Ok, this one’s baffling, especially learning at the end that FLOSS is bad because it’s meant to de-emphasize the “libre” part.

All OSS software is inherently without cost, that seems unquestioned here. So free only ever means one thing to non-laypeople, in this context. So isn’t FOSS already the neutral middle ground between OSS and FS??

Regardless, I’m struggling to conceive of how a piece of software could be OS but not F. I guess if it’s, like, surveillance software known to be used by governments…? Maybe OSS that is paradoxically restrictively licensed, threatening any forks or unauthorized compilations with legal action? That seems like a terribly naive proposition, but I’m sure it’s been floated by at least one MBA…

In other words: you can argue all day about the justifications for OS’ing your S being more related to removing cost barriers or to sharing control, but in the end, you clearly have to do both. Making “F[L]OSS” redundant at best, confusing at worst!

Surely I’m missing something, bc I know this has been litigated for many thousands of hours both pre- and post-Eternal September. But rn it just comes across as baseless pedantry

Initially there was no Open Source or OSS. There was Free Software. This started a long time ago with things like GNU and later Linux, BSD etc. Richard Stallman codified what it meant for software to be Free. Specifically, it had nothing to do with cost. The "free" was free as in freedom, not free as in beer. Unfortunately English uses one word for both senses. Romance languages like Spanish still retain both: gratis means free as in beer and libre means free as in freedom.

Open Source was a later "rebranding" of free software by some people who fell out with Stallman and wanted to emphasise more the practical advantages over the ethical ones. Stallman wasn't happy because he felt (and still feels) the most important thing is that each person should be able to do computing freely.

Anyway, long story short, free software is nothing to do with cost. Horrible acronyms like "FLOSS" are to try to make everyone happy.

> All OSS software is inherently without cost, that seems unquestioned here.

I don't think so, you could charge money for FOSS (like charging for a built binary but having the source be FOSS) and it'll still be as much FOSS as any other FOSS out there. It isn't very common to do so, but there isn't any inherently wrong or incorrect with charging for FOSS.

How could you charge for a binary if people can just compile it on their own...? Honor system? I guess you could make it inconvenient to compile, but then is that really OSS?

It's interesting to reflect on what you're saying: you'd pay someone who forces you to, but not otherwise. So if someone built a house for you you'd only pay them if they threatened to come and burn it down, or they kept some way to remotely lock you out of it?

Hmmm. Well it’s software/IP, so as always I think we need to stay away from “would you download a car” talk.

With that in mind, the proposition is basically just the honor system. Which maybe works a little sometimes, among professionals? I paid for SublimeText to support them, for example. But WinRar is a very compelling counter example.

It feels like publishing a pdf of a book but with a big red “don’t click this until you’ve Venmo’d me $5!” above it. Regardless of what I individually would do, that’s just kinda… goofy?

> How could you charge for a binary if people can just compile it on their own...?

You don't make a binary publicly available, then you put the binary behind a paywall.

Some examples:

- Ardour - Lets you pull down the source and compile locally for free, or you pay to use their compiled binaries. Author/creator of Ardour hangs around on HN, maybe they could share their experience if they see this.

- Radium - Another DAW like Ardour, does it the same way.

- Fritzing - Designer for PCBs, same approach, pay for the binaries if you'd like, but free to compile from source if you can

I'm sure there are many more examples out there, but these are the ones I thought about when I wrote my previous comment.