Free Software Quotes

Sharing the code just seems like The Right Thing to Do, it costs us rather little, but it benefits a lot of people in sometimes very significant ways. There are many university research projects, proof of concept publisher demos, and new platform test beds that have leveraged the code. Free software that people value adds wealth to the world. ~ John Carmack

Like many older fans of Free Software and Open Source, I have discovered that it is really only free in the sense that the time you spend on it is worthless. ~ Erik Naggum

There were open source projects and free software before Linux was there. Linux in many ways is one of the more visible and one of the bigger technical projects in this area, and it changed how people looked at it because Linux took both the practical and ideological approach. ~ Linus Torvalds

Certainly there's a phenomenon around open source. You know free software will be a vibrant area. There will be a lot of neat things that get done there. ~ Bill Gates

We're not done yet, but two things WordPress has been able to exemplify is that open source can create great user experiences and that it's possible to have a successful commercial entity and a wider free software community living and working in harmony. ~ Matt Mullenweg

Free software' is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept, you should think of 'free' as in 'free speech,' not as in 'free beer'. ~ Richard Stallman

Every decision a person makes stems from the person's values and goals. People can have many different goals and values; fame, profit, love, survival, fun, and freedom, are just some of the goals that a good person might have. When the goal is to help others as well as oneself, we call that idealism. My work on free software is motivated by an idealistic goal: spreading freedom and cooperation. I want to encourage free software to spread, replacing proprietary software that forbids cooperation, and thus make our society better. ~ Richard Stallman

Many users of the GNU/Linux system will not have heard the ideas of free software. They will not be aware that we have ideas, that a system exists because of ethical ideals, which were omitted from ideas associated with the term 'open source.' ~ Richard Stallman

When we speak of free software, we are referring to freedom, not price. ~ Richard M. Stallman

There are "extremists" in the free software world, but that's one major reason why I don't call what I do "free software" any more. I don't want to be associated with the people for whom it's about exclusion and hatred. ~ Linus Torvalds

The Adobe flash plug-in is non-free software, and people should not install it, or suggest installing it, or even tell people it exists. ~ Richard Stallman

Free software is part of a broader phenomenon, which is a shift toward recognizing the value of shared work. Historically, shared stuff had a very bad name. The reputation was that people always abused shared things, and in the physical world, something that is shared and abused becomes worthless. In the digital world, I think we have the inverse effect, where something that is shared can become more valuable than something that is closely held, as long as it is both shared and contributed to by everybody who is sharing in it. ~ Mark Shuttleworth

The free software community should be supported more widely. I'm totally in solidarity with what they do. ~ Laura Poitras

I consider the law prohibiting the sharing of copies with your friend the moral equivalent of Jim Crow. It does not deserve respect. ~ Richard M. Stallman

The only people who have anything to fear from free software are those whose products are worth even less. ~ David F. Emery

Defect-free software does not exist. ~ Wietse Venema

Free software is software that respects your freedom and the social solidarity of your community. So it's free as in freedom. ~ Richard Stallman

Open source is a development methodology; free software is a social movement. ~ Richard Stallman

It's clear that other problems such as [ ... ] the domination of business over government, science, thought, and society, are much bigger than non-free software. ~ Richard Stallman

Paying isn't wrong, and being paid isn't wrong. Trampling other people's freedom and community is wrong, so the free software movement aims to put an end to it, at least in the area of software. ~ Richard Stallman

My favorite programming languages are Lisp and C. However, since around 1992 I have worked mainly on free software activism, which means I am too busy to do much programming. Around 2008 I stopped doing programming projects. ~ Richard Stallman

Whether it's Google or Apple or free software, we've got some fantastic competitors and it keeps us on our toes. ~ Bill Gates

I decided not to have children. (...) I am convinced I made a wise personal decision in avoiding this. But I was not the only one that benefited from it. Everyone did. Not having children is an important contribution to humanity. My decision probably reduced the 2050 population by 5 to 10 people. (...) My decision was a contribution, and enabled me to make another contribution: to launch GNU and the free software movement. Having no dependents, I could dedicate myself to what seemed right rather than to whatever someone with money told me to do. If you are reading this page, it is because that decision enabled me to make contributions to humanity that people appreciate. ~ Richard Stallman

The mainland can stretch until it breaks at the weakest points, and those weaknesses are called faults. Each island represented a victory and a defeat: it had either pulled itself free or pulled too hard and found itself alone. Later, as these islands grew older, they turned their misfortune into virtue, learned to accept their cragginess, their misshapen coasts, ragged where they'd been torn. They acquired grace. ~ Anne Michaels

They fell, but o'er their glorious grave Floats free the banner of the cause they died to save. ~ Francis Marion Crawford

SAP is becoming the standard for business software. Oracle is in a state of chaos. ~ Bill Vaughan

