Free software began as a political movement: its central aim was – and remains – the propagation of freedom. Later, it became a development methodology too, largely at the hands of Linus, whose geographical isolation in Finland forced him to develop ways of using the Internet to coordinate a new kind of massive, but decentralised, global collaboration. Later still, free software also became a way of making serious money – something that Stallman has repeatedly said he is quite happy with, contrary to much FUD claiming otherwise.
On The H Open.
I wrote my take (which really isn't that different from your take) on this as well: http://dasublogbyprashanth.blogspot.com/2010/04/why-open-source-is-not-socialism.html .
ReplyDeleteI also found it necessary (given that people I know call Linux users (and even Firefox (on Windows) users) "commies" - then again, you can't argue with those people rationally) to argue for why *NIX is actually the capitalist OS, and Windows is the socialist one.
Check it out and please do leave comments!
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a Linux Mint user since 2009 May 1
@PV: trouble is, "socialism" has become such a term of abuse that it has lost all of its original meaning. Mostly, this is an argument conducted by people who aren't listening...
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