On Jun 25, 2:32 pm, Giorgos Keramidas <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > So much for the "free" in "free software". If you can't actually use > > it without paying money, whether for the software or for some book, it > > isn't really free, is it? > > Please do not confuse the term 'free' in 'free software' with 'gratis'. > > 'Gratis', i.e. 'lacking a monetary price tag' is something *very* > different from the meaning of 'free' in 'free software'.
Having to pay for the documentation, presumably because it's copyrighted, doesn't strike me as much more "free as in speech" than it is "free as in beer". Also being dependent on a particular publisher for access to required documentation violates "free as in no vendor lock-in", to boot. So anyone saying some "free" software is unusable without such-and-such an O'Reilly book can go peddle the software and the book somewhere where spammers are welcome. Being locked in to O'Reilly being just as bad as being locked in to Microsoft or Adobe. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
