Anand Babu wrote:
After the Free Software community succeeded in achieving its mission of a "Complete Free Operating System", the corporates feared running out of proprietary patented software businesses. Their goal was to make money, not Freedom. (Do you think IBM or Novell or RedHat cares for Freedom?). They were not able to demonstrate a money making business model out of Free Software to the VCs and hence the term Open Source (just another new name).
Not plugging for Red Hat here, but AFAIK, unlike any other commercial Linux vendor, they have released each and every bit of software under FSF licences only. Do you think their reluctance to use the term Free software could have more to do with the fact that they felt it confused people? If that is the case, then wouldnt it be in FSF's interest that they work *along* with such entities to see that they give Free software enough emphasis?
Just curious, is calling a piece of software "GNU software" instead of "Free software" diminish the intentions of FSF?
As far as I see, the nomenclature has two purposes: 1. Giving the term Freedom enough credit. 2. Giving FSF enough credit.
The term "Free software" used without widespread and all-pervasive publicity, doesnt give (1) and (2). *Practically* speaking. Even if you say, convince a newspaper about the benefits of Free software, if they go ahead and print a story of Free software with all good intentions, they are bound to be misinterpreted and both (1) and (2) will be missed.
However, emphasising "GNU software" will give FSF enough credit, and concentrating on FSF's image in the public domain, can bring about better recall.
- Sandip