riftyful said:
> But I don't mean to martinet, just making sure this is a loose comparison.
It is.
But regarding being able to move to freedom, oftentimes slaves could
ostensibly move to freedom, e.g. by paying their owners. It just didn't work
like that in practice.
Though not quite to the same level, while you could move away from
proprietary software you depend on, in practice it's not always possible.
More specifically, you're forced to make sacrifices to make yourself free. In
1983, it was literally impossible without using obsolete systems or
developing a whole system by yourself, because there wasn't any libre
software at all. Today, the problem still remains in the sense that a lot of
hardware won't work without proprietary software, and a lot of websites won't
work without proprietary JavaScript. Further, schools are often requiring the
use of proprietary software one way or another. I think you'll agree that
dropping out of college to be free is a huge, unreasonable sacrifice! So is
having to personally replace every proprietary program the university might
require you to use, and make it 100% compatible.
