Re: Steam for Linux
On Sat, 16 Feb 2013 13:32:39 Markus Koschany wrote:
> I don't believe in good and evil software. I don't think Valve is evil.
> They have finally discovered that Linux can be beneficial for their
> business model and they don't want to lose more money to app stores led
> by Microsoft or Apple, that's all.
It is easy to build business model around proprietary software and services.
However desire for profit is a poor excuse for not being in line with ethics
and free software values. Proprietary software is a waste of time, waste of
effort and stolen man-hours that could be better used otherwise. Word "evil"
is not too strong to describe essentially anti-social process.
> In my book it's better users play non-free games on a free platform
> rather than on Windows or Mac. In this regard i'm completely in line
> with Richard Stallman. [2] The article is quite remarkable because he
> also differentiates between free software and free game art. But i
> strongly disagree with his image of humanity. In an ideal world it
> wouldn't be necessary to hide the fact that non-free software exists,
> people would simply choose the best of all solutions.
Of course everything is better on free platforms. However we should avoid
temptation to promote free platform with non-free. The agenda to use non-free
to promote anything is no different from using non-free for profit.
There is nothing in the article to suggest that you need to hide anything.
The idea is simply to avoid unnecessarily promoting proprietary software.
Often it's just not worth the time to mention inferior proprietary solutions
when you build your services around free software. Why would you mention
something that you wouldn't recommend?
--
Regards,
Dmitry Smirnov
GPG key : 4096R/53968D1B
---
Odious ideas are not entitled to hide from criticism behind the human
shield of their believers' feelings.
-- Richard Stallman
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