Resisting the binary blob

Posted Nov 16, 2006 14:04 UTC (Thu) by pbardet (guest, #22762)
In reply to: Resisting the binary blob by quaid
Parent article: Resisting the binary blob

"Fedora does not have an easy way to find links to these "solutions" because to provide such links may be against the law in the US." I don't care about the reason. I care about the result: It's not easy for end-users to get things done with such a distribution. I've heard it so many times before "oh it's not our fault, it's the law's fault". "Yes, it has always been true that those who are free/libre have the right to choose to make themselves un-free." I feel perfectly free when using Linux, whether it contains free or non-free components to make it work properly. If you don't, it's your problem, not mine. I make a living of producing proprietary software, and both models can interoperate fine. I have no problem buying a software if it meets my need. The fact is that whether I use free or non-free software, I always feel a little screwed by the fact that if I encounter a problem, I'm always dependant on other parties, whether they're open source or commercial since I don't have the time, or the experience to fix drivers or complicated software. In theory, open source is great since you can fix, but in practice, it's not true for most people using the software since they have no capacity to do so. "I certainly don't have any problems installing a working system only from free software." Good for you. I still haven't found a way to get decent video playback on my MythTV box with Nvidia card with the free driver, while the Nvidia driver worked fine right away, no tweaking, no fussing around. When xpdf, kpdf or any other version craps on a pdf file, I'm glad to have acroread installed on my machine, without getting to hunt down links. The opposite is true also (which sometimes raises questions about acroread, but it's another story). I just had to click on Firefox's (free software) window complaining about missing plugin. Weird that a free software can link to proprietary one, but it would not be OK for the distribution to do it by default.

Resisting the binary blob

Posted Nov 16, 2006 16:31 UTC (Thu) by IkeTo (subscriber, #2122) [Link]

> I don't care about the reason. I care about the result

Fedora is a community project. If you don't care the reason given by a community project, expect them not to care you either.

> I feel perfectly free when using Linux

The point is *not* whether *you* feel it free, but instead whether the community building them feel it free *according to their vision*. Using binary blob is not. End of discussion.

> In theory, open source is great since you can fix, but in practice, it's not true for most people

Open source is great because you can fix, and if you are, like most people, too busy or not qualified enough, you can find others to fix. No such freedom in other platforms. The only one who can fix the software you buy is the vendor selling it. If that single entity doesn't think solving your problem is worth their time, bad luck for you.

> My goal is to see linux succeed against MS and being accepted as a real alternative.

There had been alternatives. DR-DOS, OS/2 and Gems come to mind. Now there is just Linux. Don't you understand that each such attempt is very costly, and don't you know that the one thing that keep MS from using the same tactics against Linux is exactly what you are complaining about, i.e., open source?