Now this is a point of view of what is know as 'Free Software activists'. People who beleive that there is a moral need for software being free. That is software that can be used for any purpose, modified, redistributed and have the source aviable with only the minimal restrictions.
You have people who want to say it's 'socialism' or 'capitolism' or 'communism'. But having it labelled as a *-ism clouds the issue.
So if your curious here is a speech given by Eben Moglin, which is cheif legal counsol behind the GPL and I think for the FSF. He is a professor of Law history so he always paints in a picture as part of natural progression of history. It was given at Plone conference.. (plone is a python/zope-based content management system for websites.)
As far as these sorts of things go he is a entertaining speaker.
http://www.archive.org/details/eben-moglen-oct-2006
He does a pretty good job, and that way you can decide for yourself what sort of -ism is Free software and understand the point behind what people are trying to do with the GPL license.
Also keep in mind that this is probably not a majority viewpoint behind Linux developers, especially with the kernel itself, which tend to concentrate more on the practical concerns. This is the sort of thing you get from the GNU/FSF/RMS folks.
It's kinda interesting. He points out stuff like the very first item to ever be mass produced (before weapons, food, clothing, etc) for any reason in human history is books, and for very good reason.
You have people who want to say it's 'socialism' or 'capitolism' or 'communism'. But having it labelled as a *-ism clouds the issue.
So if your curious here is a speech given by Eben Moglin, which is cheif legal counsol behind the GPL and I think for the FSF. He is a professor of Law history so he always paints in a picture as part of natural progression of history. It was given at Plone conference.. (plone is a python/zope-based content management system for websites.)
As far as these sorts of things go he is a entertaining speaker.
http://www.archive.org/details/eben-moglen-oct-2006
He does a pretty good job, and that way you can decide for yourself what sort of -ism is Free software and understand the point behind what people are trying to do with the GPL license.
Also keep in mind that this is probably not a majority viewpoint behind Linux developers, especially with the kernel itself, which tend to concentrate more on the practical concerns. This is the sort of thing you get from the GNU/FSF/RMS folks.
It's kinda interesting. He points out stuff like the very first item to ever be mass produced (before weapons, food, clothing, etc) for any reason in human history is books, and for very good reason.
