RMS: «When we call software “free,” we mean that it respects the users' essential freedoms: the freedom to run it, to study and change it, and to redistribute copies with or without changes [...] As the advocates of open source draw new users into our community, we free software activists have to work even more to bring the issue of freedom to those new users' attention.

Open Source is not about freedom, nor is it about licenses. It's about community. Of course everyone knows about Richard Stallman's concern about having the freedom to modify all software on his machine. Tim O'Reilly has had a concern for many years that Open Source licenses do not keep software Open Source when it is not being distributed but instead performed as in Web 2.0 applications.

The free software community understands that free software gives the user more freedom than proprietary software. Proprietary software confines its users, prohibits them from making changes that would allow everyone to benefit, etc. Free software advocates (myself included) have a habit of claiming that using free (libre) software means the same thing as having freedom.

"... «I ask you to please always call it Free Software because that way you will encourage other people to pay attention to the question of freedom. The term Open Source was formulated by people who did not want to talk about freedom and that is the stupidest thing any people can do.

"..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.

"This is a post about freedom. The freedom to keep your data for yourself and the freedom to run free software. You should be able to reclaim and enjoy these freedoms also when using web applications. [...] Let me be clear: web apps are great and I’m in love with them. But I think it’s time to ask for more freedom and more privacy. Here is a three step plan to achieve both these results..."

" The idea of open source is that allowing users to change and redistribute the software will make it more powerful and reliable. But this is not guaranteed. Developers of proprietary software are not necessarily incompetent. Sometimes they produce a program which is powerful and reliable, even though it does not respect the users’ freedom.

The Software Freedom Law Center (SFLC), provider of pro-bono legal services to protect and advance Free and Open Source Software (FOSS), today announced that it has carefully reviewed the lineage of the open source Atheros wireless driver for Linux and determined which portions can be distributed under the ISC license (also known as the 2-clause BSD license).

"As the advocates of open source draw new users into our community, we free software activists have to work even more to bring the issue of freedom to those new users' attention. We have to say, “It's free software and it gives you freedom!”—more and louder than ever."