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[mauvebic]

Complaining about proprietary software or speaking out against it doesn't limit anyone's choices.

You don't have to use it, what does it matter to you that others do? Can't FLOSS stand on it's own merits?

I'm involved in a project to replace Game Maker. There's a complete working 2-D game engine (used as a library) which I developed almost on my own, and now I'm working on the "room editor" (for building levels and such).

At least you're not all talk, i'd be interested in seeing the project page :-)

[onpon4]

You don't have to use it, what does it matter to you that others do? Can't FLOSS stand on it's own merits?

It's partly selfless concern; I don't think it's right for people to be victims of proprietary software, so I speak out against it just as I would speak out against suppression of free speech, for example.

In addition, on the level of my own self-interest, if everyone accepts proprietary software, then it is harder for me to be free. For example, today, it is difficult to find computers with wireless cards that work without proprietary firmware blobs, and it is even more difficult to find computers which work with a free BIOS. That hurts me as well as others.

At least you're not all talk, i'd be interested in seeing the project page :-)

Emilio hasn't made a proper project page for Stellar, just a blog which now has some incorrect information: http://stellarpygame.blogspot.com

SGE's homepage is http://stellarengine.nongnu.org, project page is https://savannah.nongnu.org/projects/stellarengine.

[mauvebic]

People can be "victims" of poorly written FLOSS too.

Fact is, Minetest is the only game I enjoy on Linux, and it wouldn't even be playable without the proprietary graphics driver that go with the card I paid good money for. Nor am I victim (or unenlightened) because I enjoy non-free games on windows.

Selfless, or self-righteous?

[onpon4]

People can be "victims" of poorly written FLOSS too.

Then you misunderstand my position.

My position is not that proprietary software is crappy and therefore users suffer. That's more in line with the open source position. My position is that users deserve the freedom to control their own computing, and for that, they need to be given the source code of the programs they run and have the freedom to use, modify, and redistribute modified or unmodified versions of the programs. The quality of the software, while I want it to be good, is secondary to freedom.

Actually, I don't agree with the open source position. Sometimes proprietary software is genuinely not very good (e.g. Windows 95), but sometimes proprietary software is, practically speaking, at least as good as similar free software (e.g. Apple OS X). Although it would be great if free software does produce better results on average than proprietary software, I see no compelling reason to believe that to necessarily be the case. I don't tend to argue about this, though, because it doesn't really matter for my position. If I'm wrong, that's great, and if I'm right, that's fine, because practical convenience is secondary.