
Jason Self at
@mlinksva While having lunch I can't believe I overlooked the biggest reason for not going with FirefoxOS. It's not free software. "What?" you ask? "Look at the license." Yes, the software license is free but Mozilla has found a way to circumvent these four freedoms using trademark law instead. I don't mean the requirement to rename if modified - that's a non-issue, according to the FSF's Free Software Definition. I'm referring to the ability to redistribute exact copies (and I mean exact in every way, exactly as received from Mozilla with exactly zero modifications) at a cost or not cost. (Referring to freedom #2.) I blogged about it some time ago: http://jxself.org/mozilla_trademark.shtml and includes a link to a reply from the FSF. And to also quote from gnu.org, "As explained in our Free Software Definition, all four freedoms must be available on both a commercial and non-commercial basis. Mozilla's trademark policy serves to limit Freedom 2 to gratis distribution only, making the software nonfree." So unless/until Mozilla changes their trademark policy such that exact copies (exact in every way i.e., completely unchanged and identical) can be distributed with or without a charge then freedom #2 is being curtailed and I can't get behind that. Maybe others can but I want all four freedoms available. In full, including freedom #2.
Claes Wallin (韋嘉誠), Mike Linksvayer likes this.