It strikes me as very strange that whereas Tennyson could support most of Mr. Buckley's propositions about free trade, and the private sector, and private enterprise, Tennyson found no difficulty also in lending intellectual support to the idea of Women's Liberation. ~ Germaine Greer

Real teachers like Jesus, Buddha, Nanak, Rumi have much more to teach humanity, than the imaginary figure Krishna, concocted by an ancient Indian man named Vyasa. ~ Abhijit Naskar

If we suggest that it is okay to make fun of everything except certain aspects of Islam because Muslims are much more sensitive than the rest of the population, isn't that discrimination? Shouldn't we treat the second largest religion in France exactly as we treat the first? It's time to put an end to the revolting paternalism of the white, middle-class, "leftist" intellectual trying to coexist with these "poor, subliterate wretches." "'I'm educated; obviously I get that 'Charlie Hebdo' is a humor newspaper because, first, I'm very intelligent, and second, it's my culture. But you - well, you haven't quite mastered nuanced thinking yet, so I'll express my solidarity by fulminating against Islamaphobic cartoons and pretending not to understand them. I will lower myself to your level to show you that I like you. And if I need to convert to Islam to get even closer to you, I'll do it!" These pathetic demagogues just have a ravenous need for recognition and a formidable domination fantasy to fulfill. ~ Charb

Humankind will not be free until the last Kremlin commissar is strangled with the entrails of the last Pentagon chief of staff. ~ Edward Abbey

A goal of Twitch is to be wherever gamers are, whether it's on laptops and handheld devices or integrated into gaming consoles and software. ~ Emmett Shear

some supporters of the unrestrained free market have found that dogma: the claim that science is nothing more than politics. ~ Timothy Snyder

The power of a text is different when it is read from when it is copied out. Only the copied text thus commands the soul of him who is occupied with it, whereas the mere reader never discovers the new aspects of his inner self that are opened by the text, that road cut through the interior jungle forever closing behind it: because the reader follows the movement of his mind in the free flight of day-dreaming, whereas the copier submits it to command. ~ Walter Benjamin

The hypothesis advanced by the propaganda model, excluded from debate as unthinkable, is that in dealing with the American wars in Indochina, the media were "unmindful", but highly "patriotic" in the special and misleading sense that they kept -- and keep -- closely to the perspective of official Washington and the closely related corporate elite, in conformity to the general "journalistic-literary-political culture" from which "the left" (meaning dissident opinion that questions jingoist assumptions) is virtually excluded. The propaganda model predicts that this should be generally true not only of the choice of topics covered and the way they are covered, but also, and far more crucially, of the general background of the presuppositions within which the issues are framed and the news presented. Insofar as there is debate among dominant elites, it will be reflected within the media, which in this narrow sense, may adopt an "adversarial stance" with regard to those holding office, reflecting elite dissatisfaction with current policy. Otherwise the media will depart from elite consensus only rarely and in limited ways. Even when large parts of the general public break free of the premises of the doctrinal system, as finally happened during the Indochina wars, real understanding based upon an alternative conception of the evolving history can be developed only with considerable effort by the most diligent and skeptical. And such understanding as can be reached through serious a ~ Noam Chomsky

All censorships exist to prevent anyone from challenging current conceptions and existing institutions. All progress is initiated by challenging current conceptions, and executed by supplanting existing institutions. Consequently, the first condition of progress is the removal of censorship. ~ George Bernard Shaw

I'm not going to tell you it's not dangerous for you. It is. But if we don't do something, the Royals will be sentenced
to the Ice Caverns. You'll never see Galen or your mother again. I'll never see Rayna again."
"But you're mated to Rayna. Doesn't that make you a Royal, too?"
"Not a true Royal, that's not how it works. They're only talking about purebloods. Paca will be exempt, too. If they're sentenced to the Caverns, we'll both be free to choose different mates. But I don't want another mate, Emma. I want Rayna. I always have. ~ Anna Banks

As I've said before, free money scams are a problem. ~ Matthew Lesko

Undermine the entire economic structure of society by leaving the pay toilet door ajar so the next person can get in free. ~ Taylor Mead

If the outer world is diminished in its grandeur, then the emotional, imaginative, intellectual, and spiritual life of the human is diminished or extinguished. Without the soaring birds, the great forests, the sounds and coloration of the insects, the free-flowing streams, the flowering fields, the sight of clouds by day and the stars at night, we become impoverished in all that makes us human. ~ Thomas Berry

I liked to feel I had to do things perfectly; I felt I was earning my freedom. Though I was in hiding, and though I worked every day until midnight, I felt I was much more in charge of myself than I had ever been. ~ V.S. Naipaul

A free society is a society in which all traditions have equal rights and equal access to the centers of power . A tradition receives these rights not because the importance the cash value, as it were) it has for outsiders but because it gives meaning to the lives of those who participate in it. ~ Paul Feyerabend

