On Friday 20 June 2008 12:43:54 Zoltán Kócsi wrote: > On Fri, 20 Jun 2008 06:22:04 -0400 > > James Knott <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > jonathon wrote: > > > On Tue, Jun 17, 2008 at 5:55 PM, Stephanie Zito wrote: > > >> Is this openoffice free? If so is it free for an unlimited time or > > >> does one [snip] > > Don't you think your reply to a simple question is a bit much? > > What's wrong with a simple answer to her question? > > Well, it never hurts to educate people about free as libre and as > gratis. The simple answer would of course be "that depends on whether > you want to download it and you have free internet or not; or maybe > you'd prefer to buy a CD on ebay or possibly you want to buy > derivatives that contain commercial extras such as StarOffice" and so > on. You can get OOo free as in beer *if* you have free 'net access or > if someone has a CD with OOo on it. Otherwise, no, OOo is not free - it > will cost you money to obtain it. There won't be licence fees, but it > will still cost money. On the other hand, if your friend has OOo, then > due to OOo being free as libre, you can indeed have it for free as > gratis. > > By the way, the simple answer is not always what is best. For example, > the simple and perfectly correct answer to the very simple question of > "Could you tell me the time, please?" would be "Yes, I could." :-)
The poor woman only wanted to know whether the software itself is free, and the context itself made it clear that she meant gratuit, not libre. She didn't want a treatise on philosophy nor a lecture on semantics. Lisi --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
