[There were a few points raised, or hinted at, in planning-ru@, which I think may demand a wider audience. Below comes the first one.] It was observed that the Software Freedom Day is more than just occasionally called “Free Software Day” in Russian — a difference that's a bit hard to notice given that it's only a matter of suffix (or, rather, ending) there: “День /свободы/ программного обеспечения” (Software Freedom) vs. “День /свободного/ программного обеспечения” (Free Software.) It doesn't help that the “Free Software” variant of the name is used by certain teams (more or less consistently) since at least 2007 [1] (though “Software Freedom” appears since 2004 [2].) [1] http://www.linux.org.ru/news/opensource/2135552 [2] http://www.linux.org.ru/news/sco/642283#comment-642440 The proponents of the “Free Software” variant argue that “software freedom” is as much a nonsensical notion as “software slavery” is. It's said that it's the /user/ freedom that's at stake; and as it's Free Software that frees the user, the Day should be called after it. It should be mentioned that French and Ukrainian Wikipedia articles for SFD are seemingly titled after “Free Software”, too (though I'm by no means fluent in these languages): http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Journée_du_logiciel_libre http://uk.wikipedia.org/wiki/День_Вільного_ПЗ Any comments? TIA. -- FSF associate member #7257 http://sf-day.org/
Hi, On Thu, Aug 9, 2012 at 6:09 PM, Ivan Shmakov <oneingray@gmail.com> wrote: [...]
"День /свободы/ программного обеспечения" (Software Freedom)
vs.
"День /свободного/ программного обеспечения" (Free Software.)
[...]
[1] http://www.linux.org.ru/news/opensource/2135552 [2] http://www.linux.org.ru/news/sco/642283#comment-642440
The proponents of the "Free Software" variant argue that "software freedom" is as much a nonsensical notion as "software slavery" is.
Well, this e-mail points to some links, but fails to substantiate this sentence pointing to such a link. I've never heard of this, but I'm 100% positive that "free software" as it is used - even in their name! - by "Free Software Foundation" isn't to represent a "nonsensical notion", but to talk about software that is free. *Free Software* is "software in freedom", "software freedom" is the whole concept - of which every free software is a practical example. More about what is free software here: http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html Note: while this is the case at least in English and in Portuguese, there might be a linguistic "trick" regarding this words in Russian, even if I don't think so. Best regards, -- Marcos Marado ANSOL.org
Marcos Marado <mindboosternoori@gmail.com> writes: On Thu, Aug 9, 2012 at 6:09 PM, Ivan Shmakov <oneingray@gmail.com> wrote:
“День /свободы/ программного обеспечения” (Software Freedom)
vs.
“День /свободного/ программного обеспечения” (Free Software.)
[1] http://www.linux.org.ru/news/opensource/2135552 [2] http://www.linux.org.ru/news/sco/642283#comment-642440
The proponents of the “Free Software” variant argue that “software freedom” is as much a nonsensical notion as “software slavery” is.
Well, this e-mail points to some links, but fails to substantiate this sentence pointing to such a link.
There was a discussion in planning-ru@, started with [3] (“… software cannot be neither free nor enslaved — simply because software lacks freedom of will and possibility of a choice…”; translation's mine.) The concerns were also raised in the comments to [4] (“… Personally, I'm against the freedom for tools, be it an axe, a hammer, or a program…”; translation's mine.) [3] http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.user-groups.foss.sfd.planning.ru/65 [4] http://linux.org.ru/news/conference/7969998
I've never heard of this, but I'm 100% positive that “free software” as it is used — even in their name! — by “Free Software Foundation” isn't to represent a “nonsensical notion”, but to talk about software that is free. *Free Software* is “software in freedom”, “software freedom” is the whole concept — of which every free software is a practical example.
The issue at hand is that, somehow, there're those who reject “software freedom” (as a particular wording), while still accepting “free software.” Please also note that I'm not taking sides on this. I'm fine with either name, and my primary concern is that the use of different names could lead to a Swiftian “Little-Endian” vs. “Big-Endian” conflict of some sort.
More about what is free software here:
Note: while this is the case at least in English and in Portuguese, there might be a linguistic “trick” regarding this words in Russian, even if I don't think so.
Neither do I. Nevertheless, Russian Wiktionary lists “рабство” (“slavery”) as an antonym for “свобода” (“freedom”), while English Wiktionary doesn't seem to do the same. Perhaps, there's indeed something to do with the interlingual differences? -- FSF associate member #7257 http://sf-day.org/
On Friday 10 August 2012 10:32:20 Ivan Shmakov wrote:
Well, this e-mail points to some links, but fails to substantiate
this sentence pointing to such a link.
There was a discussion in planning-ru@, started with [3] (“… software cannot be neither free nor enslaved — simply because software lacks freedom of will and possibility of a choice…”; translation's mine.) The concerns were also raised in the comments to [4] (“… Personally, I'm against the freedom for tools, be it an axe, a hammer, or a program…”; translation's mine.)
