For many years a battle of freedom of choice has been brewing, but like many battles of today one side is well funded, well armed, have superior numbers, and have experts in the use of propaganda. In counter to that there is commonly a side that has less money and resources, less numbers on the ground, but an agenda, an ideal. A basic concept, a belief that what is happening is not in the best interest of the people. It could be seen as a fight between the status quo, the norm, the average and change, difference, diversity. However as history proves superior forces that engages it's enemies for too long run the danger of fighting a evolved well adapted machine, that has had the benefit of experience and time. This in my belief forces the superior forces to change, and to evolve which in it's very nature is the thing the superior force is trying to stop.
Now think of a global communications network, that occupies vast amounts of homes, people, information, data, computing power, entertainment, commerce, academia, construction, finance, a digital highway to a digital online life. Then imagine that you can only choose one car to navigate this highway. One companies idea of transportation, one businesses choices suited for everyone, no competition, no inherent need to evolve. Then imagine a group of unrelated enthusiasts, designers, engineers, programmers, students, teachers, and many more multi-disciplinary teams, working in a natural union to create a change. Few in numbers at the beginning but with change and evolution brings growth, soon those numbers swell. An engine capable of mass propulsion, diverse range of movement, free from the norm's, the status quo, the average, free to dream ideas, free to implement them, free to learn from them, free to work together, free to work apart, free to change what they do, when they do it because the circumstances demand it. The closely knitted group of individual unit's, teams, building blocks combine to what I lovingly call the community. The term which in a literal sense that covers this in my belief is Free Libre Open Source Software or FLOSS for short, I say thank fully. However a more common but less actuate term is Linux. Linux may be described as a catalyst, a common ground, a global mechanism of change.
Like all groups that are closely knitted a family ethos grows, and like all families arguments happen, failing occur happen, some for the good, some for the bad. I think when you have a group of people who are truly passionate about something, to the point where they actually engage within it, then the growth of feeling and the full depth that can be achieved by those feelings can be no surprise. As a new member of the family, I see things in a less battle hardened way than from most of my more experienced and learned peers. This can be more than likely levied against being naïve and inexperienced, but I hope that previous experience brings a new set of tools to ever increasing organism of change. I mean not to equate the Linux movement to a modern day war, or a real life conflict, and if someone is forced to navigate the digital highway to an digital life designed by a superior benevolent company, then no one dies and we all wake up in the morning and start it all again. However I draw parallels to a dominant power making commercial decisions that effect everyone, who's only ethos is to win what ever the cost.
I must admit that till I fully engaged in the community the worry of a company that I had never actually chosen making decisions and designing my journey thought the digital highway had really caused any real concern. However I would say that for the years the came before my adoption of Linux in a full time nature, and a direct engagement within my local Linux community I had tended to sympathise with the open source movement. I was probably like most who use computers as part of their profession life locked in to a lack of freedom of choice. My clients, my competitors, my friends, my family all used one dominating companies interpretation of the digital life. I left my profession to further my education, and in a pursuit of a more technically challenging vocation and by luck, fate, and an unnatural understanding that my path had been set out in front of me. I too like many of peers am passionate about the freedom that I now take for granted. A navigate my way through my digital life with a custom vehicle made by the people, by the community I belong, tailored and moulded into a bespoke beast, fit for purpose. It's this freedom that sometimes leads to confusion. The confusion is whole heartedly in the name, free. Free is a term that normally describes something without cost, and it leads people in the belief that if doesn't cost anything it can't be worth anything. Well the term free software actually refers to freedom, the type of freedom that I described earlier, and is likened to the free in freedom of speech.
I have listened to only a couple of Linux based talks, some at national events and some at our local Linux community, and all have been inspiring. Some are by design left to make you think, and evaluate the freedom of choice we take, I remember hearing just a snap shot of a talk, a sentence. It's almost like an epiphany, not so deep rooted but a clearer view of what made me an avid supporter of this struggle, and the word was liberation. What I take for granted is the liberty to choose, not the choice it self. I began to hear "First they ignore you, then they mock you, then they fight you. Then you win.” a Mahatma Gandhi quote. The purpose of this quote I think is to show the time line of a struggle against a superior force. I think it's far to say that when Linux first came along, that it was a joke in the computer industry, Operating system manufacturers like many other software houses had kept their source code, the recipe to their products such closely guarded secret. How can you give your code away for free, it will never last, it's just a flash in the pan, you can almost hear them say now. However in reflection the Operating System market has been a pioneering curve in the modern market place, IBM believed that their was no value in the Operating System software and the real money was in the hardware, Apple made hardware as well as their Operating system but it's fair to say that this was somewhat eased by Xerox. Xerox had a GUI (Graphic User Interface) based Operating system, but believed that no one would want it, they let Apple have it, along with the mouse and many other toys and gadgets. The point that I vaguely try to make here is that software tends not to bind it's self to the norms of the common business ideas, and to pay little attention is a dangerous thing, as Steve Jobs, Bill Gates proved and went onto prove, in software development being unique is sometimes all you need to win.
We come to a modern day setting now, and the community has been mocked and ignored in the past, and I can say with my hand on my heart that their fighting us now. With commercial deals, to try and technologically isolate Linux, companies financing other businesses to attack Linux businesses the circle of Gandhi's quote is near completion. The Linux community grows massively every day, and many companies embrace the concept of open and free software. Business like Red Hat show that in this digital life the services is always more important than the marketing brochure. I think it's far to say one thing that Linux will never suffer from, and I've heard it said about another companies products, first rate advertising for second rate products.
And then you win...........
Delicious
Digg
StumbleUpon
