I had an experience at my local users group recently which is related to the
general misunderstanding that occurs when you refer to something as free
software.
This was my first time going to this users group meeting since I moved back
to Ohio. Naturally I brought along my dell laptop with a copy of Trisquel 5.0
running on it. As I met a couple of people and introduced myself I got the
all to common question "What version of Linux are you using?"
Being the polite person that I am and a newcomer, I didn't go on a tangent
about the fact that it is actually supposed to be referred to as GNU/Linux. I
proudly answered "Trisquel!" and he had never heard of it.
I went on to explain to him that it was a 100% free version of GNU/Linux and
is largely based on Ubuntu. He gave me a blank look and continue to tell me "
I didn't pay anything for Ubuntu" when I tried to explain to him what it
meant to be 100% free. I even tried to throw in the common "free as in
freedom" term but he still didn't get understand it. No matter how much I
tried to clarify that "free" has nothing to do with price he insisted on
informing me that he didn't pay anything for his version of Ubuntu "Linux".
I am not sure what the solution is. In America it seems like free is always
going to refer to price first, and freedom second.
