[Fsuk-manchester] Pragmatism, Freedom and Short-Termism (was: Ubuntu !free)

[Dave Page]

On Fri, May 02, 2008 at 11:59:17AM +0100, Noah Slater wrote:

> This has been raised time and time again and you are not likely to
> make any progress with it. Fundamentally, Canonical values pragmatism
> over freedom and this is reflected in Ubuntu's roadmap time and time
> again.

Just as an aside here, I'm not sure that the "pragmatism vs freedom"
argument is either true or helpful to the free software cause. Assuming
a definition of pragmatism which means "encouraging practical benefits"
then we can all see the practical benefits of free software, in terms of
reliability, security and hackability, as well as the social benefits.

What non-free software sometimes gives you is a short-term advantage at
the expense of problems later on (see security holes in nVidia's binary
drivers and lack of support for cards from which the manufacturer wishes
to force upgrades).

Perhaps Ubuntu's position might better be described as "short-termism vs
freedom" - we wouldn't want to give people the idea that freedom is
impractical, but it is certainly a long, slow fight.

Dave
-- 
Dave Page <address@hidden>
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