this post was submitted on 30 Dec 2023
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No Stupid Questions
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No such thing. Ask away!
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After hearing it for a decade plus I still don’t know what “free as in freedom/free is in beer” actually means
Free beer, like you get a free beer at a party or event, it's no cost. Free software that costs nothing but is closed source.
Free as in freedom means the user has full access to the source code and is not subject to unknown code like in proprietary software.
Freedom as RMS sees it: https://lemmy.world/post/8134208
I always get confused by this analogy because my mind goes to beer representing open source (the ingredients aren't secret, and you can brew it yourself if you want to). "Free Coca-cola" would work better, like you're not paying for it right now but only one company knows how to make it.
The phrase is "free as in SPEECH/beer", because it doesn't make sense to say "freedom" - especially since that has all sorts of other connotations, especially in the USA. Everyone should be able to understand that free speech doesn't mean a speech that you listen to at no cost to yourself. It means the ability to express yourself without censure. And beer... everyone understands that, and who doesn't love free beer?
It's open source. The line comes from the early days when people were still arguing over definitions and free vs. open source and GPL vs. BSD, when the concept was new enough to the general public so that they would confuse "free software" for "freeware": Closed-source software that doesn't cost any money. By now all that has died down (unless you're the FSF) and the acronym "FLOSS" was invented, which sidesteps the double meaning of "free" by adding on "libre". Really they should've gone for GLOSS: Gratis, libre, open, source software. If you have a choice in marketing between shiny and dentist, always go for shiny.
(And for the nitpickers yes searxng is AGPL which makes it libre, not just open).
Oh, and speaking of, haven't looked at it in a long while, there's yacy, a peer to peer search engine.
Free as in freedom means it doesn't infringe on privacy (or any other rights) and free as in beer means no financial cost.