The FSF doesn't endorse Gentoo?

[Ormaaj]

The FSF website gives a single sentence, citing their reasoning behind not endorsing Gentoo as being:

"Gentoo makes it easy to install a number of nonfree programs through their primary package system." (http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/common-distros.html)

The Gentoo philosophy states:

"If the tool forces the user to do things a particular way, then the tool is working against, rather than for, the user. We have all experienced situations where tools seem to be imposing their respective wills on us. This is backwards, and contrary to the Gentoo philosophy."

Which is fundamentally in line with the philosophy and tradition of Unix, Gnu, and free software. Gentoo respects my freedom and intelligence by giving me the choice to use it in absolutely any way, even on other platforms like BSD.

Being a meta-distribution, and due to the unique nature of portage, it would be nonsensical to intentionally cripple it by making it difficult to install any kind of software, including proprietary software. Since Portage is a scripting system for automating the building of software, it must be agnostic as to the kinds of software it builds.

I think it is wrong to judge a distribution in terms of the ease with which proprietary software could in principle be installed. If users want their systems to be free of proprietary software, then that is their choice, and the distro should make it easy to do that, which AFAIK, Gentoo does.

I'm even a student member of the FSF, but I think their distro policies here violate their own principles.

[Naib]

so in trying to promote freedom they advocate denying it

my head hurts
_________________
#define HelloWorld int
#define Int main()
#define Return printf
#define Print return
#include <stdio>
HelloWorld Int {
Return("Hello, world!\n");
Print 0;

[Ormaaj]

[Kollin]

politics...
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"Dear Enemy: may the Lord hate you and all your kind, may you be turned orange in hue, and may your head fall off at an awkward moment."
"Linux is like a wigwam - no windows, no gates, apache inside..."

[AaronPPC]

Worse...extreme ideology.
_________________
--Aaron

[djdunn]

write them an email and tell them that then.
_________________
“Music is a moral law. It gives a soul to the Universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, a charm to sadness, gaiety and life to everything. It is the essence of order, and leads to all that is good and just and beautiful.”

― Plato

[AllenJB]

The FSF are a bunch of hippies. Like Debian, the best thing to do is ignore them.

[Sven Vermeulen]

There are users that want to abide to the FSF "policy". To accomodate these users, Gentoo introduced an enhancement proposal (Handling of ACCEPT_LICENSE) where users can tell what licenses they accept (or license-groups, in which case they can select all FSF-approved licenses) and which they can't (well, won't).

I think this even puts more freedom to the users.

However, afaik, ACCEPT_LICENSE has not been introduced in Portage yet.
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Please add "[solved]" to the initial topic title when it is solved.

[AaronPPC]

[V-Li]

They do stick to their rules. You have the freedom to use Windows and you will still tell the FSF that they are morons because their definition sucks?

[Quick23t]

[energyman76b]

FSF wants you to follow their definition of freedom. By force if necessary. They hate true freedom of choice because that might lead to free people freely choosing not-fsf-approved-software. Freedom of choice is their worst nightmare.

They know what is good for you, so not being in line with their wishes makes you stupid - or evil.

In the end they want to dominate you just like everybody else.
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I identify as a dirty penismensch.

[V-Li]

You are polemic. The FSF gives you freedom of choice as long as you don't want to provide less freedom to others. That's the viral component of the GPL and what made free software so successful. Even if you consider the BSD license more free, it did not lead to the development we see today.

Being able to hack away on Linksys routers or have the source code available for a lot of devices has been caused by the GPL/FSF not hindered.

[sera]

[Ormaaj]

[d2_racing]

Look at the list, they endorse which distro ?

All the popular ones are rejected.

LFS ????

[Naib]

well in all fairness they are welcome to their philosophy. I don't agree with it and probably never will - there is far too much great closed-source application which FOSS have never come close to riveling (take Matlab:Simulink the nearest closed-source competitor is rubbish let alone the FOSS equiv which is a complete joke)

As long as FSF doesn't force themselves on me I don't really care. The moment Gentoo forces it on me I am leaving gentoo. The moment the final linux distro forces it on me I am leaving linux

simple as that. They can try and take the superiour moral high ground (and yes the GPL and all has done a fantastic job as has already been stated) but the closed-source model works as well, and for specialist software it really is the only option
_________________
#define HelloWorld int
#define Int main()
#define Return printf
#define Print return
#include <stdio>
HelloWorld Int {
Return("Hello, world!\n");
Print 0;

[energyman76b]

[tcoffeep]

lol. ironic.

[d2_racing]

Yeah

[Ant P.]

[platojones]

That reads like a Stallman rant.

[Ormaaj]

[energyman76b]

>They do not have a policy of only including free software, and removing nonfree software if it is discovered.

and if you make it possible for users to install 'non free' software, you fail in their eyes.

AKA they hate user freedom.
_________________
Study finds stunning lack of racial, gender, and economic diversity among middle-class white males

I identify as a dirty penismensch.

[sera]