Free Software is Commercial

Dr. Roy Schestowitz

2015-08-04 09:04:43 UTC
Modified: 2015-08-04 09:04:43 UTC

"There’s no company called Linux, there’s barely a Linux road map. Yet Linux sort of springs organically from the earth. And it had, you know, the characteristics of communism that people love so very, very much about it. That is, it’s free."

--Steve Ballmer, Microsoft's CEO at the time

Summary: Corporate media helps stigmatise Free/Open Source software as unsuitable for commercial use and once again it uses the 'security' card

SEVERAL days ago in our daily links we includes two articles that used the term "commercial software" (to mean proprietary software). Both cited Synopsys. It is amazing that even in 2015 there are some capable of making this error, maybe intentionally. Commercial software just means software that is used commercially. A lot of it is Free/Open Source software (the corporate media prefers the term "Open Source" to avoid discussion about the F word, "freedom").

"Commercial software just means software that is used commercially."Yesterday we found yet another headline which repeats the same formula (as if they all received the same memo), calling proprietary software "commercial software", thereby reinforcing the false dichotomy and the stigma of Free software. "Looking at our Java defect density data through the lens of OWASP Top 10," says Synopsys, "we observe that commercial software is significantly more secure than open source software."

Another article from yesterday reminded us that Free software takes security very seriously and top/leading Free software projects are widely regarded (even by Coverity) as more secure than proprietary counterparts. Oddly enough, Synopsys links to a "Coverity Scan Open Source Report 2014", not 2015, and the report is behind walled gardens, so it is hard to check if these headlines tell the whole story or just part of it. The analysis itself is done by proprietary software, whose methods are basically a secret. Go figure...

We recently saw some very gross distortions where security issues in proprietary software got framed as a Free software issues. As we have repeatedly demonstrated and stressed over the past years and a half, there seems to be a campaign of FUD, 'branding', and logos (the latest being targeted at Android/MMS) whose goal is to create or cement a damaging stereotype while always ignoring back doors and even front doors in proprietary software (now out in the open because of the British Prime Minister and the ringleader of the FBI). ⬆

