The Power of FLOSS

FLOSS, or Free/Libre Open Source Software, also known as FOSS, OSS, Open Source, Free Software, and so on, is Software that is provided with the source code available to the users, and allows those users to modify and redistribute that code in accordance with the licence. It is completely alien to the Proprietary way of thinking. The idea behind FLOSS is that people are free. They cannot be artificially restricted by licences. They will want to modify the code anyway, so let's make it part of the program. It is a system that encourages the sharing of code with the expectation that anybody who uses it will do so in order to learn from it, or make it better, and by so doing improve things for everybody.

I was drawn into this community through Linux, and through business. My business is IT, and in order to make things work the best possible for my clients, I need the best tools, and if they happen to be the least expensive, so much the better for my clients. While searching for these tools, I stumbled across the concepts of open source software, and discovered the power and strength of the community as compared to the corporation. I am not going to say that one is better, that community always triumphs over the corporation, or that corporations are inherently superior. That conversation is already settled, with neither as being inherently better. But the community is a natural strength, because it is not limited in the way a corporation is limited. A corporation may have greater focus, but it lacks the diversity of a community.

The reason I am drawn ever more within the open source community is however a belief that all people have value, and they are all part of the community. They are all part of my community, the global community. They are all working for freedom, and freedom is the basic right of humanity. So often, corporations are so focused on protecting what is theirs, that they seek to strip us of our rights. If we agree to give up those rights, then that is our individual decision, but those rights exist, and they must not be taken away from us. The right to learn is ours, the right to share what is ours, and use the tools that we have available to us without fear of reprisal. The right to speak our minds, which can best be protected by the community, and not the corporations. The right to believe what we please, whether I agree with your beliefs, or find them to be evil. Those are rights I fear to lose. Those are rights that could too easily be stripped from us if we put our trust in corporations. Corporations have no interest in my life, or protecting freedoms, they have interest in profit. All well and good, that is the reason corporations exist. But they cannot be trusted. They will sell my rights if I give them away. They will turn my data over to the right bidder. And that is why I advocate for Open Source. I own myself.