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From: Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid>
Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.advocacy
Subject: Re: Corporate Conspiracy Open-Source Theory
Date: Thu, 3 Jul 2025 03:52:04 -0000 (UTC)
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On Wed, 2 Jul 2025 11:35:21 -0000 (UTC), Borax Man wrote:

> "Cui bono?" presumes that other people are motivated by the same things
> you are.  Not everythign is about money, not when ideology is involved.

You really think amoral megacorporates are motivated by anything other 
than money? What agenda do you think they have? Are they just secretly 
wishing for the ordinary public to set up fan clubs in their honour? Run 
screaming after their executives, demanding their autographs? Maybe they 
just want to appear in fashion-magazine spreads alongside the beautiful 
people? What?

> The software licence only covers the distribution and modification of
> the software.

Free software explicitly spells out the Four Freedoms:

  0) The freedom to use the software as you wish
  1) The freedom to look at the source, figure it out and make changes
  2) The freedom to redistribute copies
  3) The freedom to redistribute your changes.

<https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.en.html>

> But freedom has more levels than simply the freedom to
> copy.  It is also what the software allows you to do, how it
> inter-operates with ther software.

Yup. All covered.

> The software licence says nothing though, about how much agency it gives
> the user, when they are using the software.  Developers rarely look past
> the code, and look at the software itself.

Not sure I understand this. You are saying “code” is not “software”?? What 
is it, then?

> Does this software give the user agency in their ability to configure
> it?

A core part of the *nix philosophy is “mechanism, not policy”. Free 
software is not supposed to impose particular ways of doing things on you, 
instead it provides a toolkit you can use to do a whole range of things in 
whatever ways you find best.

> It link it with other pieces of software?

Open interoperability standards are a key feature of Free software, yes. 
There is a strong preference for open and interoperable protocols/
standards over proprietary ones.

> To use it with other software to make their own workflows?

This is one area where command-line/scriptability-based tools often have 
an edge over GUI-centric ones.

> A piece of software can be GPL licenced, but offer no
> configuration, no real means of placing it in a pipeline, no
> extensibility, whereas another, which could be proprietary could offer
> vast configuratin options, allow extensions.

I would be curious where you can find examples of both of these things. Do 
tell.