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Comment by sceptic123 | Hacker News Reader

I mean, <edit: previous poster is> saying it's not free software if you don't have rights to modify and redistribute

Free as in beer, as in the software is free if you are giving it away.

> I think new definitions should have new terms.

The point of the article is that we already have terms that sound like they fit. You're saying you don't agree with that as new definition and the article is saying they don't agree with your more strict definition.

Isn't that the way with everything when there's a difference of opinion on the internet. The ones that have the most funding/largest platform end up winning the argument.

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The article is deliberately ignoring the history of software, which in the 90's gave a very clear definition of "open source" by the OSI as a synonym of "free software", which also historically means the four freedoms defined by Richard Stallman.

You may want to ignore what words have come to mean and try to derive a literal meaning from their constituent words, but then you need to fight established common use.

Maybe it's not deliberate, maybe they are just unaware, the 90's is a long time ago now.

It feels like OSI and Open Source advocates spend a lot of time and effort trying to fight people from using "open source" and "free software" in their literal meanings rather than the other way round. The established common use is only really within the communities that use them.

> Maybe it's not deliberate, maybe they are just unaware, the 90's is a long time ago now.

The history is much discussed. This ignorance would be fixed by a Wikipedia article. And I doubt an open source developer with forceful unconventional opinions about the definitions of open source and FOSS never saw FSF or OSI mentioned.

> The established common use is only really within the communities that use them.

This is tautological. Terms are used in the communities which use them.

The article was directed to the community which uses terms like open source and FOSS. I am confident my comments took less time to write than the article.

> Isn't that the way with everything when there's a difference of opinion on the internet. The ones that have the most funding/largest platform end up winning the argument.

No. Most attempts to change the definition of open source come from come from companies attempting to profit from the change. Most resistance comes from individuals protecting a gift economy.

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