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1. Why Open Source Misses the Point of Free Software {#why-open-source-misses-the-point-of-freesoftware .chapter}
====================================================

When we call software “free,” we mean that it respects the users’
essential freedoms: the freedom to run it, to study and change it, and
to redistribute copies with or without changes.[(1)](#FOOT1) This is a
matter of freedom, not price, so think of “free speech,” not “free
beer.”

These freedoms are vitally important. They are essential, not just for
the individual users’ sake, but for society as a whole because they
promote social solidarity—that is, sharing and cooperation. They become
even more important as our culture and life activities are increasingly
digitized. In a world of digital sounds, images, and words, free
software becomes increasingly essential for freedom in general.

Tens of millions of people around the world now use free software; the
public schools of some regions of India and Spain now teach all students
to use the free GNU/Linux operating system.[(2)](#FOOT2) Most of these
users, however, have never heard of the ethical reasons for which we
developed this system and built the free software community, because
nowadays this system and community are more often spoken of as “open
source,” attributing them to a different philosophy in which these
freedoms are hardly mentioned.

@firstcopyingnotice{{@footnoterule @smallskip Copyright © 2007, 2008,
2010, 2012–2015 Richard Stallman\
 {This essay was originally published on <http://gnu.org>, in 2007. This
version is part of @fsfsthreecite}

The free software movement has campaigned for computer users’ freedom
since 1983. In 1984 we launched the development of the free operating
system GNU, so that we could avoid the nonfree operating systems that
deny freedom to their users. During the 1980s, we developed most of the
essential components of the system and designed the GNU General Public
License (GNU GPL) to release them under—a license designed specifically
to protect freedom for all users of a program.

Not all of the users and developers of free software agreed with the
goals of the free software movement. In 1998, a part of the free
software community splintered off and began campaigning in the name of
“open source.” The term was originally proposed to avoid a possible
misunderstanding of the term “free software,” but it soon became
associated with philosophical views quite different from those of the
free software movement.

Some of the supporters of open source considered the term a “marketing
campaign for free software,” which would appeal to business executives
by highlighting the software’s practical benefits, while not raising
issues of right and wrong that they might not like to hear. Other
supporters flatly rejected the free software movement’s ethical and
social values. Whichever their views, when campaigning for open source,
they neither cited nor advocated those values. The term “open source”
quickly became associated with ideas and arguments based only on
practical values, such as making or having powerful, reliable software.
Most of the supporters of open source have come to it since then, and
they make the same association.

The two terms describe almost the same category of software, but they
stand for views based on fundamentally different values. Open source is
a development methodology; free software is a social movement. For the
free software movement, free software is an ethical imperative,
essential respect for the users’ freedom. By contrast, the philosophy of
open source considers issues in terms of how to make software
“better”—in a practical sense only. It says that nonfree software is an
inferior solution to the practical problem at hand. Most discussion of
“open source” pays no attention to right and wrong, only to popularity
and success. [(3)](#FOOT3)

For the free software movement, however, nonfree software is a social
problem, and the solution is to stop using it and move to free software.

“Free software.” “Open source.” If it’s the same software (or nearly
so[(4)](#FOOT4)), does it matter which name you use? Yes, because
different words convey different ideas. While a free program by any
other name would give you the same freedom today, establishing freedom
in a lasting way depends above all on teaching people to value freedom.
If you want to help do this, it is essential to speak of “free
software.”

We in the free software movement don’t think of the open source camp as
an enemy; the enemy is proprietary (nonfree) software. But we want
people to know we stand for freedom, so we do not accept being
mislabeled as open source supporters.

### Practical Differences between Free Software and Open Source {#practical-differences-between-free-software-and-open-source .subheading}

In practice, open source stands for criteria a little weaker than those
of free software. As far as we know, all existing free software would
qualify as open source. Nearly all open source software is free
software, but there are exceptions. First, some open source licenses are
too restrictive, so they do not qualify as free licenses. For example,
“Open Watcom” is nonfree because its license does not allow making a
modified version and using it privately. Fortunately, few programs use
such licenses.

