Captain Beyond

Ironically a Linux-derived OS.

Nothing ironic about it. There’s nothing mystical about Linux, it’s just a kernel. The guy who made it says he doesn’t care about anything but code.

Personally, I only care about the code. When I say maybe there are people who worry about walled gardens and cloud providers who take ownership of your data, I am not one of those people. That’s not what I actually care about. That’s not what I do. What I do is code. What I care about is code.

As an end-user I believe I am entitled to the freedom to use, modify, and share the software I use. If your business model is incompatible with my values I won’t support you, simple as. I don’t have any problem monetarily supporting developers but not if they disagree with my principles.

I’m pretty sure I’ve seen this exact argument made against ad-blockers, too.

I prefer my version of stage 3: I still care about software freedom and advocate for it (as well as related issues like interoperability, privacy, and right to repair) but without being an obnoxious fanboy for “Linux” or talking down to people who still use non-free technology for whatever reason.

Simply caring about an issue doesn’t make one a cultist or zealot, and not caring about anything does not make one enlightened.

I say this as someone who is probably one of the biggest supporters of software-freedom around here, but bullying or shaming people for preferring non-free apps does nothing but incite resentment towards the movement. I value the four freedoms because I think I deserve control of my computing, not because I think it’s my place to dictate what others should value.