Links 28/03/2026: Microsoft's LinkedIn a National Security Risk, Microsoft's Slop "Ambitions Face Investor Scrutiny Amid Soaring Costs": Links for the day
SLAPP Censorship - Part 26 Out of 200: Asking for Documents and Information You Already Have, Even Letters and E-mails That You Yourself Sent!: barristers are expensive
Open Web Destroyed by Centibillionaires, Says Anil Dash of Blogging Fame: Blogging was going through its 'prime years' about 20 years ago
"Linux" Slop Going Away, Microsoft et al Pay 'Linux' Foundation to Promote Slop: It's a timely reminder that the Linux Foundation exists to promote whoever pays the Linux Foundation, even pedophiles and companies that attack the GPL
Gemini Links 28/03/2026: "Finding My Base Tone", "Astrobotany", and BugoutBack/OFFLFIRSOCH: Links for the day
Links 28/03/2026: More Worldwide Bans on Social Control Media (Harms to Adolescents), Protests in US Against Dictatorship: Links for the day
Gemini Links 28/03/2026: Echo Delay and 0x0.st: Links for the day
Rumours of More IBM Mass Layoffs at Beginning of April: IBM is not doing well
Over at Tux Machines...: GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, March 27, 2026: IRC logs for Friday, March 27, 2026
"Headcount" as Distraction From Mass Layoffs and Salary Reductions: Things aren't looking well when one considers revenue is acquired, not earned
"Linux" Slop Turning Rarer, New York Times Nowadays Contaminated With LLM Slop: Another day has passed without much slop about "linux"
Links 27/03/2026: Studying Whale Births, Apple is Cancelling Products, Cambodia Arrests Journalists Over Photographs: Links for the day
Gemini Links 27/03/2026: GTD, Gopher Catchup, Gemini Crawlers, and "Slop Everywhere": Links for the day
Mozilla Was Ruined Like Sirius Open Source Was Ruined - From the Top Down: Mozilla will never return to its Free software roots
Nokia Could Never Recover From Microsoft: It's very important to remember what really happened
Why Techrights and Many Other Sites Stopped Doing April Fools’ Day Articles: Well before slop (made by LLMs) it was "bad optics" to have satire or humour in a site, irrespective of the day of the year
President Not-Cocaine Campinos Notified of Historic EPO Strikes (Thousands of Workers Not Coming Back to the Office): Please do pay attention to how the media treats these strikes in Europe's second-largest institution
Slides From the Presentation Discussing EPO Strikes Until End of June or Until End of 2026 (Maybe Next Year Too): More to come soon (later today)
IBM Cuts Are Everywhere (Global), the Aim is to Lower the Pay: Because the revenues keep falling (IBM buys other companies' revenues using borrowed money)
Perpetual Strikes to Begin at European Patent Office (EPO), Large Majority Votes for Strikes Any Day of the Week: Approved industrial actions [...] Notice how none of the media or even so-called 'IP' blogs write about it
Mozilla is Not a Privacy Company, Mozilla is Run by GAFAM Executives and Managers Who Came From American Surveillance Companies: Would you trust a VPN they claim to be "free"?
SLAPP Censorship - Part 25 Out of 200: That Time Matthew J. Garrett Got Temporarily Banned/Suspended From Twitter: That he gets banned from large social control media platform is hardly surprising given his combative communications
Ubuntu Started as Free With ShipIt, Now It Becomes Payware That Exploits Debian Volunteers (Slaves): "Ubuntu" the distro now replaces the GNU components inherited from Debian with a bunch of Microsoft GitHub (proprietary) things that reject reciprocal licences
Last Night The Register MS Published a Fake Article. It Mentioned "AI" 27 Times.: Paid-for nonsense! [...] What's left of once-respectable news sites actively harms society
Links 27/03/2026: Google Executive (GAFAM, US, Surveillance) "Named the New BBC Head", Prominent Climate Scientist Resigns From NASA: Links for the day
Gemini Links 27/03/2026: "Being Busy" and "Posting Again": Links for the day
GNOME Has No "Real" Executive Director, Only an IBM (Perma)'Interim' One With No Openings in Sight: GNOME is having financial problems
Microsoft Experiencing "Leadership Exodus": Microsoft's current position is no better than Meta's (Facebook)
GNU/Linux Distros Should Reject "Age Verification" and Uphold Software Freedom for Users: It's not about protecting children
Slop Plunge: we can already "smell the blood" of the so-called 'AI industry'
IBM Media Puff Pieces While Layoffs Go On and On: Has the PR industry absorbed the press?
Media Says Microsoft Hiring Freezes, But There Are Already Microsoft Layoffs: They want the public to talk about Microsoft as if it's just not hiring when it is actually firing
Richard Stallman lynchings: Sruthi Chandran splitting Debian: Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Over at Tux Machines...: GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, March 26, 2026: IRC logs for Thursday, March 26, 2026
Links 26/03/2026: Tor Relay at National Taiwan Normal University, Copyright Hammers Fall: Links for the day
Gemini Links 26/03/2026: "The War of the Worlds" and "sometimes science is just the dumbest thing": Links for the day
The World Wide Bots: The shape of the Web is so bad that bots exceed humans in some places
Links 26/03/2026: Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) Closes 101 Law Firms in 2 Years, "Please Compensate the Work You Appreciate": Links for the day
Regaining Software Freedom Means Regaining Control Over Programs That Run on Our Devices: Richard Stallman will speak in Italy
Microsoft Secure Boot Removes Users' Choice: Has Greenland banned Microsoft and 'secure' boot yet?
IBM Pushes Workers Out, It Does Not Count Them as "Layoffs": The number of IBM layoffs can be as large as tens of thousands per year
Hard to Find a Job After Working for Microsoft (Back Doors Giant, Bribery Hub): It generally looks like people who chose to serve Microsoft's agenda don't end up too well
Microsoft Lost 31% Of Its Alleged "Value" in Five Months, Then It Got Downgraded: In 2026 Microsoft focuses on keeping the layoffs silent
Altering Perceived Reality to Make It Seem Like Microsoft is Thriving, Not Failing: pretend XBox did not die
SLAPP Censorship - Part 24 Out of 200: The Failed Effort by Brett Wilson LLP to Strike Out My Lawsuit and My Wife's Lawsuit Against Garrett (the Master Allowed Our Lawsuits to Proceed): This is lawfare
Official New Figures Show That Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) Sees Rise in Dishonesty Among Law Firms Forcibly Shut Down ('Euthanised' Due to Misconduct): It's rather if in our little country as many as 16 law firms were found to be so dishonest that they needed to be shut down
Back to Normalcy: In our datacentre at least
IBM is "Increasing Its Temporary and Part-time Headcount" While Net Headcount Falls (Despite Buying Many Companies and Their Workforce): Headcount is a rather superficial yardstick.
Confluent Insiders: IBM Laid Off Over 800 at Confluent, Not Just 800: For the record, the layoffs at Confluent won't be over. After the bluewashing there will be "IBM RAs" impacting Confluent folks, aside from PIPs
EPO Union Decides to Continue Industrial Actions, Next Strike in Four Days: The latest strike had the highest participation rate
Over at Tux Machines...: GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, March 25, 2026: IRC logs for Wednesday, March 25, 2026
Microsoft's "Silent Layoffs" in Slop Clothing: "AI-powered transformation" is just a euphemism for mass layoffs
Where and How to Spot LLM Slop: Many people correctly perceive LLMs as a site's downfall, a step towards the abyss
Public Talk by Richard Stallman in Half a Day "at the Engineering and Architecture Campus of Cesena of the University of Bologna": He'll probably attract a fairly large crowd
Gemini Links 26/03/2026: Buying a House, Stargazing, OFFLFIRSOCH 2026: Links for the day

Free Software is Commercial

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