[3] http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.user-groups.foss.sfd.planning.ru/65 [4] http://linux.org.ru/news/conference/7969998
Well, once again this might be a linguistic problem (and take into account that even my english is far from perfect, so take my interpretations with a grain of salt). But this seems to me the same argument we've seen about "free information". When you speak about "free information" you aren't implying that "information wants to be free", and, in fact, "information doesn't want to be free, people do". The same applies to free software: software doesn't want to be free, people do. Free software is software that enables *people* to be free, and here you can actually use free vs. enslaved - if you use non-free software, you're getting enslaved. In free software, it isn't the software that is free, it's its users. Pointing once again to http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html : "“Free software” means software that respects users' freedom and community. Roughly, the users have the freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software. With these freedoms, the users (both individually and collectively) control the program and what it does for them." There's actually a Russian translation of that text - http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.ru.html - I'm not sure about its translation quality, but maybe you could take a look and possibly reply to those arguments by pointing to that text. Best regards, -- Marcos Marado ANSOL.org
As already pointed out, there's the Free beer (gratis) vs. Free speech (libre) as a means to distinguish between two common English uses of the word "free". But, it sounds to me as if your language problem might be with the word "software". Again, since I don't know Russian, I fall back to the English word "speech". By the same logic you used, speech can't be "free" or "enslaved" exactly. And we don't usually use the phrase "speech freedom" but instead, refer to "free speech" as "freedom of speech" and refer to individuals as being "free to speak". What about "free trade" and terms that mean unrestricted and / or unencumbered? "Free Software" and "Software Freedom" are expressing what individuals are able to freely do with the materials provided, with the caveat that those freedoms are immutable even though the materials are VERY mutable. So, are there parallel linguistic constructs in Russian that would convey the same ideas? "Free to recode, reuse, etc."?
And in the spirit of the late, great American humorist George Carlin's frequent riffs on "English: it's a silly language", I marvel that "individual freedoms" have nothing in common with the "freedom of individuals". ;-) I'll stop now.
On 08/10/2012 01:09 AM, Ivan Shmakov wrote:
[There were a few points raised, or hinted at, in planning-ru@, which I think may demand a wider audience. Below comes the first one.]
It was observed that the Software Freedom Day is more than just occasionally called “Free Software Day” in Russian — a difference that's a bit hard to notice given that it's only a matter of suffix (or, rather, ending) there:
“День /свободы/ программного обеспечения” (Software Freedom)
vs.
“День /свободного/ программного обеспечения” (Free Software.)
It doesn't help that the “Free Software” variant of the name is used by certain teams (more or less consistently) since at least 2007 [1] (though “Software Freedom” appears since 2004 [2].)
[1] http://www.linux.org.ru/news/opensource/2135552 [2] http://www.linux.org.ru/news/sco/642283#comment-642440
The proponents of the “Free Software” variant argue that “software freedom” is as much a nonsensical notion as “software slavery” is. It's said that it's the /user/ freedom that's at stake; and as it's Free Software that frees the user, the Day should be called after it.
It should be mentioned that French and Ukrainian Wikipedia articles for SFD are seemingly titled after “Free Software”, too (though I'm by no means fluent in these languages):
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Journée_du_logiciel_libre http://uk.wikipedia.org/wiki/День_Вільного_ПЗ
Any comments?
TIA.
Hi! Before this goes any further the name of the day is indeed Software Freedom Day and not Free Software Day as it is a day to promote Free AND OPEN Source Software. Now we (SFI/DFI) will never venture into official translations and let local teams translate the way which makes sense for them and their event. If some prefer to only promote Free Software, so be it. It's a shame they would miss out talking about Firefox for example, which surely is a piece of software some Windows users at their event might have heard of (or event be using without knowing it is Open Source). And this gives me the opportunity to remind that the day is geared toward reaching out to people who are not familiar with Free And Open Source Software. I would keep any similar debate as far away from the event as possible in order to avoid making those potential new user confused and feel FOSS is complicated (and that we don't even agree with each others). In French it's a non issue as there is only "logiciel libre". In English I have always found that the expression Free Software and the word Freedom associated with Software is confusing to people not in the know. I can truly understand why some people had issues selling "Free Software" ("didn't you say it was free?" "ah..."). Besides since I've been living in non-English speaking countries I have always found that people tend to think Open Source is Free Software. So excluding Open Source Sofware would be a very stupid move as we would be denying half of the world (at least) a celebration of the software they love to use and want to share with everyone else. SFI and SFD is an inclusive celebration and should remain that way. I hope I have addressed your questions. Thanks. Fred
participants (4)
-
Frederic Muller - DFI -
Ivan Shmakov -
Kevin Cole -
Marcos Marado