Nothing's really free right??

dreamworks

--== babyface ==--
Joined
19 Jan 2003
Messages
355
Hi guys ..

As I look to develop further knowledge into the open source or linux world, I realize popular suites like Mandrake, Suse and Redhat has all gone commercialized.

Except for Redhat that still has the Fedora project, basically if you wanna use the OS that these developers have, you'd have to pay.

So I guess that nothing is really free after all yeah? Whatever happens to the real "open source"??


Now I am trying to decide whether to go slackware or fedora. Any comments or advise please?

Appreciate a healthy feedback or constructive criticism. Thanks!! : )
 
Open source means that the source code is available for viewing, changing (and license dependant) re-distribution. It does not mean the products have to be free.

Mandrake, RedHat and most distributions have always sold their products, you can't expect them to make and distribute an entire operating system for 100% free, these things need funding from somewhere. These distributions are available for free download.
 
Since when did you have to pay for Redhat? I downloaded it once and see what it was like and i didnt have to pay anything.
 
The way I understand it the software itself is certainly free - the company still makes money though because if you require SUPPORT then you are expected to license and pay for that.

So personal users happy to support themselves and delve around to find answers to problems may be happy to get it on a free, unsupported basis whilst corporate users will pay because they want the support.

That's my understanding anyway.
 
thats only if you want support from them, companies like redhat are mainly targetting other companies not individual users. The companies are often more likely to pay for support every once and a while than to have a linux tech on the pay roll 247

So you can still download, install and run it all without having to pay a penny, but if you want "RedHat" support from RedHat then they want you to pay for that.

Also you sometimes see versions of Linux or Unix availible on CD for maybe £5 or something, in that case you are probably paying for the CD its burnt on and postage.
 
I bought redhat from amazon, came with six disks and six source disks, some great reading matter!

Not bad for £19.99, I furthermore add.
 
heh. Theres a great line from GNU...

``Free software'' is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept, you should think of ``free'' as in ``free speech,'' not as in ``free beer.''
 

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Also Hi EP and people. I found this place again while looking through a oooollllllldddd backup. I have filled over 10TB and was looking at my collection of antiques. Any bids on the 500Mhz Win 95 fix?
Any of the SP crew still out there?
Xie wrote on Electronic Punk's profile.
Impressed you have kept this alive this long EP! So many sites have come and gone. :(

Just did some crude math and I apparently joined almost 18yrs ago, how is that possible???
hello peeps... is been some time since i last came here.
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