floss-and-foss.html (6027B)
1 <!--#include virtual="/server/header.html" --> 2 <!-- Parent-Version: 1.96 --> 3 <!-- This page is derived from /server/standards/boilerplate.html --> 4 <!--#set var="TAGS" value="essays aboutfs free-open" --> 5 <!--#set var="DISABLE_TOP_ADDENDUM" value="yes" --> 6 <title>FLOSS and FOSS - GNU Project - Free Software Foundation</title> 7 <!--#include virtual="/philosophy/po/floss-and-foss.translist" --> 8 <!--#include virtual="/server/banner.html" --> 9 <!--#include virtual="/philosophy/ph-breadcrumb.html" --> 10 <!--GNUN: OUT-OF-DATE NOTICE--> 11 <!--#include virtual="/server/top-addendum.html" --> 12 <div class="article reduced-width"> 13 <h2>FLOSS and FOSS</h2> 14 15 <address class="byline">by Richard Stallman</address> 16 17 <p>The two political camps in the free software community are the free 18 software movement and open source. The free software movement is a 19 campaign 20 for <a href="/philosophy/free-software-even-more-important.html"> 21 computer users' freedom</a>; we say that a nonfree program is an 22 injustice to its users. The open source camp declines to see the 23 issue as a matter of justice to the users, and bases its arguments on 24 <a href="/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html"> practical 25 benefits only</a>.</p> 26 27 <p>To emphasize that “free software” refers to freedom and 28 not to price, we sometimes write or say “free (libre) 29 software,” adding the French or Spanish word that means free in 30 the sense of freedom. In some contexts, it works to use just 31 “libre software.”</p> 32 33 <p>A researcher studying practices and methods used by developers in 34 the free software community decided that these questions were 35 independent of the developers' political views, so he used the term 36 “FLOSS,” meaning “Free/Libre and Open Source 37 Software,” to explicitly avoid a preference between the two 38 political camps. If you wish to be neutral, this is a good way to do 39 it, since this makes the names of the two camps equally prominent.</p> 40 41 <p>Others use the term “FOSS,” which stands for 42 “Free and Open Source Software.” This is meant to mean the 43 same thing as “FLOSS,” but it is less clear, since it 44 fails to explain that “free” refers to <em>freedom</em>. 45 It also makes “free software” less visible than 46 “open source,” since it presents “open source” 47 prominently but splits “free software” apart.</p> 48 49 <p>“Free and Open Source Software” is misleading in 50 another way: it suggests that “free and open source” names 51 a single point of view, rather than mentioning two different ones. 52 This conceptualization of the field is an obstacle to understanding 53 the fact that free software and open source are different political 54 positions that disagree fundamentally.</p> 55 56 <p>Thus, if you want to be neutral between free software and open 57 source, and clear about them, the way to achieve that is to say 58 “FLOSS,” not “FOSS.”</p> 59 60 <p>We in the free software movement don't use either of these terms, 61 because we don't want to be neutral on the political question. We 62 stand for freedom, and we show it every time—by saying 63 “free” and “libre”—or “free 64 (libre).”</p> 65 </div> 66 67 </div><!-- for id="content", starts in the include above --> 68 <!--#include virtual="/server/footer.html" --> 69 <div id="footer" role="contentinfo"> 70 <div class="unprintable"> 71 72 <p>Please send general FSF & GNU inquiries to 73 <a href="mailto:gnu@gnu.org"><gnu@gnu.org></a>. 74 There are also <a href="/contact/">other ways to contact</a> 75 the FSF. Broken links and other corrections or suggestions can be sent 76 to <a href="mailto:webmasters@gnu.org"><webmasters@gnu.org></a>.</p> 77 78 <p><!-- TRANSLATORS: Ignore the original text in this paragraph, 79 replace it with the translation of these two: 80 81 We work hard and do our best to provide accurate, good quality 82 translations. However, we are not exempt from imperfection. 83 Please send your comments and general suggestions in this regard 84 to <a href="mailto:web-translators@gnu.org"> 85 <web-translators@gnu.org></a>.</p> 86 87 <p>For information on coordinating and contributing translations of 88 our web pages, see <a 89 href="/server/standards/README.translations.html">Translations 90 README</a>. --> 91 92 Please see the <a 93 href="/server/standards/README.translations.html">Translations 94 README</a> for information on coordinating and contributing translations 95 of this article.</p> 96 </div> 97 98 <!-- Regarding copyright, in general, standalone pages (as opposed to 99 files generated as part of manuals) on the GNU web server should 100 be under CC BY-ND 4.0. Please do NOT change or remove this 101 without talking with the webmasters or licensing team first. 102 Please make sure the copyright date is consistent with the 103 document. For web pages, it is ok to list just the latest year the 104 document was modified, or published. 105 106 If you wish to list earlier years, that is ok too. 107 Either "2001, 2002, 2003" or "2001-2003" are ok for specifying 108 years, as long as each year in the range is in fact a copyrightable 109 year, i.e., a year in which the document was published (including 110 being publicly visible on the web or in a revision control system). 111 112 There is more detail about copyright years in the GNU Maintainers 113 Information document, www.gnu.org/prep/maintain. --> 114 115 <p>Copyright © 2013, 2015, 2016, 2021 Richard Stallman</p> 116 117 <p>This page is licensed under a <a rel="license" 118 href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">Creative 119 Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License</a>.</p> 120 121 <!--#include virtual="/server/bottom-notes.html" --> 122 123 <p class="unprintable">Updated: 124 <!-- timestamp start --> 125 $Date: 2021/09/11 09:37:22 $ 126 <!-- timestamp end --> 127 </p> 128 </div> 129 </div><!-- for class="inner", starts in the banner include --> 130 </body> 131 </html>