Hi, I post an useful extract from an article below. Fear of Freedom
The main argument for the term "open source software" is that "free software" makes some people uneasy. That's true: talking about freedom, about ethical issues, about responsibilities as well as convenience, is asking people to think about things they might rather ignore. This can trigger discomfort, and some people may reject the idea for that. It does not follow that society would be better off if we stop talking about these things. Years ago, free software developers noticed this discomfort reaction, and some started exploring an approach for avoiding it. They figured that by keeping quiet about ethics and freedom, and talking only about the immediate practical benefits of certain free software, they might be able to "sell" the software more effectively to certain users, especially business. The term "open source" is offered as a way of doing more of this—a way to be "more acceptable to business." The views and values of the Open Source movement stem from this decision. This approach has proved effective, in its own terms. Today many people are switching to free software for purely practical reasons. That is good, as far as it goes, but that isn't all we need to do! Attracting users to free software is not the whole job, just the first step. Sooner or later these users will be invited to switch back to proprietary software for some practical advantage. Countless companies seek to offer such temptation, and why would users decline? Only if they have learned to *value the freedom* free software gives them, for its own sake. It is up to us to spread this idea—and in order to do that, we have to talk about freedom. A certain amount of the "keep quiet" approach to business can be useful for the community, but we must have plenty of freedom talk too. At present, we have plenty of "keep quiet", but not enough freedom talk. Most people involved with free software say little about freedom—usually because they seek to be "more acceptable to business." Software distributors especially show this pattern. Some GNU/Linux<http://www.gnu.org/gnu/linux-and-gnu.html>operating system distributions add proprietary packages to the basic free system, and they invite users to consider this an advantage, rather than a step backwards from freedom. We are failing to keep up with the influx of free software users, failing to teach people about freedom and our community as fast as they enter it. This is why non-free software (which Qt was when it first became popular), and partially non-free operating system distributions, find such fertile ground. To stop using the word "free" now would be a mistake; we need more, not less, talk about freedom. If those using the term "open source" draw more users into our community, that is a contribution, but the rest of us will have to work even harder to bring the issue of freedom to those users' attention. We have to say, "It's free software and it gives you freedom!"—more and louder than ever before. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-software-for-freedom.html The bold words are one of my concern also, since you mentioned you choose GNU/Linux because of technical merits. So if there's more technical merits elsewhere on proprietary world, I predict people will jump ship easily. The objective is not to jump ship, but to educate people about software freedom. If one really know about software freedom he/she will not jump ship easily if there's more technical merits there. Jumping ship is a problem if one stick to the Open Source Ideals believing mainly in the part about technical advantage because it's open source. Many jump ship, just because they know open source but don't know software freedom like the GNU philosophy. Can we prevent this from happening? In long term, we do like a loyal user group that is loyal to GNU/Linux, and not some people who don't appreciate software freedom and took Linux for granted as an alternative OS in comparison. I dunno how they will jump, from windows to GNU/Linux, from linux to BSD, from BSD to Mac OS X. I hope people will understand how important GNU philosophy means instead as a whole. Regards John On 6/20/07, Chen Xiangpeng <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
On 6/20/07, John Thng <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > 1) Calling this variant of the GNU system "Linux" plays into the hands > of people who choose their software based only on technical advantage, not > caring whether it respects their freedom. [9]<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU/Linux_naming_controversy#_note-6> Which brings us to an interesting point, who here choose to use Linux base on technical merits? Who uses it out of job requirements? Who uses it because of the Free Software Ideals? I choose Linux because of the technical merits. I am a pragmatist and not idealist :P XP
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