I think that you have missed the point. I don't believe that the
intention of the discussion was to size-off the merits of Open Source
and Free Software. Rather, my reading of the message was that it proposed
that different projects work together to offer greater protection
against security threats.
The proposal's intent was clear. I responded it by saying the FSF is
possibly interested, and pointing out one aspect that needs to be
changed so that the FSF can participate.
The message addressed me and other FSF activists under the label of
"open source", which is actually the name of a movement we disagree
with. We can participate in cooperation on security, but we cannot
participate in calling ourselves "open source".
To make FSF participation possible requires some simple and easy
changes in the way we will talk about what we're doing. It has to be
called "free software", so the FSF is not mislabeled. If people who
identify themselves as open source advocates are participating also,
it should be called "free software and open source", so that they are
not mislabeled either.
This should be easy to do. I hope that any others who are interested
will agree to this change, and we can move on to see whether there
is useful work to be done together on security.
