Tuesday, January 10th, 2006, 5:25 pm
Free Software – What Does it Truly Mean?
Filed under: 
Season of the playful penguins from Oyonale
I decided to explore and assemble a few favourite essays that explain what “free software” actually means. It does not mean what people tend to believe. I can assure you that, so please read on.
Essay #1: What software freedom means to me
Some seem to view software as a closed sphere; meaning that one person or group’s success must come at the expense of another’s. For those that have this rather selfish and narrow view of a closed world of zero sum games, I guess it makes sense to be able to take software and ideas that others have created, and offer them back with some modifications as proprietary solutions under the exclusive control of one individual or group.
Essay #2: Debunking common GNU/Linux myths
(Fallacy:) Free software is Communism. Free software promotes a gift economy and is anti-capitalist. Free software will kill the software industry and hurt the economy. First let’s examine free software. Basically it is software that you are allowed to use, sell, distribute and modify in any way you see fit. Compare that with proprietary software, which most often only allows you to use the software on a limited basis — no redistribution, sale, or modification of the software is allowed. Actually it goes further than that; criminal and civil penalties can be imposed on you for doing any of those things. It would be more accurate to say that proprietary software is fascist rather than suggest that free software is communist.
The “free” in free software does not mean “free of charge;” it means “free of restriction.” That’s free as in rights, not price. This is a point often misunderstood or misrepresented by proprietary software CEOs and others who have a proprietary software agenda to push.
That being said, free software is often also free of charge.
[...]
So, as the GNU slogan clearly says, it is “free as in freedom“.
