[wonderlust]

You are literally the first person on the internet I've ever seen to believe this. Everyone either doesn't know the concept at all, or knows it to be more or less exactly what open source people say it is. Its been well defined since my beginnings in the AOL cd era, pay per hour 28k modem days.

Its not just Foss people, its common knowledge among technical people.

[zaroth]

If free open source meant the same as open source, then wouldn't they be called "oss people" and not "foss people"?

I've heard the term "published source" used when trying hard not to step in this particular pile.

[arcticfox]

From an article on gnu.org discussing related issues, here's a quote from author Neal Stephenson:

> Linux is “open source” software meaning, simply, that anyone can get copies of its source code files.

And the state of Kansas:

> Make use of open-source software (OSS). OSS is software for which the source code is freely and publicly available, though the specific licensing agreements vary as to what one is allowed to do with that code.

For me, the reason for the confusion comes from (1) the ambiguous use of the word "open" (visible) vs "closed" (hidden) and (2) the fact that I've personally never seen until now a project that was "source available" but not open to modify under some license, so I haven't had to deal with the distinction.

(And since I'm a little insulted by your incredulity that a technical person could believe that to be true, FWIW, it's common knowledge among English speakers when to use "its" and "it's".)

[arcticfox]

And here, even Richard Stallman admits the obvious meaning of the expression:

> However, the obvious meaning for the expression “open source software”—and the one most people seem to think it means—is “You can look at the source code.”

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.h...