Re: [libreplanet-discuss] Gratis software being released as proprietary

[J.B. Nicholson-Owens]

Pen-Yuan Hsing wrote:
> Anyway, thanks again for your input thus far, from what I've gathered
> here's some points from what you've suggested:
>
> * Free Software is important for science because it can be peer
> reviewed like any other method, and users can trust the methodology
> (i.e. software) you created.

This is important, but not of paramount importance. The most important 
thing is to behave ethically. Treating others ethically when it comes to 
computer software means granting others the freedoms of free software.

> * Free Software development is not uncontrolled. They still get full
> attribution/credit and control the official release. Others just get
> to submit changes or fork their own versions.

I'm not sure what you mean when you say "uncontrolled" here because that 
word doesn't mean a lack of attribution. Democratic development of 
software is naturally controlled by each developer according to their 
own wishes. People are free to associate as they wish to share their 
improvements.

> * Free Software will be of higher quality.

This is not guaranteed, no matter how one defines 'quality'. Free 
software is about securing and protecting the four freedoms for all 
computer users. Thus low quality free software is a more ethical and 
wise choice than high quality non-free software. With enough development 
work the program quality will improve. If one is denied the freedom to 
run, inspect, share, and modify the program only its proprietor 
determines how that program changes. A proprietary developer's values 
may not be the same as yours. Since you're not allowed to know what 
they're doing it follows that you can't trust what they do.

> * Even if they one day want to sell this software, keeping it Free
> will actually make it easier.

I don't know if this is true as this is a highly subjective 
consideration, but one's ability to distribute copies of the software 
for a fee (what I take you mean by selling software) is certainly an 
attractive point in favor of such a sale for me.

> * Free Software will avoid unmaintained software from permanently
> dying.

Sure; anyone can maintain free software on their own. They could choose 
to do so without informing anyone else. Therefore there's no way to know 
if any free program is no longer maintained. The most one can say is if 
a particular developer is no longer maintaining their copy of a free 
program.

> Finally, I believe there will be great value in creating an extensive
> FAQ about Free Software to answer and rebut some of the issues I
> mentioned before.
[...]
> How can we develop something like this?

I recommend the texts on https://gnu.org/philosophy/ and hearing the 
talks on the https://audio-video.gnu.org/ website. These are wonderfully 
informative and deal with the issues you're raising. Keep in mind that 
the free software movement has been around 30 years so there's quite a 
lot of thought covering the topics you're getting into.

I recommend against calling what you're doing "open sourcing" a program 
as that is a reference to a different movement which favors 
developmental methodology over software freedom; in fact, that movement 
does not frame anything they do in terms of ethical action (valuing 
software freedom for its own sake). There's a couple of essays on this 
difference:

The older essay:
https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-software-for-freedom.html

The newer essay:
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html

both from the same repository of essays I pointed to earlier.