Free software: principles, history, and examples

The four freedoms

The Free Software Foundation (FSF), founded in 1985 by Richard Stallman, defines software as Free Software if the following freedoms are granted to the recipient by license:

"Freedom 0": The freedom to run the program the way you want, for any purpose.

"Freedom 1": The freedom to study the operation of the program and adapt it to one's own data processing needs. ^*

"Freedom 2": the freedom to redistribute the program and thereby help one's fellow man.

"Freedom 3: The freedom to improve the program and release those improvements to the public for the benefit of the entire community. ^*

^* For freedoms 1 and 3, access to the source code is a prerequisite, otherwise modifying a program is difficult or impossible.

For more information, see the "Definition" section.

Roots

The Free Software movement emerged from the hacker community. Its vision of freedom manifests itself in the GNU project, which has existed since September 1983, the Free Software and the Open Source movement, which emerged 15 years later. One characteristic of a hacker is not the activity itself, but the way it is done. Someone who develops for a Free Software project, for example, is not automatically a hacker, but the hacker community is closely linked to these movements. Within the early hacker community of the 1960s and 1970s, at US academic institutions such as MIT, Stanford, Berkeley and Carnegie Mellon, it was natural to disclose source code and share one's own software improvements with other programmers. Software was then considered an adjunct to (expensive) hardware. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, IT companies began to commercialize software and keep the source code secret. Richard Stallman is a prominent hacker who made significant contributions to the self-image of academic hacker culture, in part by countering this development.

Until the 1980s, Free Software existed as public domain software. In addition, software was freely distributed as printed source code in computer magazines and books. The hacker community and the intellectual climate around MIT's "AI" computer were the main inspiration for Richard Stallman to create the GNU project. This initially aimed to create a free operating system. This was followed in 1985 by the founding of the FSF, a foundation for the promotion of such projects, which published the first definition of Free Software in February 1986. Where "free" means the freedoms for society that such a licensed product offers.

For more information on this, see the sections "Developments Ahead" and "The Emergence of Free Software".

Delimitation

Freeware

The English word free has two different meanings and in the term freeware, in use since 1982, stands for "free of charge" (more precisely for "free software"); in Free Software it stands for "freedom" (more precisely for "freedom-giving software"). English-speaking activists make the distinction clear with free as in free beer ("free as in free beer") and Free as in Freedom ("free as in freedom").

Freeware does not grant the user the freedoms listed by the Free Software Foundation, but rather those of the individual license agreement with the creator. Therefore, it is considered "non-free" software.

Free software, on the other hand, contains the freedoms mentioned and may or may not be free.

open source

The term Open Source was introduced in 1998 by the founders of the Open Source Initiative (OSI): Eric S. Raymond, Bruce Perens, and Tim O'Reilly. They wanted to focus on the more pragmatic approach of such software, rather than on a (from their point of view) potentially off-putting, morally charged and polarizing free software idea. Open source software is described by them as a beneficial development model, where the question of whether software should be open source is a purely practical and not an ethical question.

With its emphasis on the superiority of the development process, the OSI tends to reflect the view of the developers, while the FSF focuses on the view of the users. The FSF sees non-free software as a social problem. In their eyes, the decision for or against Free Software is therefore primarily an ethical and social decision; the practical benefits are secondary. Since the OSI's presentation does not mention the freedom that Free Software gives to users, the FSF accuses the OSI of distracting from the essential points.

These two different movements with different points of view are united by a common appreciation for open source code and the goal of building a free software ecosystem, resulting in numerous projects in which they collaborate. Alternative compromise names such as "Free and open source software" (FOSS) or "Free/Libre Open Source Software" (FLOSS), which are accepted by supporters of both positions, are intended to emphasise the common ground.

For more information on this, see the section "Comparison with the open source definition".

Semi-free software

Because of concerns about commercial exploitation or amoral use of one's own software, there have been and still are efforts not to grant all freedoms from the definition of free software in its license without restriction. If the freedoms listed by the FSF are reduced by the commercial redistribution (but the other freedoms remain unchanged), this was called semi-free software by the FSF until 2011.

Since 2012, the FSF no longer makes this distinction and counts software with such adapted licenses as "non-free" software.

Non-free software (proprietary)

If one or more conditions of the freedoms listed by the FSF are not met, the software is said to be proprietary or "non-free" (in the sense of lacking freedoms).

Free hardware

Free hardware (also referred to as open hardware or open source hardware) is close to the free software and open source movement or goes back to it. This is hardware that is manufactured according to free construction plans.

The earliest known publication of the definition, dated February 1986, is from the (now discontinued) "GNU's Bulletin Publication" of the FSF. The source for this document can be found in the philosophy section of the GNU Project website. The definition initially referred to two points:

Quote: "The word 'free' in our name does not refer to price; it refers to freedom.

·         First the freedom to copy a program and redistribute it to your neighbors, so that they can use it as well as you.

·         Second, the freedom to change a program, so that you can control it instead of it controlling you; for this, the source code must be made available to you."

In German: "The word 'free' in our name does not refer to price; it refers to freedom.

·         First, the freedom to copy a program and give it to your neighbors so that they can use it as well as you.

·         Second, the freedom to modify a program so that you control the program and not the program controls you; for this purpose, the source code must be made available to you."

- FSF, 1986

In 1996, Free Software was defined on the gnu.org website by referring to the "three levels of freedom" and explicitly adding that one must also have the freedom to study the software. This can also be read out in the older two-point definition as part of the freedom to be able to change the program, but is not so clearly emphasized there. Later Stallman avoided the word "level" because one needs all freedoms and the word for it is somewhat misleading.

Finally, a freedom was added that explicitly says that users should be able to run the program as they wish, for any purpose. The existing freedoms were already numbered from one to three, but this freedom should come before the others, so it was added as "freedom 0".

The modern definition defines Free Software by the four freedoms already listed above. In summary, it defines Free Software as software that guarantees end users the freedoms to use, review/study, share, and modify the software.

Since April 2008, the definition has been published in 39 languages on the FSF website. The FSF also publishes on its website a list of licenses that meet the requirements of this definition.

Further Definitions of Free Software

In July 1997 Bruce Perens published the Debian Free Software Guidelines.

Comparison with the open source definition

The differences to free software have already been clarified above in the section on differentiation from open source software. In contrast, there are also many similarities. For example, the "Debian Free Software Guidelines" was used by the Open Source Initiative (OSI) under the name "Open Source Definition"; the only change is the replacement of the term "Free Software" by "Open Source Software". The FSF commented as follows:

Quote: "The term open source software is used by some to mean more or less the same category as free software. It is not exactly the same software category: some licenses have been accepted [by the OSI] that we consider too restrictive, and there are Free Software licenses that have not been accepted [by the OSI]. However, the differences in the extension of the category are small:

all free software is publicly available source code and all open source software is nearly free. “

- FSF