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1. Cory Doctorow's linkblog (pluralistic@mamot.fr)'s status on Tuesday, 05-Mar-2024 11:11:18 UTC Cory Doctorow's linkblog

   The point of #SoftwareFreedom was #TechnologicalSelfDetermination, the right of technology users to decide not just what their technology *does*, but who it does it *to* and who it does it *for*:

   https://locusmag.com/2022/01/cory-doctorow-science-fiction-is-a-luddite-literature/

   The open source split from free software was ostensibly driven by the need to reassure investors and businesspeople so they would join the movement.

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   • Cory Doctorow's linkblog (pluralistic@mamot.fr)'s status on Tuesday, 05-Mar-2024 11:11:15 UTC Cory Doctorow's linkblog

     in reply to

     Thus, by dribs and drabs, freedom leeches out of openness. Today's tech giants have mobilized "open" to create a two-tier system: the largest tech firms enjoy broad freedom themselves - they alone get to decide how their software stack is configured. But for all of us who rely on that (increasingly unavoidable) software stack, all we have is "open": the ability to peer inside that software and see how it works, and perhaps suggest improvements to it:

     https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBknF2yUZZ8

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   • Cory Doctorow's linkblog (pluralistic@mamot.fr)'s status on Tuesday, 05-Mar-2024 11:11:16 UTC Cory Doctorow's linkblog

     in reply to

     But "open" doesn't merely resolve the linguistic ambiguity of libre vs gratis - it does so by removing the "liberty" from "libre," the "freedom" from "free." "Open" changes the pole-star that movement participants follow as they set their course. Rather than asking "Which course of action makes us more free?" they ask, "Which course of action makes our software better?"

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   • Cory Doctorow's linkblog (pluralistic@mamot.fr)'s status on Tuesday, 05-Mar-2024 11:11:17 UTC Cory Doctorow's linkblog

     in reply to

     The "free" in free software is (deliberately) ambiguous, a bit of wordplay that sometimes misleads people into thinking it means "#FreeAsInBeer" when really it means "#FreeAsInSpeech" (in Romance languages, these distinctions are captured by translating "free" as "libre" rather than "gratis").

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   • Cory Doctorow's linkblog (pluralistic@mamot.fr)'s status on Tuesday, 05-Mar-2024 11:11:17 UTC Cory Doctorow's linkblog

     in reply to

     The idea behind open source was to rebrand free software in a less ambiguous - and more instrumental - package that stressed cost-savings and software quality, as well as "ecosystem benefits" from a co-operative form of development that recruited tinkerers, independents, and rivals to contribute to a robust infrastructural commons.

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   • Matthew Fennell (matthew@social.fennell.dev)'s status on Tuesday, 05-Mar-2024 11:12:46 UTC Matthew Fennell

     in reply to

     • Benjamin Mako Hill

     @pluralistic thank you for sharing this talk, and thank you @mako for giving it in the first place.

     I find it one of the most articulate comparisons between #OpenSource and #FreeSoftware. It really articulately explains the intuitive difference in feeling between using open source and free software projects.

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