Second, and more important in practice, many products containing
computers check signatures on their executable programs to block users
from installing different executables; only one privileged company can
make executables that can run in the device or can access its full
capabilities. We call these devices “tyrants,” and the practice is
called “tivoization” after the product (Tivo) where we first saw it.
Even if the executable is made from free source code, the users cannot
run modified versions of it, so the executable is nonfree.

The criteria for open source do not recognize this issue; they are
concerned solely with the licensing of the source code. Thus, these
unmodifiable executables, when made from source code such as Linux that
is open source and free, are open source but not free. Many Android
products contain nonfree tivoized executables of Linux.

### Common Misunderstandings of “Free Software” and “Open Source” {#common-misunderstandings-of-free-software-and-open-source .subheading}

The term “free software” is prone to misinterpretation: an unintended
meaning, “software you can get for zero price,” fits the term just as
well as the intended meaning, “software which gives the user certain
freedoms.” We address this problem by publishing the definition of free
software, and by saying “Think of ‘free speech,’ not ‘free beer.’” This
is not a perfect solution; it cannot completely eliminate the problem.
An unambiguous and correct term would be better, if it didn’t present
other problems.

Unfortunately, all the alternatives in English have problems of their
own. We’ve looked at many that people have suggested, but none is so
clearly “right” that switching to it would be a good idea. (For
instance, in some contexts the French and Spanish word “libre” works
well, but people in India do not recognize it at all.) Every proposed
replacement for “free software” has some kind of semantic problem—and
this includes “open source software.”

The official definition of “open source software” (which is published by
the Open Source Initiative and is too long to include here[(5)](#FOOT5))
was derived indirectly from our criteria for free software. It is not
the same; it is a little looser in some respects. Nonetheless, their
definition agrees with our definition in most cases.

However, the obvious meaning for the expression “open source
software”—and the one most people seem to think it means—is “You can
look at the source code.” That criterion is much weaker than the free
software definition, much weaker also than the official definition of
open source. It includes many programs that are neither free nor open
source.

Since that obvious meaning for “open source” is not the meaning that its
advocates intend, the result is that most people misunderstand the term.
According to writer Neal Stephenson, “Linux is ‘open source’ software
meaning, simply that anyone can get copies of its source code
files.”[(6)](#FOOT6) I don’t think he deliberately sought to reject or
dispute the official definition. I think he simply applied the
conventions of the English language to come up with a meaning for the
term. The state of Kansas published a similar definition: “Make use of
open-source software (OSS). OSS is software for which the source code is
freely and publicly available, though the specific licensing agreements
vary as to what one is allowed to do with that code.”[(7)](#FOOT7)

The New York Times ran an article that stretched the meaning of the term
to refer to user beta testing[(8)](#FOOT8)—letting a few users try an
early version and give confidential feedback—which proprietary software
developers have practiced for decades.

The term has even been stretched to include designs for equipment that
are published without a patent.[(9)](#FOOT9) Patent-free equipment
designs can be laudable contributions to society, but the term “source
code” does not pertain to them.

Open source supporters try to deal with this by pointing to their
official definition, but that corrective approach is less effective for
them than it is for us. The term “free software” has two natural
meanings, one of which is the intended meaning, so a person who has
grasped the idea of “free speech, not free beer” will not get it wrong
again. But the term “open source” has only one natural meaning, which is
different from the meaning its supporters intend. So there is no
succinct way to explain and justify its official definition. That makes
for worse confusion.

