Thanks for long post, thoughtful and I only have a reflection left: >> Okay. But given a situation when someone comes to you with a hardware >> component that requires non-free software to work, and asks you to >> install Debian on it, would you resolve that by > >> 1) install the free Debian system on it and provide them with the >> documentation and binaries how to install the non-free software >> required after they made their own informed decision > >> or > >> 2) install the Debian system including the non-free work on it and >> provide them with documentation explaining what happened > >> ? > >> I take it yours and Steve's proposals is 2) while mine is 1). > > Correct. Wonderful -- it is good that I am able to finally express your view in a way that you actually agree with. >> And, yes, approach 1) may result in the possibility that you have to say >> "sorry, I can't install Debian on your hardware, and here is why". We >> say the same when someone comes with an old 8086 processor or a quantum >> computer prototype too, too broaden the view a bit. > > Right, but in that case you would say "no one has written the code to make > this work." In the case of 1 above, honestly the way I would read that is > that you are saying "the software to make this computer work exists, but > it is a politically incorrect thoughtcrime and therefore I am not allowed > to touch it because it would violate my purity," something that I would > find INTENSELY off-putting. This is in part for personal reasons due to > past experiences with religious cult behavior, which leaves me with a > deep-seated flinch reaction to things that feel like purity culture. Sure, although I would settle with: "no one has written the free code to make this work" and point at the DFSG, the non-free code that exists and even explain how to use that non-free code, and the problems and consequences of doing that. I think precisely that has been the Debian way, and believe it is a successful recipe. It is a way that I practice myself, for example I got non-free GPS code to work on a free Android-clone: https://blog.josefsson.org/2017/03/04/gps-on-replicant-6/ I think this is also the traditional FSF approach: develop free software on non-free systems (SunOS etc) and acknowledged that supporting free software on non-free environments is useful and important -- but not as useful and important as supporting free software on free environments, when that exists. I agree purity leads to cults and problems. My view of this situation is that the Debian project is climbing up the stairs of the pragmatists' ivory tower to the point where it suffers from the ills of purism: by forbidding the free installer, the pragmatist becomes the mirror image of a purist that wants to forbid everything that doesn't comply with its own ideal. In my mind, the pragmatic approch is to publish both the free and non-free installer. /Simon
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