Learn technique; have full command to the extent of not being conscious of how it is done. When craftsmanship has been developed, you are free to create ... technique will give way to expression! ~ Sergei Bongart

There was a present on the front seat of Ethan's car, a Gap box tied with a white ribbon. "Happy birthday, Jenna," Ethan said, leaning over to kiss me, his lips cool from the iced chai he stopped for every morning. I opened the box and pulled out an orange sweater with a cream-colored stripe down the arms.
"Thank you. I love it."
"I know," he said, pulling away from the curb. "That's what you said when you handed it to me at the store and told me to get it for your birthday."
"I'm sorry," I said, holding the sweater in my lap. I knew he was just teasing, but I wanted to be the kind of person who could enjoy surprises. I wanted to be as spontaneous and free as everyone else seemed to be and not feel all the time like if I didn't follow some kind of specific map of daily life, disaster would be right there waiting. "I just...really liked it."
"And wanted to make sure you got it," he said, smiling. "So basically you're greedy."
"Basically. ~ Sara Zarr

He who gives away shall have real gain. He who subdues himself shall be free; he shall cease to be a slave of passions. The righteous man casts off evil, and by rooting out lust, bitterness, and illusion do we reach Nirvana. ~ Buddha

For me, the moment the mic is on and it's rolling, it's impossible to vocally relax for some reason. But one day, I'm going to be able to sing the way I sang when I was a little kid, completely open and free. That's, I think, the one thing that's changed: Growing older, I'm not ashamed to hear my voice. ~ Cat Power

To the girls of the Middle East: Be immodest, rebel, disobey, and know you deserve to be free ~ Mona Eltahawy

we are free of each other, and yet not, and never will be. ~ Elizabeth Strout

We should not hoard knowledge; we should be free from our knowledge. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

I obtained life because the time was right. I will lose life because it is time. Those who go quietly with the flow of nature are not worried by either joy or sorrow. People like these were considered in the past as having achieved freedom from bondage. Those who cannot free themselves are constrained by things. ~ Zhuangzi

I create recipes that are not just "good for gluten-free" but just plain GOOD, period! ~ Carol Kicinski

So then you're free?'
'Yes, I'm free,' said Karl, and nothing seemed more worthless than his freedom. ~ Franz Kafka

When I woke up I reminded myself that freedom is never free. You have to fight for it. Work for it and make sure you are able to handle it. Now ~ Toni Morrison

In life, only potential was free. ~ Sofía Segovia

We can see the mind as a lotus. Some lotuses are still stuck in the mud, some have climbed above the mud but are still underwater, some have reached the surface, while others are open in the sun, stain-free. Which lotus do you choose to be? If you find yourself below the surface, watch out for the bites of fishes and turtles. ~ Ajahn Chah

Giving the banks free interest loans is like the government subsidizing the banks. That's crazy! ~ Kenneth Eade

And if you've ever wondered what happens when a person close to you is taken too soon-and it's always too soon-you may find other truths here, truths that may break the grip of sadness in your life, that may set you free from guilt, that may even bring you back to this world from wherever you are hiding. And then you will never fell alone ~ Ben Sherwood

Rebirth is inevitable so long as one has desires. It is like taking the soul from one pillow-case and putting it into another. Only one or two out of many men can be found who are free from all desires. ~ Sarada Devi

Lost in the stormy kiss, Elizabeth felt her legs gliding down his as he gently lowered her against him until her feet touched the floor. But when his fingers pulled at the ribbon that held her gown in place at her shoulder, she jerked free of his kiss, automatically clamping her hand over his. "What are you doing?" she asked in a quaking whisper. His fingers stilled, and Ian lifted his heavy-lidded gaze to hers.
The question took him by surprise, but as he stared into her green eyes Ian saw her apprehension, and he had a good idea what was causing it. "What do you think I'm doing?" he countered cautiously.
She hesitated, as if unwilling even to accuse him of such an unspeakable act, and then she admitted in a small, reluctant voice, "Disrobing me."
"And that surprises you?"
"Surprises me? Of course it does. Why wouldn't it?" Elizabeth asked, more suspicious than ever of what Lucinda had told her.
Quietly he said, "What exactly do you know about what takes place between a husband and wife in bed?"
"You-you mean 'as it pertains to the creation of children'?" she said, quoting his words to her the day she agreed to become betrothed to him.
He smiled with tender amusement at her phrasing. "I suppose you can call it that-for now."
"Only what Lucinda told me." He waited to hear an explanation, and Elizabeth reluctantly added, "She said a husband kisses his wife in bed and that it hurts the first time, and that is how it is done."
Ian hes ~ Judith McNaught

Caleb reached up and slid the tie out of her hair to let it fall free. "You were crazy to do it. But I love you because you're wild and fearless, not in spite of it, and I know the price."

He sensed her cringe against him. "Which is?"

"At random and unexpected times, you terrify the life out of me. ~ G.S. Jennsen