Re: [libreplanet-discuss] Amusing Free Software Story

[Aaron Wolf]

Libre is indeed perfectly fine as long as it gets over the one burden of 
becoming acceptable for English.

But note that "FLOSS" is lousy while "FLO" is fine. And that's why 
Snowdrift.coop has embraced "FLO" because we're not strictly about software 
anyway.

The simple fact is, unless we could make everyone *stop* using "Open" (and note 
that there are orgs like Open Knowledge who are not half-assed (i.e. no NC/ND 
bullshit) and also not promoting the corporate watered-down philosophy of "Open 
Source" ­— i.e. Open Knowledge is indeed about empowering the people, not about 
a business process.), we can't avoid the discussion.

I would *love* if everyone just went with Libre and it got accepted in English 
context, that's that. But we would need Open Knowledge and FSF and others to 
embrace "Libre" fully. Otherwise, we'll have to keep clarifying that we *do* 
mean "free" in FSF terms. As long as we *are* acknowledging that but accept the 
downsides, then "Free/Libre" is needed, and I really think Free/Libre/Open i.e. 
FLO is the best general option.

On 03/18/2015 07:45 PM, Logan Streondj wrote:
> On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 11:18:19AM -0500, mark@picaflor-azul.com wrote:
> > Hello,
> >
> >> And I am not saying we should not use "libre" -- au contraire! But
> >> IMVHO we
> >> should definitely not say "the term free is lost, too many people
> >> use it in
> >> the wrong sense".
> >
> > I've thought about this quite a bit. I really like the term Libre
> > Software. Being pretty fluent in Spanish it immediately suggests
> > freedom to me. I think that this is probably not the case for most
> > English speakers. I also like the term Freedom Software. In the
> > example with my mother, I'm pretty sure it wouldn't have mattered at
> > all what I called it. It just would have taken her an extra thirty
> > seconds to decide that I was talking about the same freeware, which
> > she knows is worthless.
> >
> > Sincerely,
> >
> > Mark
>
> Ya, i totally agree with the libre crowd.
> freeware is worthless, and "free software" is misleading.
>
> I recently saw some website where some free software project said they
> weren't accepting donations, because they are free software.
> if people have that impression, they can't put food on the table.
>
> open is also vague, and leads to a lot of BSD/MIT users,
> cause technically it's "open". also Openware is a management services
> company in Latin America.
>
> (Free Libre Open Source Software) FLOSS,
> which just makes people think of dental hygiene.
>
> libre on the other hand is more clear,
> protecting the liberty of the user.
>
> libreware is also an available word.
> libre wares can refer to any kind of libre product technically.
> libre hardware, libre music, libre books,
>
> from Logan ya
>