On Mon, Jan 21, 2008 at 01:06:31PM +0100, Andrew Savory wrote: > Accounting is the only one for which there are no "good enough" > equivalents.
I would argue that the lack of CMYK support in GIMP along with a few other issues prevent GNU/Linux being used for high end design work. > "Foundations solidly in non-free" is a bit of an exaggeration when it is > built on top of Darwin, I think. I was refering the deep rooted Apple philosophy more than anything. > This is the problem that an awful lot of FLOSS advocates suffer from: the > inability to see that the "all or nothing" zealot approach doesn't tend to > work very well in some circles. I wouldn't consider it zealotry, more "leading by example." > My presentations have become significantly better since I opted to use what > I consider to be the best presentation software out there: Apple's Keynote. > Therefore my effectiveness at describing the benefits of FLOSS at a senior > level has increased. If I was attending one of your presentations my first question to you would be "if this FLOSS thing is so great, why are you using so called 'non-free' software to deliver this presentation. I get the impression that FLOSS may be good in theory, but simply isn't ready for the mainstream." and I suspect that anyone thinking straight would be thinking the same thing. How would you answer? > Writing presentations is one. Email (I fought for years with mutt, evolution > etc. before finally accepting mail.app is better for *me*). Code (when I get > the chance) is done in a proprietary text editor that I find *I* am > significantly more productive in (yes, I've tried all the others for a long > time). I agree with your points, things like this are largely down to personal preference... but this is besides the point, because I was listening right up until the point you said... > Conservatively, they give me a 10x boost on productivity. I call BS. So where you might spend 1 hour reading and replying to email in the morning I must spend 10 hours, presumably in an uphill battle against all the horrible, ghastly things mutt does wrong. > But more than that - do we really live in a world where proprietary software > must not exist? Isn't the freedom to be able to write and license software > however you like and to choose whichever software you want to use just as > important as the four freedoms? No, absolutely not. You are arguing for the freedom to restrict freedoms, which is patently absurd. > That's the message I'm getting here. Great, that's the whole point. > > I think the "ethical" argument is a great way to upset people and > > > harm the adoption of FLOSS. > > > > Drop the OS bit from the middle and what you have is a socio-political > > movement centered around the very concept of computing ethics. It > > sounds to me like you, personally, should be using the term OSS > > because this statement is clearly contradictory. > > Sorry, can't parse that ... can you restate? You were claiming that the "ethical" argument is a great way to upset people and harm the adoption of FLOSS. I was pointing out that the free software movement is centered around the very concept of computing ethics and hence your statment is entirely contradictory. -- Noah Slater <http://bytesexual.org/> "Creativity can be a social contribution, but only in so far as society is free to use the results." - R. Stallman _______________________________________________ Fsfe-uk mailing list Fsfe-uk@gnu.org http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/fsfe-uk
