Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
bts@alum.mit.edu (Brian T. Sniffen) a tapoté :
> Carl Witty <cwitty@newtonlabs.com> writes:
>
> >> "Software" is not a controversial word in English (roughly inverse of
> >> "hardware" in one sense). Some people advocate a bizarre definition of
> >> it in order to further their agenda. If you're going to define common
> >> words just because someone objects to the normal meaning being used,
> >> you'll get some bozo that objects to the word "social" and claims it
> >> only applies to the welfare state. That's clearly ungood.
> >
> > "Software" is a controversial word in English. In an informal survey,
> > two out of two people surveyed (my officemate and myself) agreed that we
> > would not, by default, call an arbitrary collection of bits "software"
> > (the particular example in the survey question was "an MP3 file"); but
> > that we would agree to use a different definition of software than the
> > one we are accustomed to in certain contexts.
>
> But your question, "Is this MP3 file software?" is itself biased.
> Consider the alternatives:
>
> 1. "Is this MP3 file software or hardware?"
This is one is definitely worse: you explicitely point out which
definition of the word software you think is the most usual, by asking
to refer to this definition.
--
Mathieu Roy
Homepage:
http://yeupou.coleumes.org
Not a native english speaker:
http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
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