ESR: Terminology Wars: A Web Content Analysis Jul 5, 2004, 22 :00 UTC (19 Talkback[s]) (6487 reads) (Other stories by Eric S. Raymond)
"I collect statistics on the Web usage of the terms 'open source' and 'free software,' and show evidence for the following:
"Among software developers and in the technology trade press, use of the term 'open source' dominates use of the term 'free software' by 95%-5% or more.
"On the general Web, the ratio is 80%-20% or more.
"The gratis/libre ambiguity in the term 'free software' produces about an 80% false-positive rate in Web searches.
"Use of the term 'free software' is in long-term decline, and older or obsolete pages form a larger part of its share than for 'open source.'
"In this paper I take no position on what I believe should be the case or what terminology pepple should use, I simply report what is..."
