[ubuntu-in] Subject of Proprietory Software(s) codecs etc on Ubuntu

[Jasbir Khehra]

ramnarayan.k at gmail.com wrote:
> Onkar Shinde wrote:
>> On 3/11/07, ramnarayan.k at gmail.com <ramnarayan.k at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> Hi
>>>
>>> This is a follow up on the previous posts on piracy
>>>
>>> there is a persistent issue of Ubuntu not being totally open source and
>>> that it includes components (codecs etc ) that are propreitory and that
>>> basically go against the GNU/Linux core FLOSS philosophy
>>>
>>> comments !!!
>> Wrong analogy. 
> 
> yep true
> 
> Just that while the discussions on the ebook were on it struck me that
> this was one question i had been wantin to ask - to clarify
> 
>> The ebook was published by someone (or some company)
>> and there is no mention about it being freely redistributable.
>> FOSS is about sharing but not something which is not owned by you or
>> when you don't have license for sharing.
> 
> FOSS yes but the question still is about the proprietory stuff -  the
> difference i guess is that a. the proprietory drivers, etc are not
> licensed as open source - even if they are freely distributable
> 
> [whereas in the case of the book it is not freely distributable (and nor
> is it open source)]
> 
Yup, you got it right this time. :)
Just that in the case of proprietary h/w driver stuff u only need them 
if you 'purchase' the hardware. So here comes the difference between the 
  vendors which support Linux(with proprietary drivers) and those which 
support Open Source.

rgrds
Jasbir