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Is it appropriate for someone to be a mod here when they don't understand open source, and insult users in the community? (programming.dev)

submitted 7 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

52 comments fedilink hide all child comments

https://lemmy.ml/post/13864821

I'd understand if they were a random user, but a mod should already have at least some understanding about a community's topic.

But worse to me are their comments in that post calling the people responding "childish trolls in this community". I do not think that this is appropriate for a moderator.

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (2 children)

https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.en.html

Am I missing something, ~~gnu~~ gpl is a licence, Foss a philosophy, is ~~gnu~~ gpl licence Foss? And if so why are so many people saying charging for software isn't Foss when Richard stalman himself makes the point "This is a matter of freedom, not price, so think of “free speech,” not “free beer.”"

Sorry if I got this wrong I am generally confused by this hole thing.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (2 children)

GNU is not a license, it's a project, one that practically spearheaded the whole FOSS movement back in the 80s. The programs that were part of the GNU project were licenced under the GNU General Public License (GPL), which was originally written by Richard Stallman, and evolved over time to its current version, GPLv3 (now backed by the Free Software Foundation). So the "GPL" is the actual license that can be applied to any program, should the developer choose to do so (so it's not limited just to the GNU project).

All GPL licenced programs are considered to be FOSS. However, FOSS can also imply other licenses such as MIT, LGPL, Apache etc. Most of them are kinda similar, but the way but differ slightly on how permissive/restrictive it is when it comes to modifications and derivatives.

why are some many people saying charging for software isn't Foss when Richard stalman himself makes the point "This is a matter of freedom, not price, so think of “free speech,” not “free beer.”"

As you said, it's not about the price at all, the "free" means freedom. Specifically, the GPL explicitly states that you may charge money for the software. Other free software licences also generally state something similar.

The confusion regarding selling is best explained by the FSF:

Selling a copy of a free program is legitimate, and we encourage it.

However, when people think of “selling software,” they usually imagine doing it the way most companies do it: making the software proprietary rather than free.

So unless you're going to draw distinctions carefully, the way this article does, we suggest it is better to avoid using the term “selling software” and choose some other wording instead. For example, you could say “distributing free software for a fee”—that is unambiguous.

https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/selling.html

Also, just to be clear, opensource =/= FOSS. Opensource just means that the source code is available, FOSS however implies that you're free to modify and redistribute the program (+ some other freedoms/restrictions as per the specific license used).

[–] [email protected] 1 points 7 months ago

Thank you for clearing this up, the comments in the linked post where having me question myself

[–] [email protected] 1 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Opensource just means that the source code is available, FOSS however implies that you’re free to modify and redistribute the program

Incorrect. "Open Source" also means that you are free to modify and redistribute the software.

If the source code is merely available but not free to modify and/or redistribute, then it is called source-available software.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Incorrect. "Open Source" also means that you are free to modify and redistribute the software.

Not necessarily true - that right to modify/redistribute depends on the exact license being applied. For example, the Open Watcom Public License claims to be an "open source" license, but it actually doesn't allow making modifications. This is also why we specifically have the terms "free software" or "FOSS" which imply they you are indeed allowed to modify and redistribute.

I would recommend reading this: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.en.html

[–] [email protected] 1 points 7 months ago

Not necessarily true - that right to modify/redistribute depends on the exact license being applied.

If you don't have the right to modify and redistribute it (and to do so commercially) then it does not meet the definitions of free software or open source.

For example, the Open Watcom Public License claims to be an “open source” license, but it actually doesn’t allow making modifications.

The Sybase Open Watcom Public License does allow making modifications, and distributing modified versions. The reason why the FSF has not approved it is that it requires you to publish source code even if you only wanted to run your modified version yourself and didn't actually want to distribute anything to anyone. (The Watcom license is one of the few licenses which is approved by OSI but not FSF. You can see the other licenses which are approved by one but not the other by sorting this table.)

The FSF's own AGPL license is somewhat similar, but it only imposes the requirement if you run the software for someone else over a network. (Neither of these requirements are likely to be enforceable by copyright law, as I explained in my comment about the AGPL in the thread which this thread is about...)

This is also why we specifically have the terms “free software” or “FOSS” which imply they you are indeed allowed to modify and redistribute.

I would recommend reading this: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.en.html

I would recommend that you re-read that, because it actually explains that the two terms refer to essentially the same category of software licenses (while it advocates for using the term free software to emphasize the philosophical aspects of those licenses).

[–] [email protected] 4 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (1 children)

There's nothing wrong with charging for your FOSS. You can't, however, force anybody who gets it from you to also charge the people they end up distributing it to like some sort of Ponzi scheme. The transactional relationship between you, your software, and another party ends at the first level.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 7 months ago

This is what I had thought, where I was confused was the vast amount of comments in the linked post stating flatly that charging for software went against foss