User:Andrew89

This user knows that GNU's Not Unix.

This user is playing free media formats.

This user is interested in contributing to End Software Patents.

This user is interested in contributing to Defective by Design.

This user supports the Open Document Format.

This user supports the FSF's group campaign against ACTA.

Not Facebook'd ! You won't find me on Facebook

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Username	Andrew89
Full name	Andrew Ter-Grigoryan
Email	roeplay@lavabit.com
XMPP/Jabber	AndrewT@jabber.org
Website	https://diasp.org/people/17049
Blog
Microblog
IRC	AndrewT (irc.freenode.net)
Groups
Learning
Spoken languages	English
Programming languages
Identities
Interests
City	Bowling Green
State	Kentucky
Country	United States of America

My Free Software Odyssey

FSF member # 8401.

My entry into the world of free software really began when I tried Ubuntu 7.10 (Gutsy Gibbon). Prior to that, I was using an assortment of free software applications on Windows, and well before that, I had heard of "open source" and "Linux".

Eventually, I became more serious about free software ideals, researched the history of the movement, Richard Stallman, the GNU project, etc., and joined the FSF. I wanted to start using a completely free distribution, and Trisquel GNU/Linux was the only one that fit the bill. I was actively involved in the Trisquel project from winter of 2009 until spring of 2011, particularly in the areas of documentation and bug testing. The experience was worthwhile. In early June of 2011, in the spirit of compromise, I decided to migrate to Fedora. Fedora may not meet the FSF standards for a free distributio, but besides being a well-rounded beauty of an operating system, Fedora Project is more committed to the ideals of free software than most of the other popular distributions. The free software movement has come a long way after all these years, and perhaps it will one day come so far that using a fully-free distribution is not a thorny experience. That day has not yet arrived.

For years, I have avoided Facebook. Since mid-2011, however, I have been a part of the Diaspora community. Hopefully this thing keeps growing and growing and turns into a game-changer for the social networking world. The battle is being fought uphill and it's going to be a long haul.

Like many, I find myself somewhere in between the uncompromising dogmatism of Richard Stallman and the devil-may-care approach of Linus Torvalds. If free software ever wins out, it probably won't be because society begins demanding freedom from its software, because in general (and unfortunately) people don't like to reflect on the ethical implications of their choices. I like to think I've chosen a path of productive moderation.

I still call it GNU/Linux, because I believe in giving credit where it is due (and a great deal more credit is due to the GNU project than it has received), and I still prefer the term "free software", because "open source" misleads people as to the main ethical value of the software -- freedom for each and every user.