From owner-freebsd-advocacy Thu Feb 27 11:20: 2 2003 Delivered-To: freebsd-advocacy@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id B852937B401 for ; Thu, 27 Feb 2003 11:20:00 -0800 (PST) Received: from thor.acuson.com (ac17859.acuson.com [157.226.71.79]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 9B29443FAF for ; Thu, 27 Feb 2003 11:19:59 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from DavidJohnson@Siemens.com) Received: from mvaexch02.acuson.com (mvaexch02.acuson.com [157.226.230.209]) by thor.acuson.com (iPlanet Messaging Server 5.2 (built Feb 21 2002)) with ESMTP id <0HAZ00GWZEZ476@thor.acuson.com> for freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG; Thu, 27 Feb 2003 11:18:40 -0800 (PST) Received: by mvaexch02.acuson.com with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2653.19) id ; Thu, 27 Feb 2003 11:11:44 -0800 Received: from dhcp-46-158.acuson.com ([157.226.46.158]) by mvaexch01.acuson.com with SMTP (Microsoft Exchange Internet Mail Service Version 5.5.2653.13) id Y2R04Q8Q; Thu, 27 Feb 2003 11:13:00 -0800 Content-return: allowed Date: Thu, 27 Feb 2003 11:19:17 -0800 From: Johnson David Subject: Re: O'Reilly apologizes for calling BSD "Free Software" In-reply-to: <3E5E289D.500C9704@mindspring.com> To: Terry Lambert Cc: freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG Message-id: <200302271119.17369.DavidJohnson@Siemens.com> Organization: Siemens Medical Systems MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Content-disposition: inline User-Agent: KMail/1.5 References: <200302261224.54884.DavidJohnson@Siemens.com> <86bs0yne2d.fsf@vanilla.zzz> <3E5E289D.500C9704@mindspring.com> Sender: owner-freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk List-ID: List-Archive: (Web Archive) List-Help: (List Instructions) List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG On Thursday 27 February 2003 07:02 am, Terry Lambert wrote: > > Excuse me. But isn't FreeBSD 'Free Software'? Or, I misunderstood > > the story? > > He means "Free" as in "Libertine", not "Free" as in "Free". "Libertine" is not really the right word, except in the most cynical sense. Here's a slightly improved statement: He means "Free" as in "regulated", not "Free" as in "unrestricted". It's a fundamental split between basic philosophies of freedom. One side is concerned with the "greater good" or "public weal", and sees no problems with eliminating some freedoms while promoting others, so long as the total freedom is maximized according to their calculus. The other side is concerned with individuals, and sees any reduction of an individuals freedoms to be unacceptable. I hesitate to assign any political labels to the two sides, since there are radical anarchists, extreme authoritarians, and everyone in between, in both camps. It gets interesting in terms of software, because distributing software under both models is a volunteer cooperation. Some members of the second side may indeed wish to maximise the greater good and public weal, but do not see distributing software, as an appropriate vehicle. And some members of the first side may find genuine distaste at regulating the freedoms of individuals, but consider the individual free to choose the authors distribution terms or not. David To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-advocacy" in the body of the message