Dispelling Common Free Software Misconceptions
Here is a great site (www.getgnulinux.org) as an introduction to Free Software concepts, and this page does a pretty lucid job of clearing up some common misconceptions, including the infamous allusions to the dreaded "C" word.
5. Free software is like communism.
Supporters of this idea argue that there can be no private ownership with free (or “open source”) software. Let’s answer this with an example.
Let’s suppose you use one application that is free software, at home and within your company. You find a great way to improve it, so now with your modified version, your computer works better and your factories run twice as fast!
This modified version is your own version. You are not required to tell anyone about it, nor must you share any of the profits you made using it. You are simply exerting your freedom to use and modify free software.
What the free software license requires is that if you redistribute this software, then you must keep it free. Namely, if you sell CDs with your software on them, or start letting people outside your home or company use it, then you must:
* Either give everyone the same rights you had when you obtained the original software, that is, the freedom to inspect, modify and redistribute your modified version;
* Or, make the original software and your secret addition to it clearly separate (that is, your addition should contain none of the original work).So in fact, you have more “ownership” over free software than over proprietary software –where the programmer decides everything you can and can’t do with the software.
Free software has nothing to do with a political system. You can run free software on top of proprietary software, just as well as the opposite. The free software license is simply an ethical contract between the programmer and the end-user.
Oh, you thought I meant the infamous allusions to this dreaded "C" word?