On Sat, May 2, 2020 at 2:17 PM Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca>
wrote:

> >>> I don't know, but it
> >>> seems like both Vi(m) & Emacs have got a revival lately.
> >> That's true for FOSS editors in general, though. We didn't have so many
> good
> >> options before.
> > Indeed, seems as a general trend, we have never had so much FOSS
> > software in general, not just editos, but everything, from AI research
> > to Game Engines, 3D Editors, compilers, libraries, you name it. Seems
> > like world has realized power of open source, which is great.
>
> Sadly, I believe this only applies to a particular subset of the uses
> of computers.  Maybe we could describe it as the subset that applies to
> desktop computers.  In the tablet/phone world, Free Software is
> not nearly as prevalent (instead, in that sphere, the most prevalent is
> freeware which is a name that mostly disappeared, replaced by the name
> "free software").
>

I agree in general, bit things aren't necessarily as stark as they might
seem; there are a fair (I originally said "reasonable" and then rejected
that implication) number of iOS and Android packages that make their source
code available for all to see and maybe-use. The troubles tend to arise
where the tools for building and installing that software is closed, and
also in the steady move towards "walled gardens" where a user needs to jump
through extradoridinary hoops to install and run self-made software on
their own devices. As a practical matter, the rough shape of Android app
security has resulted in strong movements towards ever more proprietary
walls for a large set of users, the platform maintainers (Google and the
various OEMs), and many of the software producers (because "knock-off"
versions of popular software with added spyware/exploit code is so common).
At least in the U.S., the hegemony of the mobile carrier networks makes
free mobile software very difficult. From my own perspective of hobby-level
hacking on mobile hardware since the mid 90's, it feels a bit like "one
step forward, two steps back, and then the goalposts get moved forward 20
meters".

Sorry for the tangent; thanks for the FSF & GNU.
~Chad