[NBLUG/talk] FLOSS in language (was RE "women in... &")

[S. Saunders]

On Thu, June 8, 2006 17:44, Bill Kendrick wrote:

> On Thu, Jun 08, 2006 at 04:59:51PM -0700, S. Saunders wrote:

> > I had seen "FOSS" and "F/OSS" but hadn't seen "FLOSS"
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FLOSS
>
> It's because Free is kind of an ambiguous term.  Most people think
> "$$$" rather than "freedom".  (In Spanish, there's "Gratis" vs
> "Libre"; each translating to the two different meanings of "free"
> in English.)

Technically, "gratis" is available to us in English, too.  It's just
a bit of an egghead word (well, ok... more than "a bit").  Also,
the subculture has siezed upon "free as in free beer" as their
preferred way to make that distinction, so "gratis" is lingua
non grata.


- Steve S.