On Thursday 03 April 2008, Chris Walters wrote: > Hal Vaughan wrote: > | On Thursday 03 April 2008, Chris Walters wrote: > |> Ron Johnson wrote: > |> | On 04/03/08 15:39, Ivan Savcic wrote: > |> |> On Thu, Apr 3, 2008 at 10:03 PM, Ron Johnson > |> |> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > |> > |> <snip> > |> > |> |>> That smells of elitism. (Not that I mind...) > |> |> > |> |> No, it's just you can't have all. It's a matter of compromise. > |> |> A "pick two" game, if you wish. And Debian simply can't please > |> |> everyone. The point is, why be bothered by that? Debian set > |> |> it's goals and a corresponding target group was gathered around > |> |> them. And a good one, if you ask me. > |> | > |> | Because it's "elitist" to not want to please all the people all > |> | the time... > |> > |> No, it is elitist to say, "Debian is the only good distribution, > |> the only truly GNU/Linux distribution worth having. All others > |> are for the uneducated masses, who don't care about being right. > |> We are smarter and better than they are, because we choose Debian > |> - all hail the mighty Debian!" > | > | According to St. IGNUcious himself (aka RMS), at a talk I saw him > | give last Thursday, Debian isn't a true GNU/Linux distro because it > | includes non-free software. > | > | I'm not saying I agree with him on this, but it is his opinion that > | there are only a few truly free distros out there. He named them > | and I've forgotten them, but they were not any names I recognized > | or had heard of before and I'm familiar with at least the top 25-50 > | names. > | > | Hal > > You can see them listed on the gnu.org website (the supposedly only > true GNU/Linux distributions). To be on that list, you have to only > offer pure open source GPL'ed software, yada yada. I didn't > recognize any of them, either and I periodically look at DistroWatch > to see if there are any new ones that will allow me to rule the > world! lol.
Yeah, I figured they'd be listed on the GNU website -- that I didn't bother to check and see what the distros were is an indication of just how important I thought it was. While I love open source, and think it offers much closed source does not, I wouldn't go anywhere near as far as RMS would in saying closed source is unethical. I also have to wonder if he would have the same stance if, when he started that crusade, he weren't at a university, but had to make a living and pay the bills and pay for junior's food by programming at a company that made money on software. > Seriously, that is a bit too open source purist for most people, as > most people want choices - I'd bet that the majority of the users of > those other distros (all two of them), download and use non-free > software. I did think of asking him about distros such as Debian and *buntu that don't include non-free but have "unofficial" ways of having it added after the fact, but decided there was no point to it. Hal -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]