Re: [Audio-video] http://audio-video.gnu.org/video/ghm2013/Samuel_Thibault_Jean-Philippe_Mengual-Freedom_0_for_everybody_really_.text

[Garreau\, Alexandre]

Le 20/07/2014 à 03h12, Richard Stallman a écrit :
> [[[ To any NSA and FBI agents reading my email: please consider    ]]]
> [[[ whether defending the US Constitution against all enemies,     ]]]
> [[[ foreign or domestic, requires you to follow Snowden's example. ]]]
>
> You response to my point about inequalities of wealth missed the
> point.

Because I didn’t disagree with you, you just misunderstood what I said
and argued on the wrong thing (since I already agree with it), so I
explained it.

>     No. I just say  social freedom  or  right  for what you just call
>      freedom  and  technical freedom  or  ability  for what you call
>      practical opportunity .
>
> By stretching the word "freedom" so that it equates to "range of
> options", you hide the distinction on which our campaign is based.  To
> the extent that you succeed, you interfere with the public's
> understanding of what we stand for.

It’s just a different meaning in a different context, just as sometimes
“freedom” can mean “without constraints”, or other things. It’s an usual
thing for a word to have different meanings according context. We say
same things but use different words for it, and that doesn’t lead to
confusion because it is the normal way language is used: yet the fact
“free” also mean gratis can lead to confusion, you don’t urge people not
using “free” in this meaning, you just explain the differences, and
that’s actually better than asking people just using the word “gratis”
to mean “gratis”.

We didn’t invented this meaning /ex nihilo/, it’s an existing meaning of
“freedom” for already a lot of people (the fact we first made this link
without seeing any confusion problem is a proof). Using that other
meaning doesn’t create further confusion, it just make aware people of
this other nuance, and so, if explained, it could even *clarify* things
by making explicit the different meanings of freedom and the links they
can have, philosophically, hence making stronger both fights.

>     We can’t because we need this “purely linguistic” way of recalling
>     the strong link between what you call “freedom” (and I call
>     “social freedom” or “right”) and what you call “functionality” or
>     “capacity” (and I call “technical freedom” or “ability”).
>
> This says that the confusion is no accident -- it is intentional.

What is intentional is just a linguistic link, not a confusion.
Confusing people is *not* our goal. If we persist with the idea of
“technical freedom” it’s because we don’t think it’s confusing.

> Unfortunately that means we must not cooperate with your organization,
> because we don't want to help you confuse people or let people think
> we agree with it.

You can still say “we agree with them but just disagree on the rhetoric
of using the word freedom to mean capacity”, we could also explain that
too, that we *sometimes* *also* use a different meaning of freedom that
FSF doesn’t want to use and thus that confusion shouldn’t be made.

At the end we all agree and think the same things: a free software
doesn’t *have* to be accessible to be a “free software” and hackers that
forget accessibility aren’t doing oppression, but accessibility is a
“functionality” we should think about and teach people. We just use
different words for saying that.

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