To: Renuka Prasad <[email protected]>, [email protected], [email protected] Perusing some of the documents from IT for Change, I see that the term "public software" is used for at least five different concepts: 1. Software necessary for participation in digital society 2. Software used by the government. 3. Software developed for the government. 4. Software development projects that would serve a public interest. In addition, there is a fifth possible concept of public, which enters because IT for Change uses "private" as the opposite of "public". 5. Software that is published. (The FSF speaks of a program as "private" when it has not been published.) Their text refers to these four concepts indiscriminately by the same term; only by studying the meaning of the text is it possible to tell which concept is in use in any given place. Clear understanding of the various issues requires distinguishing these concepts. It will be useful to have shorter and distinctive terms for them; here are some suggestions. 1. Everyday necessary software. 2. Government-used software. 3. Government-commissioned software. 4. Public interest software development. 5. Published software. Some statements by IT for Change contrast public software with "FOSS". Thsi introduces another conceptual difficulty, because FOSS identifies free software and open source -- two different philosophies, with two different practical criteria. The term "FOSS" is usable when this difference is of no concern; but the difference matters here. For the free software movement, what matters is to contrast public software with free software. The results will be different, because IT for Change's analysis presumes that FOSS is always published, but free software is not always released to the public. Free software is defined in terms of freedom for those who have the program, not in terms of who has access. If you write a program for your own use, you enjoy the four freedoms in using that program, so your copy is free software. This is true even if you never distribute a copy to anyone else. We refer to these programs as "private software". This is pertinent because IT for Change gives, as an example of a program that should not be "FOSS", a program to break encryption. The argument is that the government might want to develop this but would not want to publish it. Perhaps so -- but it does not follow that the program is not free software. On the contrary, if the government has the four freedoms in using the program, the program is free even though it is private. (Whether it is good for the government to be able to break our encryption is a question that we need not raise here.) When IT for Change argues that public software is not necessarily "FOSS", it cites the example of software that "should not be published". However, that example is not pertinent to free software. (Open source might be a different issue.) Software users all deserve freedom, so all software should be free, but this does not mean that all software must be published. With case eliminated, perhaps there is no case in which public software would not be free software. Another question that arises in the IT for Change texts is, in which circumstances should the government support software development. I agree with IT for Change that the government should devote its resources to development of software in the cases where its existence benefits the public. Otherwise, it would be a waste of public funds. For instance, I see no reason why the government should develop software for people to use for gambling. But if, perchance, the government does develop and release software for gambling, it must release that software as free software. To release it in any other way would be wrong. If the government does not develop and release software for gambling, anyone else is free to do so. He might release the program; if so, it ought to release it as free software; to do otherwise is wrong. Or he might use it privately, in which case, it ought to be free software for the sake of his own freedom (and normally, it will be free software for him). Distinguishing these various concepts of "public", and understanding their relationship, will make it possible to clear up a number of issues about public software, and perhaps reduce conflict between public software and the free software movement. If some public software may not be free, the free software movement will have to argue against the claim that public software is, in general, desirable or ethical. But if all public software is free software, that disagreement doesn't arise -- which would be a relief. _______________________________________________ network mailing list [email protected] http://lists.fosscom.in/listinfo.cgi/network-fosscom.in