Another misunderstanding of “open source” is the idea that it means “not
using the GNU GPL.” This tends to accompany another misunderstanding
that “free software” means “GPL-covered software.” These are both
mistaken, since the GNU GPL qualifies as an open source license and most
of the open source licenses qualify as free software licenses. There are
many free software licenses aside from the GNU GPL.[(10)](#FOOT10)

The term “open source” has been further stretched by its application to
other activities, such as government, education, and science, where
there is no such thing as source code, and where criteria for software
licensing are simply not pertinent. The only thing these activities have
in common is that they somehow invite people to participate. They
stretch the term so far that it only means “participatory” or
“transparent”, or less than that. At worst, it has become a vacuous
buzzword.[(11)](#FOOT11)

### Different Values Can Lead to Similar Conclusions…but Not Always {#different-values-can-lead-to-similar-conclusionsbut-notalways .subheading}

Radical groups in the 1960s had a reputation for factionalism: some
organizations split because of disagreements on details of strategy, and
the two daughter groups treated each other as enemies despite having
similar basic goals and values. The right wing made much of this and
used it to criticize the entire left.

Some try to disparage the free software movement by comparing our
disagreement with open source to the disagreements of those radical
groups. They have it backwards. We disagree with the open source camp on
the basic goals and values, but their views and ours lead in many cases
to the same practical behavior—such as developing free software.

As a result, people from the free software movement and the open source
camp often work together on practical projects such as software
development. It is remarkable that such different philosophical views
can so often motivate different people to participate in the same
projects. Nonetheless, there are situations where these fundamentally
different views lead to very different actions.

The idea of open source is that allowing users to change and
redistribute the software will make it more powerful and reliable. But
this is not guaranteed. Developers of proprietary software are not
necessarily incompetent. Sometimes they produce a program that is
powerful and reliable, even though it does not respect the users’
freedom. Free software activists and open source enthusiasts will react
very differently to that.

A pure open source enthusiast, one that is not at all influenced by the
ideals of free software, will say, “I am surprised you were able to make
the program work so well without using our development model, but you
did. How can I get a copy?” This attitude will reward schemes that take
away our freedom, leading to its loss.

The free software activist will say, “Your program is very attractive,
but I value my freedom more. So I reject your program. I will get my
work done some other way, and support a project to develop a free
replacement.” If we value our freedom, we can act to maintain and defend
it.

### Powerful, Reliable Software Can Be Bad {#powerful-reliable-software-can-be-bad .subheading}

The idea that we want software to be powerful and reliable comes from
the supposition that the software is designed to serve its users. If it
is powerful and reliable, that means it serves them better.

But software can be said to serve its users only if it respects their
freedom. What if the software is designed to put chains on its users?
Then powerfulness means the chains are more constricting, and
reliability that they are harder to remove. Malicious features, such as
spying on the users, restricting the users, back doors, and imposed
upgrades are common in proprietary software, and some open source
supporters want to implement them in open source programs.

Under pressure from the movie and record companies, software for
individuals to use is increasingly designed specifically to restrict
them. This malicious feature is known as Digital Restrictions Management
(DRM) (see our campaign against it, at
[DefectiveByDesign.org](DefectiveByDesign.org)) and is the antithesis in
spirit of the freedom that free software aims to provide. And not just
in spirit: since the goal of DRM is to trample your freedom, DRM
developers try to make it hard, impossible, or even illegal for you to
change the software that implements the DRM.

Yet some open source supporters have proposed “open source DRM”
software. Their idea is that, by publishing the source code of programs
designed to restrict your access to encrypted media and by allowing
others to change it, they will produce more powerful and reliable
software for restricting users like you. The software would then be
delivered to you in devices that do not allow you to change it.

This software might be open source and use the open source development
model, but it won’t be free software since it won’t respect the freedom
of the users that actually run it. If the open source development model
succeeds in making this software more powerful and reliable for
restricting you, that will make it even worse.

### Fear of Freedom {#fear-of-freedom .subheading}

The main initial motivation of those who split off the open source camp
from the free software movement was that the ethical ideas of “free
software” made some people uneasy. That’s true: raising ethical issues
such as freedom, talking about responsibilities as well as convenience,
is asking people to think about things they might prefer to ignore, such
as whether their conduct is ethical. This can trigger discomfort, and
some people may simply close their minds to it. It does not follow that
we ought to stop talking about these issues.

