“With the success of GNU/Linux in the hacker community, and
it’s subsequent notice by the mainstream, there has been a rapid
attempt by many businesses to “cash in” on the free (as in beer :()
software phenomenon. This has led to the euphemization of free
as “open source”, and a plethora of so-called open source software
licenses, that are almost, but not quite, as free as the GPL. With
business being what it is, this should come as no surprise.”
“The trouble with many of these open source licenses is that
they tend to be received with less than abundant enthusiasm by
hackers — the very people that business is counting on to debug,
extend, and support, some latest software venture, all for free,
while someone else makes a profit. If that isn’t enough to
discredit any semblance of inherent fairness, many of these
licenses have been denounced as unfair by Richard Stallman,
architect of the GPL. Many heed what he has to say.”