[SWLUG] Free as in freedom

[Dave Cridland]

On Sat, Aug 10, 2013 at 7:43 AM, Neil Greenwood <
neil.greenwood.lug at gmail.com> wrote:

> On 10 Aug 2013 01:26, "Hugh Mayfield" <hugh.mayfield at gmail.com> wrote:
> > I wondered to what extent people in this group are interested in free
> software as opposed to simply open source?  To what extent to people try to
> run fully free systems?  Does the group see itself as supporting GNU+Linux
> or simply Linux?  If there was a "free software user group" in South Wales
> would people see that as something worth joining, or a needless duplication
> of SWLUG, or somewhere in between?
> >
>
> I try to be Free (as in speech) rather than just free (as in beer), but
> I'm pragmatic with it. For instance, I use nvidia drivers on my work
> desktop since suspend doesn't work on that machine without them.
>
I don't think that "Free Software" is either particularly free-as-in-speech
- clever marketing campaign, though - or ethically superior. About the only
thing I consider unethical in software licensing is dual GPL/commercial,
because it strikes me as somewhat two-faced due to the baggage the GPL
carries. I'm not *against* people deciding that all software should/must be
open-source, I just don't think there's any kind of moral dimension to it.

I will cheerfully pay for software if I think it's better, though I find
more inherent value in software that I can recompile and tweak - even if I
try to avoid actually compiling other people's software these days. This
extends to graphics drivers - so I'm on nVidia binary, though I'm happier
using the open source Radeon driver on my laptop. I suppose I see
source-code availability under sensible licensing (ie "Open Source™") as a
feature, desirable but not mandatory.

I've tried OS X, I find it unusable - I prefer Win7 to OS X, and prefer a
cinnamon desktop (Mint-ish) to either. On the other hand, I use a paid-for
Python IDE (PyCharm).

What I am reasonably fanatical about is open standards, and as such, I
think it's a deep concern if an open-source, "Free Software", etc version
of some program cannot exist. I'm (considerably) more concerned with
network than hardware here, mind, so I'll put up with nVidia as long as
they support OpenGL (but thank heavens we're out of the 3Dfx Glide years).

As for whether we need two groups - not really. It's much more fun
discussing things with people who respect your views but don't share them,
don't you think?

Dave.
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