That is, however, what the leaders of open source decided to do. They
figured that by keeping quiet about ethics and freedom, and talking only
about the immediate practical benefits of certain free software, they
might be able to “sell” the software more effectively to certain users,
especially business.

This approach has proved effective, in its own terms. The rhetoric of
open source has convinced many businesses and individuals to use, and
even develop, free software, which has extended our community—but only
at the superficial, practical level. The philosophy of open source, with
its purely practical values, impedes understanding of the deeper ideas
of free software; it brings many people into our community, but does not
teach them to defend it. That is good, as far as it goes, but it is not
enough to make freedom secure. Attracting users to free software takes
them just part of the way to becoming defenders of their own freedom.

Sooner or later these users will be invited to switch back to
proprietary software for some practical advantage. Countless companies
seek to offer such temptation, some even offering copies gratis. Why
would users decline? Only if they have learned to value the freedom free
software gives them, to value freedom in and of itself rather than the
technical and practical convenience of specific free software. To spread
this idea, we have to talk about freedom. A certain amount of the “keep
quiet” approach to business can be useful for the community, but it is
dangerous if it becomes so common that the love of freedom comes to seem
like an eccentricity.

That dangerous situation is exactly what we have. Most people involved
with free software, especially its distributors, say little about
freedom—usually because they seek to be “more acceptable to business.”
Nearly all GNU/Linux operating system distributions add proprietary
packages to the basic free system, and they invite users to consider
this an advantage rather than a flaw.

Proprietary add-on software and partially nonfree GNU/Linux
distributions find fertile ground because most of our community does not
insist on freedom with its software. This is no coincidence. Most
GNU/Linux users were introduced to the system through “open source”
discussion, which doesn’t say that freedom is a goal. The practices that
don’t uphold freedom and the words that don’t talk about freedom go hand
in hand, each promoting the other. To overcome this tendency, we need
more, not less, talk about freedom.

### “FLOSS” and “FOSS” {#floss-and-foss .subheading}

The terms “FLOSS” and “FOSS”[(12)](#FOOT12) are used to be neutral
between free software and open source. If neutrality is your goal,
“FLOSS” is the better of the two, since it really is neutral. But if you
want to stand up for freedom, using a neutral term isn’t the way.
Standing up for freedom entails showing people your support for freedom.

### Rivals for Mindshare {#rivals-for-mindshare .subheading}

“Free” and “open” are rivals for mindshare. “Free software” and “open
source” are different ideas but, in most people’s way of looking at
software, they compete for the same conceptual slot. When people become
habituated to saying and thinking “open source,” that is an obstacle to
their grasping the free software movement’s philosophy and thinking
about it. If they have already come to associate us and our software
with the word “open,” we may need to shock them intellectually before
they recognize that we stand for something *else.* Any activity that
promotes the word “open” tends to extend the curtain that hides the
ideas of the free software movement.

Thus, free software activists are well advised to decline to work on an
activity that calls itself “open.” Even if the activity is good in and
of itself, each contribution you make does a little harm on the side.
There are plenty of other good activities which call themselves “free”
or “libre.” Each contribution to those projects does a little extra good
on the side. With so many useful projects to choose from, why not choose
one which does extra good?

### Conclusion {#conclusion .subheading}

As the advocates of open source draw new users into our community, we
free software activists must shoulder the task of bringing the issue of
freedom to their attention. We have to say, “It’s free software and it
gives you freedom!”—more and louder than ever. Every time you say “free
software” rather than “open source,” you help our cause.

