Re: [libreplanet-discuss] ethical edtech edit-a-thon

[Aaron Wolf]

On 2019-03-13 11:39 a.m., Dmitry Alexandrov wrote:
> Aaron Wolf <wolftune@riseup.net> wrote:
>> There's a bunch of confusion going on here. <…>
>>
>> As far as trying to talk about these topics in general, I suggest the use of 
>> FLO (Free/Libre/Open), as discussed at 
>> https://wiki.snowdrift.coop/about/free-libre-open
> 
> Argh!  That’s a perfect idea to get some more bunches of confusion, if you 
> ask me.
> 
> When Raymond & Co. decided to coin a new word to hijack the essence of free 
> software to promote their own idea, they cared and succeed not to repeat Dr. 
> Stallman’s mistake of using an ambiguous word, so they didn’t not call it 
> ‘open’, which would be even more overloaded than ‘free’ is¹, but ‘open 
> _source_’.
>

I'm not suggesting "open" on its own be accepted as anything precise,
it's far too overused and abused. "Open Source" is a recognized term.
But FLO as a full term is not overloaded but is specifically NOT an
overused overloaded term. So, it is exclusively used to talk about
free/libre/open-source etc.

"Open" isn't used only for "Open Source" in this context though as there
are "Open Access" journals and "Open" as in https://okfn.org/ "Open
Knowledge"

"Open" on its own is nearly useless. But FLO is more specific, it refers
to meeting all the core freedoms while having some tie-in to the
mostly-synonymous cases of "Open" as in "Open Source". It's not Free
*or* Libre *or* Open, but Free AND Libre AND Open (not to suggest that
those terms mean different things, but something that clearly meets
*all* of them is clearly FLO).


> Another reason, more apparent then than today, was in the fact, that ‘open 
> software’ have been already _taken_ to mean something entirely different: 
> (mostly nonfree) software based on open standards (keywords: SUS, CDE, Motif).
> 
> _
> ¹ Well, I by no means an expert in English, but any dictionary in my 
> possession says so.  Moreover, after verbatim translation to another language 
> ‘free software’ tends to rid itself from ambiguity, while ‘open’ does not — 
> at best.  At worst, it acquires further meanings, like that of ‘opened 
> programs’ (= ‘running programs’), for instance.
>

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