Re: [libreplanet-discuss] Is there any software that is libre but not gratis?

[Isaac David]

Hi there Sam,

As a matter of fact all free (libre) software is subject to the possibility of

being copied and distributed gratis; digital information is intrinsically so easy

to copy and computers and computer networks make the costs of

production and distribution almost nonexistent. Among doing other

things, free software eliminates an artificial scarcity imposed on software

by legal and technical mechanisms.

Having said that, there's still a cost associated with producing the original

program and its changes. Nothing prevents free software developers from

refusing to release their original products unless given a monetary value

in exchange. In this sense selling free software is no different from selling

proprietary software. I think you could find plenty of examples that fit this

scenario. Just some weeks ago people on this maling list were discussing

the possibilities and issues with paying for proprietary software to be

relicensed as free, and I think Blender came up as a prominent example.

Finally, although free software can't guarantee that users will pay for copies

to the same extent proprietary software can, some free software developers

have emulated this unnatural business model and I can give a few examples:

* Back when Internet connections were slower and costly, the FSF sold copies

of popular GNU programs that went distributed on a physical medium.

* Minitube is a free desktop client for Youtube which for a very long time only

offered Windows and MacOSX users the option to buy binaries (or compile them

themselves). I'm seeing Minitibue runs both gratis and sold binaries in parallel

now, but I remember meeting OSX and Windows users who asked for "cracks"

and "open source software" alternatives to Minitube. Absolutely hilarious!

* Ardour charges for all binaries distributed through their website.

* I've seen free software Android applications like Mupen64Plus (based on

Mupen) doing fine selling copies in the nasty Google Playstore.

I'm liking the shape your draft is taking. It's a shot of fresh air in light of

Wikipedia's COMMONNAME policy commonly crippling correct terminology.

Is that table supposed to be near-exhaustive or only a hint? If the former is

the case, may I suggest the following:

* Adding "libre [software]" to the cell (libre=yes, gratis=yes, acceptable=yes).

   Regardless of commercial status, "libre" and "Free Software" are always 

   acceptable for libre/free software. I understand that free software is easily

   confused with gratis software in the English language, however in the free

   software community the term has always referred to freedom, not price; and

   you won't find the unintended meaning worthy of a Wikipedia article. I think

   you also agreed to this interpretation when you correctly added "free" and 

   "free software" to (libre=no, gratis=yes, acceptable=no).

* Removing "free", "free software" and never adding "libre [software]" to the

  cell (libre=yes, gratis=no, acceptable=no) for the previous point's reason. This

  could perfectly be replaced with whatever you have added to 

  (libre=yes, gratis=yes, acceptable=no).

* Adding "freeware" to (libre=yes, gratis=yes, acceptable=no) and 

  (libre=yes, gratis=no, acceptable=no) and (libre=no, gratis=yes, acceptable=yes).

  Although prone to misassociation with free software because of their close

  phonology and writing, freeware is the very description of software that is

  proprietary and gratis. Once again you can attest my interpretation reading the

  relevant Wikipedia article.

Oh, by the way, "free/libre" as used in the free software movement is 

interchangeable 99% of the time with "open" as used in the Open Source

definition. None of those definitions cares whether a piece of software is

gratis or commercial, although the whole idea behind open source was to make

free software more appealing to commercial settings.

I hope this helps.

Le mar. 23 févr. 2016 à 19:38, Sam Pablo Kuper <sampablokuper@riseup.net> a écrit :

This is a genuine question. My impression is that the set of software that is wholly libre but is not available gratis, is an empty set. However, my knowledge of libre software is limited compared to that of this mailing list's users. If you know of any examples of software that are libre but not available gratis, I would be grateful to know about them. My impression is that Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL), for instance, is not in that set, because the parts of RHEL that are not available gratis are also not libre, and so RHEL as a whole is not libre (even though *most* of its constituent parts are indeed libre). Thanks! Sam Pablo Kuper P.S. In case you are curious why I am asking this, it is because I am editing a Wikipedia "draft" to offer guidance to Wikipedia editors writing about software. I am trying to determine whether there is a need to provide guidance for writing about software that is libre but not gratis. Here is the current version of the draft. The draft is absolutely a work in progress. The second row in the table is the relevant one: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Draft:Don%27t_call_non-free_software_%22free%22&oldid=706569795#Summary