Why there is free software

Free software, software libre or libre software is software that can be used, studied, and modified without restriction, and which can be copied and redistributed in modified or unmodified form either without restriction, or with minimal restrictions only to ensure that further recipients can also do these things and that manufacturers of consumer-facing hardware allow user modifications to their hardware. Free software is generally available without charge, but can have a fee, such as in the form of charging for CDs or other distribution medium among other ways.

In practice, for software to be distributed as free software, the human-readable form of the program (the source code) must be made available to the recipient along with a notice granting the above permissions. Such a notice either is a free software license, or a notice that the source code is released into the public domain.

The free software movement was conceived in 1983 by Richard Stallman to satisfy the need for and to give the benefit of software freedom to computer users. Stallman founded the Free Software Foundation in 1985 to provide the organizational structure to advance his Free Software ideas.

From 1998 onward, alternative terms for free software came into use. The most common are software libre, free and open source software(FOSS) and free, libre and open source software (FLOSS). The Software Freedom Law Center was founded in 2005 to protect and advance FLOSS.^[3] The antonym of free software is proprietary software or non-free software. Commercial software may be either free software or proprietary software, contrary to a popular misconception that commercial software is a synonym for proprietary software. An example of commercial free software is GNAT.

Free software, which may or may not be distributed free of charge, is distinct from freeware which, by definition, does not require payment for use. The authors or copyright holders of freeware may retain all rights to the software; it is not necessarily permissible to reverse engineer, modify, or redistribute freeware.

Since free software may be freely redistributed it is generally available at little or no cost. Free software business models are usually based on adding value such as applications, support, training, customization, integration, or certification. At the same time, some business models which work with proprietary software are not compatible with free software, such as those that depend on the user to pay for a license in order to lawfully use the software product.

In the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, it was normal for computer users to have the software freedoms provided by free software. Software was commonly shared by individuals who used computers and by hardware manufacturers who welcomed the fact that people were making software that made their hardware useful. Organizations of users and suppliers, for example, SHARE, were formed to facilitate exchange of software. By the late 1960s, the picture changed: software costs were dramatically increasing, a growing software industry was competing with the hardware manufacturer's bundled software products (free in that the cost was included in the hardware cost), leased machines required software support while providing no revenue for software, and some customers able to better meet their own needs did not want the costs of "free" software bundled with hardware product costs. In United States vs. IBM, filed January 17, 1969, the government charged that bundled software was anticompetitive.^[7] While some software might always be free, there would be a growing amount of software that was for sale only. In the 1970s and early 1980s, the software industry began using technical measures (such as only distributing binary copiesof computer programs) to prevent computer users from being able to study and modify software. In 1980 copyright law was extended to computer programs.

In 1983, Richard Stallman, longtime member of the hacker community at the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, announced the GNU project, saying that he had become frustrated with the effects of the change in culture of the computer industry and its users. Software development for the GNU operating system began in January 1984, and the Free Software Foundation (FSF) was founded in October 1985. He developed a free software definition and the concept of "copyleft", designed to ensure software freedom for all.

The economic viability of free software has been recognized by large corporations such as IBM, Red Hat, and Sun Microsystems. Many companies whose core business is not in the IT sector choose free software for their Internet information and sales sites, due to the lower initial capital investment and ability to freely customize the application packages. Also, some non-software industries are beginning to use techniques similar to those used in free software development for their research and development process; scientists, for example, are looking towards more open development processes, and hardware such as microchips are beginning to be developed with specifications released under copyleft licenses (see the OpenCores project, for instance). Creative Commons and the free culture movement have also been largely influenced by the free software movement.

What do you think about free software is beneficial or even detrimental?

Free software licenses

• the GNU General Public License
• the GNU Lesser General Public License
• the BSD License
• the Mozilla Public License
• the MIT License
• the Apache License

Source : wikipedia, GNU, FSF, Apache, Open Source, Mozilla