Wildemar Wildenburger <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]:
> While I agree that the word "free" implies "free of monetary cost" to > many people societies, that is by no means set in stone (talk to native > americans, blacks, jews, palestinians, etc. about the word free, see > what they have to say). Words are defined by popular usage. In popular usage, the meaning of free as an adjective depends on the context. If the adjective is applied to people, it means the opposite of slavery or imprisonment. If it's applied to something other than people, it means free as in beer. For example, a dog with no owner, wandering freely (adverb), would not be called a free dog (adjective), to mean possessing freedom. Free dog means free as in beer. Likewise, in popular usage, free software means free as in beer. People who use it with a different meaning are vainly trying to change its meaning. But the meanings of words can't be arbitrarily changed, just by dictating different meanings. The meaning has to be adopted by popular usage, which free-as-in-GPL software has not been. Therefore, I propose, using dog freedom as our logic, we call it stray software. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
