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Comment by mwfunk | Hacker News Reader

I've long felt that RMS/FSF's very specific and nonintuitive usage of "free" was intended to be misleading. If someone says "free" (which has many, many different meanings, all positive) when they really mean "copyleft" (which has one very complicated meaning), they're not trying to clarify anything, rather they're trying to muddy the waters so that people who don't understand copyleft or the FSF's political philosophy might think it's much simpler and much less specifically (and restrictively) defined than it actually is. Even the phrase "free as in freedom" doesn't actually disambiguate it, as it's a very specific type of very atypically defined freedom.

It always felt like a certain type of PR strategy, where the intent is to intentionally mislead people who aren't paying close attention, and that's always rubbed me the wrong way. Source: observing 3 decades of neverending confusion, flamewars, and arguments over this very topic.

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It's less confusing when you focus on the 'freedom of the users'.

Maybe that's the part of the message that's been most lost over the years. Focusing so much on free/libre that the group to which it applies (everyone (else), end users) is forgotten.

Freedom for the users is the empowerment to treat ideas and expressions of ideas as simply that. A restoration to the laws of nature which make the cost of copying an idea merely seeing it in action.

Yes, that brings hard questions to the table as well. However my answer to those is mostly that works covered as free/libre software should be public works. Common infrastructure that everyone is supposed to have access to. An open and level playing field for the advancement of education and the useful arts of science. They should also provide a useful platform for more transitory productions like games and videos.

People walking around with smartphones just don't think of themselves as "users of software," though that's exactly what they are.

It's unclear wording. It's also not the most immediate and intuitive concept for people outside the industry to wrap their heads around.

Think about driving a car. You're driving a car, you need to know about stuff like having a license and gas and insurance and so on, i.e. the things that a "driver" or "motorist" is generally responsible for.

Obviously, no license needed for having a smartphone, and all you really need is a charger to keep it going, which is part of why there's nothing nudging people to that conceptual leap of being "a user of software".

We could do better, but there's an industry-wide revulsion to finding the right language for communicating with your people, i.e. marketing.

I used to be a big advocate of "free software" as distinct from "open source," but after spending a few years in the marketing side of the industry, I don't give a shit at all about that distinction, because neither does anyone who isn't already drowning in the kool aid.

Like I said, we could do better.

No, it's really not. If I'm an end-user who wants to do something, and you tell me that what I want isn't available for my own good (because anyone who built it would be violating my freedom), I'm going to at best think you're being disingenuous. And might want to punch you in the face a bit.

>It's less confusing when you focus on the 'freedom of the users'.

No it isn't. The entire purpose of the GPL is to restrict the freedom of the users. Public domain gives freedom to the users. Everything else adds restrictions. And it is all a big argument about which restrictions are "good" in the eyes of the people arguing.

> very specific and nonintuitive usage of "free"

Supposedly it is because the word libre isn't recognized well enough in English.

Quoting: "To emphasize that “free software” refers to freedom and not to price, we sometimes write or say “free (libre) software,” adding the French or Spanish word that means free in the sense of freedom. In some contexts, it works to use just “libre software.”"

And: "We stand for freedom, and we show it every time—by saying “free” and “libre”— or “free (libre)”."

https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/floss-and-foss.en.html

Perhaps liberty software or liberal software would work...

> Perhaps liberty software or liberal software would work

Parts of both of those terms have negative connotations in the US. They'd probably be fine everywhere else, but in the US, they'd be really damn polarizing.

My usual goto about "free" software and "free" service:

"Free speech is not the same as free beer."

Sure, that's a common line. But the fact that such an explanation is necessary at all is a pretty strong indicator that the label "free" is a poor one.

I don't think RMS was being deliberately obtuse, I think he was just trying to be too clever by half, and making stupid puns. Think about it. The same guy that thought, "If we have 'free speech', why not 'free software'?" is the same guy that thought "Not 'copyright', 'copyleft'!", which doesn't even make any sense.

"Oh I get it now. So how much is a copy of GNU Toolchain?"

"Oh it's free."

"..."

"It's free as in beer."

"Support home brewing! The beer is free as in speech, not Gmail"

By RMS? Why would he make his message intentionally less clear?

He does this stuff all the time, he's always used language in a very Orwellian manner. It's much easier to promote "freedom" (which means all sorts of things to different people, all of them positive) than it is to promote copyleft and all that it entails. Everybody loves freedom right? But it is obfuscating, hence the neverending confusion about exactly what he means when he uses terms like "free", "freedom", and "free software".

In general, he seems to be almost obsessively sensitive to how the words used to frame ideas can influence someone's feelings towards those ideas ("GNU/Linux"...). Which of course is true, words are very important. However, he channels this obsession with words towards obfuscation rather than clarity. He's very fond of always using derogatory puns for things he doesn't like in his essays, or incorrect acronym expansion. For example, always referring to DRM as "Digital Restrictions Management"- apropos and humorous as it may be, for me it's hard to not feel like he's treating his audience like children and thinks they can be influenced by wordplay. He has expended an utterly tremendous amount of energy over the past 3 decades scolding people for using incorrect terminology, when in fact the confusion over terminology almost entirely comes from him trying to redefine common terms, or him trying to change the term people commonly use to refer to something to another term that carries some sort of loaded meaning.

It's a rhetorical technique, but it's a particular type of rhetorical technique that has always raised massive red flags for me, regardless of who is using it or for what purpose.

Arrogance

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