Re: [DRAFT] resolving DFSG violations
On Thu, Oct 23 2008, martin f krafft wrote:
> It's all a matter of defining what your priorities are, which brings
> us back to the Social Contract, which says that these include:
>
> - 100% freeness
> - cater best to the interests of our users
Frankly, this mindset infuriates me. It frames the discussion
incorrectly, it implies that freeness and user interest are at
odds. Logically, it aargues that Windows is the best for users, since
it caters to newbies, and is not free- and since the implication is
that freedom can be taken too far, allowing the users freedom to see
movies legally, to use MS office and photoshop legally might triump the
new fangled linux thingy.
No. Freedom is in the long term best interests of the users. We
allow people to use non-free stuff, yes -- but we do so not by
tainting main, but by putting these tools to help the unfortunate
folks who cannot take advantage of a free operating system.
The same goes for people who are complaining oabout advocates
of the social contract and libre software, calling them folks who do
not care for users. I contend that people who stuff main with non-free
stuff _are_ the ones acting against the interests of the suers in the
long term, since freedom is the gift that Debian started out trying to
give users.
Why is not putting non-free firmware in non-free not the right
thing to do? Why is trying to create a 100% free distribution, as our SC
states, supposed ot be the dark side? I hope the few loud voices acting
against the interests of the users by trying to prevent Debian from
providing them a free operating system are indeed few.
manoj
--
The beauty of a pun is in the "Oy!" of the beholder.
Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@debian.org> <http://www.debian.org/~srivasta/>
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