Firefox, the browser that dared to challenge the supremacy of Microsoft's Internet Explorer, has just reached 400m downloads - and deservedly so. It now claims a market share of nearly 20% in the UK and 30% in Germany. Firefox, part of the admirable Mozilla Foundation, is based on open source, created and improved on by volunteers all over the world.

RMS: «...Their stated definition for the term “open source” is somewhat broader than free software, and thus includes my work. But describing the GNU GPL as an “open source license,” as Microsoft did, is more than half misleading. The GNU GPL embodies the firm philosophy of the free software movement; it doesn't come from the open source movement.

“Open Source” advocate: «...I associate much more with the "Open Source" (also as Richard defines it) camp, and am open to the existence and use of proprietary software...» --

"...For the Open Source movement, the issue of whether software should be open source is a practical question, not an ethical one. As one person put it, “Open source is a development methodology; free software is a social movement.” For the Open Source movement, non-free software is a suboptimal solution.

There are a lot of people that confuse Free Software (and Open Source) with Shareware.

Though all three types Free/Open/Share may well be available for free (as in zero cost), there are some fundamental licensing issues that make them each separate and distinct.

The third Release Candidate build for Firefox 3.5 is on its way. Mozilla repeatedly stressed during the development process of the next iteration of its open source browser that it was aiming to produce a single RC for Firefox 3.5. And fact is that it came extremely close to doing so.

"...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..."

The journey of software from an original, open source/hardware movement to a closed-shop, licensed world and back to open source is now complete and for many businesses open source is a viable and more flexible alternative,

I'm a big fan of Matt Asay's writings about free software even though I have been rather dreading the appearance of one that I knew, one day, he would write...because it would be wrong. And now he has written it, with the self-explanatory headline: “Free software is dead. Long live open source.”