Without Free Software, Open Source Would Lose its Meaning

"Matt states in his first paragraph what the key issue is:

"One of the most inspiring things I've witnessed in my 10-plus years in open source is its gradual embrace of pragmatism. By "pragmatism" I don't mean "capitulation," whereby open source comes to look more like the proprietary world it has sought to displace. Rather, I would suggest that the more open source has gone mainstream the more it has learned to make compromises, compromises that make it stronger, not weaker.

"When I interviewed Richard Stallman in 1999 this is what he had to say on this subject:

"The only reason we have a wholly free operating system is because of the movement that said we want an operating system that's wholly free, not 90 percent free."

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