Re: [libreoffice-marketing] website terminology for free software

On 4 August 2011 20:57, Florian Effenberger
<floeff@documentfoundation.org>wrote:

> Hello,
>
> I've received a request to change two things on our website, regarding
> terminology:
>
> - Instead of solely using "open source", I was asked that we should also
> use "free software".
>
> - "Linux" should be referred to as "GNU/Linux".

I think it is a bit like acknowledging a trademark. Since a good part of any
Linux distro is software contributed by GNU it seems a simple courtesy to
acknowledge that. It's easy to forget to because the term Linux is in such
common use. However, I have come across people misusing the open source
label because they think it might be a marketing advantage. The Fronter VLE
is an example, trying to compete with Moodle.


> I am, as we have a saying in Germany, rather emotionless on this, but I do
> see that many people have concerns with solely using "open source" or
> leaving out the "GNU" prefix.

I'm not emotional about it, but I can see some practical reasons why we
should not ignore GNU or the freedoms specifically associated with FOSS
rather than just OSS.


> Shall we aim for achieving a good mixture of both terminologies? Anyone has
> severe concerns on that?
>
> Florian
>
> --
> Florian Effenberger <floeff@documentfoundation.org**>
> Steering Committee and Founding Member of The Document Foundation
> Tel: +49 8341 99660880 | Mobile: +49 151 14424108
> Skype: floeff | Twitter/Identi.ca: @floeff
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