> I hear you on this. I'm currently working on a writeup about the history of open source and the GPL.
If you're going to write up a history, please use the term "free software". "Open source" didn't exist for a large part of the history of the free software movement (and I would argue that it was a movement to sabotage discussions about freedom).
> The dream of having totally free and open replacements for major tools like Photoshop never really happened. There is a lot of new OSS, but it's all BSDL, Apache, MIT and other license.
It did though. Okay, Photoshop is still not overtaken by GIMP. But we have professional free software video editors, development tools, web and database servers, document writers, etc. These days you can run a modern system entirely in freedom, though of course we would love to make more free software to do things even better.
> I'm not like a hard core Stallman person. I don't run libre-firmware laptops from pre-2008 and I enjoy my Gapps on my phone, but I'm not a big fan of startups/monetization of everything. I think a lot of good ideas are strangled by making them commercially viable.
I'm slowly becoming one, and the main reason why is because I want to work towards the world I want to live in. Sure, lax licensed software is fine to use as a free software advocate. But when I develop free software under a lax license, I'm acting against the free software world I want to live in. By allowing proprietary versions of my software to exist, I am acting against my goals.
I want to live in a world where all of the software I need to use is free. All of the hardware that runs updatable software also must be free. Otherwise, I'm powerless when the developers' company decides to do something immoral. Having code under the GPLv3 protects us from both of these things, and it makes me sad when people use lax licenses for innovative work.
I used to use Photoshop. Most of the killer features are the workflow, which is what GIMP is lacking (GIMP is a bunch of hacked together tools). But that actual toolset is not _that_ complicated if you wanted to pay someone for a year or two to do it.
If you're going to write up a history, please use the term "free software". "Open source" didn't exist for a large part of the history of the free software movement (and I would argue that it was a movement to sabotage discussions about freedom).
> The dream of having totally free and open replacements for major tools like Photoshop never really happened. There is a lot of new OSS, but it's all BSDL, Apache, MIT and other license.
It did though. Okay, Photoshop is still not overtaken by GIMP. But we have professional free software video editors, development tools, web and database servers, document writers, etc. These days you can run a modern system entirely in freedom, though of course we would love to make more free software to do things even better.
> I'm not like a hard core Stallman person. I don't run libre-firmware laptops from pre-2008 and I enjoy my Gapps on my phone, but I'm not a big fan of startups/monetization of everything. I think a lot of good ideas are strangled by making them commercially viable.
I'm slowly becoming one, and the main reason why is because I want to work towards the world I want to live in. Sure, lax licensed software is fine to use as a free software advocate. But when I develop free software under a lax license, I'm acting against the free software world I want to live in. By allowing proprietary versions of my software to exist, I am acting against my goals.
I want to live in a world where all of the software I need to use is free. All of the hardware that runs updatable software also must be free. Otherwise, I'm powerless when the developers' company decides to do something immoral. Having code under the GPLv3 protects us from both of these things, and it makes me sad when people use lax licenses for innovative work.