Via https://freedom-to-tinker.com/blog/randomwalker/ethical-dilemmas-faced-by-software-engineers-a-reque... a course module on
Pick one of
a) Failure of the module makers
b) Failure of the free software movement to convince anyone outside it that software freedom is an important ethical matter
c) Even free software advocates would agree software freedom not an appropriate topic for a module on software engineering ethics
An Introduction to Software Engineering Ethics
I only skimmed, but pretty sure freedom of any sort is not covered at all.Pick one of
a) Failure of the module makers
b) Failure of the free software movement to convince anyone outside it that software freedom is an important ethical matter
c) Even free software advocates would agree software freedom not an appropriate topic for a module on software engineering ethics
Distributing text in PDF format (“we've formatted this into these sized pages so it won't fit on your screen, and you need clunky software to read it) is deeply offensive as far as I'm concerned, so I'll give the module makers a fail for that.
I consider Free Software philosophy at its infancy, regardless of the @FSF's efforts and @rms going around speaking about it. Once we have the topic of Free Software being taught at universities, then I'd accept we'd have done our jobs in the Free Software movement to educate about it as ethics. The subject matter of ethics may also be considered at its infancy as well, so we can't be too hard on ourselves. Lets fix this. What page do we really have truly dedicated about breaking down the philosophical aspects of *why* Free Software is an ethical attribute ? Most material I have seen are about licensing and rights but nothing to help those on the other side of things. Finger pointing at Microsoft or Apple won't help either. IMHO we need something like free-software-philosophy.org or something similar whereby the actual real philosophy is argued and paralleled with other historical ethical philosophy. What real *good* objective philosophical counters on the philosophy of the free software do we have other than Steve Ballmer ramblings on calling it a cancer? Is the @FSF willing to document objective counters? Would doing that parallel its mission? IMHO one reasonable counter is the consideration for exactly what type of software must be free software. One can argue games don't have to be free software, for example, I however obviously see gains on even making 3D engines open -- see ID's efforts on the Quake engine, but the philosophical argument of software for games having to be free software due to morality is likely weak. I consider this an objective counter. We need these as part of the education.
Luis R. Rodriguez at 2013-08-21T15:29:02Z
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