[indigochill]

> ...avoid things that other people control, because then you must serve as their slave.

A good mantra for self-hosted FOSS as well, come to think of it.

[ralls_ebfe]

But is it really? I just read a german translation, which says to neither wish to have, nor to wish to avoid. Does anyone here know enough greek to clarify this?

[ralls_ebfe]

Another translation:

> Whoever then wishes to be free, let him neither wish for any thing nor avoid anything which depends on others: if he does not observe this rule, he must be a slave.

http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%...

[indigochill]

My parsing of the sentence of the "neither wish to have" part is that the thing the other person controls is the object of this wish.

So it still works if we extrapolate that to something like "If I was in control of this software, I would make it so much better." Well, congrats, because you are (in FOSS)! Even if someone else maintains a project, you can always fork it.

[OJFord]

That was my (native British English) reading of the English too - it's just that GP's quote clips the context.