"...copyleft is a tool designed to spread freedom in software, at any cost. The FSF, which wrote the GNU and Affero licenses, has the goal to make all software free as in freedom. Companies are ‘free’ to join the revolution, or to look somewhere else for their needs.

RMS (Zagreb on March 9th 2006): "... Many people suggest a two stage solution. They say, first, let's teach people to use Free Software, and then, once they're using it, we'll teach people to appreciate the freedom.

"..RMS’s other mission here is to promote the Free Software Movement. The creator of the GPL...is at pains to correct misunderstandings of what the term free software means and to draw a distinction between it and the open source movement.

"...The free software movement’s biggest failure is an ironic one: our free software became so appealing to geeks that usage and development of free programs spread much more than the appreciation of the freedom that the movement is based on. As a result, our views came to be seen as eccentric in the community that we built..." (RMS)

Free software is software you can study, modify and share without restriction. But unlike proprietary software, there is no big budget marketing campaign behind it. Rather, people discover it and come to value the freedom it provides. What are these people's motivations for working on free software? Why is community and sharing so important? Why should everyone be using free software?

When explaining why Free Software is important, one question that often comes up is: “do I really need the software freedom?”

Associate members of the Free Software Foundation form a dedicated part of the community: a free software society that supports the ethical cause of computer users' freedom.. If you support the goal of a free software society, please join with your peers around the world in taking this important step.

"...In 1998, some of the people in the free software community began using the term "open source software" instead of "free software" to describe what they do. The term "open source" quickly became associated with a different approach, a different philosophy, different values, and even a different criterion for which licenses are acceptable. The Free Software movement and the Open Source movement are today separate movements with different views and goals, although we can and do work together on some practical projects..."

Free software is simply software that respects our freedom -- our freedom to learn and understand the software we are using.