Nope, no shortcut. You're the kind of guy who has to learn all his lessons the hard way, and still not understand them.

You don't understand. In the GNU world, OS X users are second class citizens. Switch to a free OS and you'll have best of breed.

At least you have the possibility of porting GNU apps...

Remap your brain.

Emacs 23 rules! :)

I think I have that impression to, that, at least, Apple at one point seemed to hire a bunch of people out of the free software community. However, there's on thing to remember: A company's behavior depends on the people who control the company, not necessarily the people who work for the company. And the notion that Apple is super-restrictive comes from how fierce they are about intellectual property. Every one of their innovations comes at a cost to everyone else.

Have you seen them contribute to a GPLed project lately? Didn't think so.

You seem to be a smart guy, but please notice the contradiction here as I see it. You say you're in the "pragmatist camp" because you don't think GNU/Linux should use only OSS/free software, yet when you look long term you notice that e.g. the Bitkeeper license was unsuitable for this purpose. Now look at the free software definition. We purists, as you like to call us, believe that all software that doesn't meet these four criteria our unsuitable for our purpose.

As it turns out, purists are just pragmatism who look at everything in terms of the long term. "From the perspective of eternity," as the philosophy Spinoza wrote. But really, this purist/pragmatist thing is a false dichotomy, it's false that purists aren't pragmatists too. People are making out that purists don't get anything done, even though the free software movement itself is an example of just the opposite. That so many self-described pragmatists are using GNU/Linux today just goes to show you that the purists have indeed accomplished a great deal. Why would anyone use a different operating system than the one they are used to if the old one could accomplish the task?

GNU/Linux is about idealism, even if the participants are seeking after different ideals. I even put Linus in this camp, he doesn't care about software freedom, but you know there are other things that he indeed cares a great deal about.

Did you click on that link I gave you of GNU software? Here it is again: http://directory.fsf.org/GNU/. People talk about GNU as being a set of tools or utilties don't seem comprehend what an immense suite of software GNU really is. Even if you don't want to call the operating system "Linux", at least acknowledge that GNU is a very substantial part of what "Linux" is. The GNU project started before Linux even existed, and it's sad that it's success or failure has been ridiculed or trivialized based on their inability to produce a workable kernel. On the contrary, GNU has been enormously successful, but no one really knows what it is.

The GNU project has one aim, and one aim only: an entirely free (as in freedom) operating system. It sounds simple enough, yet the world would be a much different place if that wasn't the case. Because of GNU, I feel that this goal is very much a strong part of what "Linux", the OS if you prefer to call it that, is all about, and the basic model that most distributions follow today. Very few distro's include only free software, but there's a conscious effort to separate out the free components from the proprietary ones, using rules that are very close to the GNU definition for free software. While a lot of the free software projects have become more diffuse in ideology, even a lot of the GNU projects, I think within each project you'll find a substantial contributor that still believes in keeping software free.

I just hope that this is enough to keep GNU/Linux free. So, ultimately, that's why I prefer the term "GNU/Linux". Freedom is that something special that makes it different from the rest of the software world where users are no different than cattle to be milked for profit.

So, I can see myself becoming more accepting of calling the system just "Linux", but not out of apathy, or even a rejection, of what GNU is about. And really, a lot of businesses, and a lot of foolish people wanting to become more "business-friendly", really hate GNU and it's aim because they find it inconvenient. Yes, maybe it is more difficult to extract a profit from your users while treating them fairly. Guess what? Who cares! Not our concern.

GNU/Everything

And as everyone ignores, much of that work is part of the GNU project.

But no one wants to give credit when it's GNU.

You're right.

Just call it GNU to avoid this sort of confusion.

I'm serious. Just remember that GNU was there first, and the whole point of the GNU project was to write a free OS. And most of the software that you use on a GNU/Linux system is GNU software (not Linux software). GNU software, by definition, is software meant to be part of the GNU system. You can't say that about Apache, or Ruby, or X.org. Of course, there are parts of the GNU system that aren't GNU software but are free so that GNU can rely upon it.

Linux without GNU is a sad state, a kernel without an operating system. And GNU without Linux is a system that doesn't run. So GNU/Linux, at least, makes sense. Of course, you *could* run a Linux system without any GNU software at all. If you want to do that, just to make a point, go for it, and that wouldn't be a GNU variant. And you can even have some GNU software on your machine, if the your computer doesn't rely too much on GNU software, just like running gcc windows doesn't make windows a variant of GNU.

But why aren't more people doing that? Where is this mythical Linux operating system, in the wild? It's because Linux is simply an incomplete operating system without GNU. Therefore, GNU/Linux it is.

(Of course, I'm talking about a general purpose operating system. Chrome OS, isn't a GNU system, but I don't see anyone calling Chrome OS "Linux" either, just because it uses the Linux kernel. Nor does anyone call Mac OS X "Darwin". The Palm Pre OS isn't a GNU system, but no one calls it a Linux distribution. An OS is more than just the kernel folks, get over it!)

And yet, that is the proprietary mindset: providers versus consumers, is just another terminology for developers versus users.

The key insight into applications like emacs and firefox, is that users are developers too. You shouldn't distinguish between the two when you consider what "freedom" people should have. Yes, someone should be allowed to write their own extension to firefox, and distribute it widely, if that is their choice. The same is true of emacs. People should be allowed to have their buggy software fixed, even if the provider expresses his right to refuse to do so.

You comment suddenly made me wonder. What if the world was written in brainfuck?

That... That would explain a lot.

Why write a clone when you can have the real thing?

Okay, maybe someday.

Maybe?

For those of you saying that RMS is being hypocritical with the Portable.Net project, you should read this first:

Don't get caught in .NET

With all the RMS-bashing that slashdot has turned into lately, you'd wonder what the point is in providing arguments for your position.

Well, it's obviously a loose term, and I think that's one source of all this debate (people trying to make political points is the other source). But when I read "culture" I think of what is handed down from one generation to another, so when someone says that a certain country is a violent culture, I don't make that evaluation based on whether anything in particular is happening in that country (going to war, terrorist attack), but whether there is a culture, a religion, tradition, or institution, that encourages that. For instance, if there's a culture where it is allowable to stone women I would call that a violent culture. So I don't consider the US a violent culture simply because most forms of violence aren't considered tolerable to us. But that doesn't mean that violent crimes don't occur, but it doesn't represent the culture in my opinion.

Nooooo! It's my own inability to read sarcasm!

Well, it's not all my fault. Because the traditional definition of culture is what is handed down from one generation to another, what you wrote didn't sound absurd enough to ring my sarcasm bell.

Read what you wrote before:

It's a semantic conundrum!