#### Note {#note .subsubheading}

Karim R. Lakhani and Robert G. Wolf’s paper on the motivation of free
software developers (“Why Hackers Do What They Do: Understanding
Motivation and Effort in Free/Open Source Software Projects,” in
Perspectives on Free and Open Source Software, edited by J. Feller and
others (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2005),
[http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/sloan-school-of-management/15-352-managing-innovation-emerging-trends-spring-2005/readings/\
lakhaniwolf.pdf](http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/sloan-school-of-management/15-352-managing-innovation-emerging-trends-spring-2005/readings/%3Cbr%3Elakhaniwolf.pdf))
says that a considerable fraction are motivated by the view that
software should be free. This is despite the fact that they surveyed the
developers on SourceForge, a site that does not support the view that
this is an ethical issue.

<div class="footnote">

------------------------------------------------------------------------

### Footnotes

### [(1)](#DOCF1)

@raggedright See @pageref{Definition} for the full definition of free
software. @end raggedright

### [(2)](#DOCF2)

@raggedright See “Linux and the GNU System” (@pageref{Linux and GNU})
for more on the operating system. @end raggedright

### [(3)](#DOCF3)

@raggedright For a typical example, see, for instance, Jay Lyman’s
article\
 “Open Source Is Woven Into the Latest, Hottest Trends”\
 (12 September 2013, [http://www.linuxinsider.com/story/\
Open-Source-Is-Woven-Into-the-Latest-Hottest-Trends-78937.html](http://www.linuxinsider.com/story/%3Cbr%3EOpen-Source-Is-Woven-Into-the-Latest-Hottest-Trends-78937.html)).
@end raggedright

### [(4)](#DOCF4)

@raggedright See “How Free Software and Open Source Relate as Categories
of Programs,” at <http://gnu.org/philosophy/free-open-overlap.html>.
@end raggedright

### [(5)](#DOCF5)

@raggedright See <http://opensource.org/docs/osd> for the full
definition. @end raggedright

### [(6)](#DOCF6)

@raggedright Neal Stephenson, In the Beginning...Was the Command Line
(New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1999), p. 94. @end raggedright

### [(7)](#DOCF7)

@raggedright Kansas Statewide Technology Architecture, “Information
Architecture,” version 8.0, 20.3.8, accessed 11 October 2001,
[https://web.archive.org/web/\
20001011193422/http://da.state.ks.us/ITEC/TechArchPt6ver80.pdf](https://web.archive.org/web/%3Cbr%3E20001011193422/http://da.state.ks.us/ITEC/TechArchPt6ver80.pdf).
@end raggedright

### [(8)](#DOCF8)

@raggedright Mary Jane Irwin, “The Brave New World of Open-Source Game
Design,” New York Times, online ed., 7 February 2009,
[http://www.nytimes.com/external/\
gigaom/2009/02/07/07gigaom-the-brave-new-world-of-open-source-game-\
design-37415.html](http://www.nytimes.com/external/%3Cbr%3Egigaom/2009/02/07/07gigaom-the-brave-new-world-of-open-source-game-%3Cbr%3Edesign-37415.html).
@end raggedright

### [(9)](#DOCF9)

@raggedright Karl Mathiesen and Tess Riley, “Texas Teenager Creates \$20
Water Purifier to Tackle Toxic E-Waste Pollution,” 27 August 2015,
[http://theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2015/aug/27/texas-teenager-water-purifier-\
toxic-e-waste-pollution](http://theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2015/aug/27/texas-teenager-water-purifier-%3Cbr%3Etoxic-e-waste-pollution).
@end raggedright

### [(10)](#DOCF10)

@raggedright See “Various Licenses and Comments about Them,” at\
 <http://gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html>. @end raggedright

### [(11)](#DOCF11)

@raggedright Evgeny Morozov, “Open and Closed,” 16 March 2013,
<http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/17/opinion/sunday/morozov-open-and-closed.html>.
@end raggedright

### [(12)](#DOCF12)

@raggedright See both @pageref{FLOSS} and the article “FLOSS and FOSS,”
at <http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/floss-and-foss.html>, for more on this
issue. @end raggedright

</div>

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