Freeing the Mind: Free Software and the Death of Proprietary Culture

The subject matter we are going to talk about is variously named and thewords have some resonances of importance. I am going to use the phrase Free Software to describe this material, and I am going to suggest to you that the choice of words is relevant. We are talking not merely about a form of production or a system of industrial relations, but also about the beginning of a social movement with specific political goals, which will characterize not only the production of software in the twenty-first century, but the production and distribution of culture generally. My purpose this morning is to put that process in large enough context so that the significance of free software can be seen beyond the changes in the software industry alone. Business Week, we can assume, needs to hype its material in order to make people want to read below the first paragraph. But I think Business Week here is probably guilty of low blood pressure