Fedora Freedom and linux-libre

[Andrew Haley]

Chris Chabot wrote:

> Now i don't mean to interrupt this wonderful meeting of the minds,
> but i am wondering why mail box has been overflowing with an
> seemingly endless discussion between only, what, 3 or 4 people?
>
> In this open source world where attention and focus is our capital,
> do we really all need to be enlightened analogies that seem to
> frequently involve guns, poisons and other such very colorful
> statements.. to a casual observer it would seem it won't be long
> until we can evoke Godwin's law.
>
> I have to admit i did scan through today's and yesterday's emails
> and found very little that really related to fedora, even though the
> subject of the email and the mailing list would imply this should
> somehow be fedora related? Since this seems to now only involve a
> very few, but very vocal, people maybe you can take it off list and
> report back anything fedora related that may or may not come out of
> it?

I have to disagree with you here.  Although this discussion is between
only a few people, it is relevant and important to Fedora.  The
question of where Fedora stands with respect to the inclusion of
unfree software is of key importance; indeed, I might be convinced
that nothing is more important.  Unlike discussion of particular
packages and particular technical issues, this affects everyone and
goes to the core of why I'm here, and why Fedora is worth the effort.

I agree that analogies with guns and death don't help anyone, though.

Andrew.