Posted by: Anonymous Coward
on January 09, 2004 07:02 PM
First, let me thank you for a really interesting discussion. I would like to add one more freedom which seems essential for me: the freedom to simpy exists. Here is what I mean,
Proprietary software produced by corporations which in their finality ALL exist to serve the need for $$$ of their shareholders exist as long as the corporation's business plan and financial interests are served. There is a HUGE cultural mistake made today (at the age of turbocapitalism and corporateering) which assumes that the market's interests are the same as the people's interests. Of course, they are not. Free software has to exist as the collective product of a COMMUNITY rather than of any one CORPORATION. Then it cannot be bought, sold, terminated, or otherwise limited in its life and growth. That is the key-freedom which allowed GNU/Linux to survive against the multi-billion dollar "evil empire" in Redmond (let's face it - MS coul purchase Mandrake or RedHat tomorrow morning without even noticing the costs of aquisition on it's next board meeting). Of course, there is a potential threat now from the SCO lawsuit against not only IBM, but the GPL license. But look at it again this way. As long as free software remains the product of an essentially anonymous community it cannot be shut down by court order. One or several US-based Linux-companies might have to comply with some fascist and corrupt court order, but the COMMUNITY? It will continue hacking, illegally if need be. And we might win the same way Zimmerman won against the Federal Government for making PGP available. Imagine thousands of Zimmermans spread throughout the world and you will have the distributed power and freedom of our GNU/Linux community.
To use a military comparison, we don't present our enemy with a usable target<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:-)
Also - we are free from Gurus. Look at the Apple dummies who worship Steve Jobs and who like to say that Macs took a plunge down when he was away from Apple. They are collectively dependent upon this one guy even more than Windoze users depend of the image (not substance, of course) of Gates (so much for "thinking different). We can like or admire Linus, or RMS, or Knopper or anyone else, but essentially, WE DO NOT *NEED* THEM! They are not our gurus. If tomorrow Redmond succeeds in buying off and hiring ALL of them (however unlikely this is) what would it do to GNU/Linux? NOTHING AT ALL! That's also something which is a freedom of being the product of a community which cannot be collectively bought!
On the long term, it seems to me that this freedom, the one of being the collective child of a distributed community, might be as important as the freedoms you list above. And for that, GNU/Linux MUST remain free in RMS's definition of freedom.
Learn about Linux
Download Linux
Get Linux help
one more freedom added
Posted by: Anonymous Coward on January 09, 2004 07:02 PMProprietary software produced by corporations which in their finality ALL exist to serve the need for $$$ of their shareholders exist as long as the corporation's business plan and financial interests are served. There is a HUGE cultural mistake made today (at the age of turbocapitalism and corporateering) which assumes that the market's interests are the same as the people's interests. Of course, they are not. Free software has to exist as the collective product of a COMMUNITY rather than of any one CORPORATION. Then it cannot be bought, sold, terminated, or otherwise limited in its life and growth. That is the key-freedom which allowed GNU/Linux to survive against the multi-billion dollar "evil empire" in Redmond (let's face it - MS coul purchase Mandrake or RedHat tomorrow morning without even noticing the costs of aquisition on it's next board meeting). Of course, there is a potential threat now from the SCO lawsuit against not only IBM, but the GPL license. But look at it again this way. As long as free software remains the product of an essentially anonymous community it cannot be shut down by court order. One or several US-based Linux-companies might have to comply with some fascist and corrupt court order, but the COMMUNITY? It will continue hacking, illegally if need be. And we might win the same way Zimmerman won against the Federal Government for making PGP available. Imagine thousands of Zimmermans spread throughout the world and you will have the distributed power and freedom of our GNU/Linux community.
To use a military comparison, we don't present our enemy with a usable target<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:-)
Also - we are free from Gurus. Look at the Apple dummies who worship Steve Jobs and who like to say that Macs took a plunge down when he was away from Apple. They are collectively dependent upon this one guy even more than Windoze users depend of the image (not substance, of course) of Gates (so much for "thinking different). We can like or admire Linus, or RMS, or Knopper or anyone else, but essentially, WE DO NOT *NEED* THEM! They are not our gurus. If tomorrow Redmond succeeds in buying off and hiring ALL of them (however unlikely this is) what would it do to GNU/Linux? NOTHING AT ALL! That's also something which is a freedom of being the product of a community which cannot be collectively bought!
On the long term, it seems to me that this freedom, the one of being the collective child of a distributed community, might be as important as the freedoms you list above. And for that, GNU/Linux MUST remain free in RMS's definition of freedom.
#