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Comment by folkrav | Hacker News Reader

This is far from the first time I see this discussion. If anything, it makes me even more heavily dislike the confusion created by using the word "open", which already carries a definition, to describe this concept that's actually more than "open". Free or libre software at least means what it says.

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Right. At this point there's an established playbook:

1. Someone who doesn't understand open source claims that open source means source available

2. Someone who does understand open source points to the OSI definition and points out that availability of source is nowhere near enough

3. Bickering about legal matters as if trademark law is the best way to handle terminology

4. Accusations that it's essentially tyranny for the OSI and FSF to try to establish standard definitions for open source and free software, or for the rest of us to insist upon proper use of these terms

Examples:

• https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25367131

• https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25834067

• https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26079067

• https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27267367

• https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25364878

• https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26017500

• https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31084823

Normal people get really confused by the word "free" to the degree that I think it might actually be worse than "open." Libre is really perfect but no one wants to call it that because it sounds silly.

> Libre is really perfect but no one wants to call it that because it sounds silly.

Maybe I'm biased cause the word exists in French, but I'm not sure how "libre" sounds silly.

We really have to stop letting engineers name things...

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