Free access to information...

If we want to keep the world moving forward, while closing the disparity among the people, we need the people to have free access to it and be able to redistribute what's relevant to them.

Closing access to information to anyone does more harm than good, since it limits the options any given person or group to find a solution to whatever problem they might be facing. After all, if there is any way to get solutions is to know what is going on.

To get a clear picture of what is being faced, people need to be able to find information about it and to learn what others did whenever possible. If not, there can be disastrous consequences that could be avoided by simply allowing informations to be freely shared among people and communities.

Information is a common good, and is not something that can be owned by any person or entity. By allowing information to be owned, it's values decreases exponentially. Mainly because the information stops being useful because it can't be put in use in the benefit of the people. Almost all the value of any piece of information relies on being put into work by the people who needs it at any given moment in time.

If we want to make a fairer world to live in, where people can truly hope for a better future, knowledge most spread far wide. And knowledge depends on information, accurate information to be precise, which need to flow freely to those who need it.

So, let's support systems that promote easy and free access to information to the people.

People is smarter than some want us to believe...

For me it's sad and annoying when companies see that others start implementing their own version of something they pioneered, and instead of keep ahead by making their implementation better by adding new features they go the litigation way.

In my mind, trying to get others out of the market by litigating against them is a waste of time and resources. Specially when they have already proven that they can actually come with products that are better and more innovative than the competition. If they keep working on ways to keep ahead of the rest by actually making better products, the odds is that people would keep choosing them.

And let's face it, most of the time people choose they competition devices not because they are confused. Most often the choice is motivated by the fact that the implementation offered by the others is more appealing to that individual.

It seems that some companies do believe that people are stupid, and can't seem to recognize one product from another. They don't seem to want to take into account that when people wants something, specially something that means a substantial investment, they shop around before making the buy. So, they get to know the differences of the products that are interesting for them.

So, let's make sure that all companies understand that we should be the ones deciding what product are successful, and how they are implemented.

Crack bad behavior, not the software...

While I agree that OS vendors have the right to implement a code of conduct for developers. Yet, I don't think that also limiting what they can develop and how it can be developed on the OS.

A great OS, is one that is open for all to develop whatever software developers thing there is a need of and for the user to be able to use the software that better fits his needs. Users should be who decide what software they want to use, and from which developer.

The vendor should limit itself to checking that developers behave themselves according to the code of conduct that was set by the vendor. Otherwise, the vendor should be neutral on what runs on the OS.

Without this level of openness, users can suffer from lack of choice and innovation. The vendor holds a virtual monopoly on what, and how, any piece of software can be implemented. Meaning that they can shut down any developer that does anything that competes on an area they don't want anyone to do so. In essence, the vendor has the power to lock down the user to state that it chooses.

The best way to keep the user safe is not by limiting what the developer can do, and how he can do it. The best way to do so is by educating the users on best practices, and keeping an eye on developer behavior. By doing so, the OS can be as safe as it can be, but let's keep in mind that all have vulnerabilities and bad guys will try to exploit them.

So, if we enlist the both users and developers to make use of best practices the OS software ecosystem will be as safe as it can be. There should be clear behavior guidelines and what will happen if they are breached, with clear penalties depending on the severity of the breach.

Being as open as possible about the software that runs on an OS, is the best option for everyone involved.

Users must have the control...

Software would always be at the control of the user, who should have the final say on what the software does at all times.

Not only that, the users should be able to study and modify their software as much as they please. All the components should be accessible to the user to be studied, or modified, as much as the user chooses to do. Once the the user has the software in his hands, there should be mechanisms that allow the user to do so without having to fear reprisals from the original developers.

Being able to do study and modify the software run on their computers, the users become less dependent on a single single vendor to meet their needs. And if anything should happen to the vendor they relied on, it's a lot easier to find an alternate vendor that fills their needs without much pain.

In some cases, the users themselves can take the software and work on it themselves. Which can give the user an extra layer of protection, and reduce dependence on outside influences, to make their software a better fit to their needs.

Not only that, improvements could be shared by the whole community of users of any given software. Allowing the development to be a lot faster, and giving it a high level of security since you have several people looking at the code.

Since the user can see the source code, and compare it to the original, it becomes harder for people with bad intentions to add malicious segments to the code without being detected. Even if they could add some of that code, the odds of being discovered and corrected quickly is a lot higher. More often than not, any bug or security vulnerability is discovered and patched quickly.

By being open, software can be a mayor tool for users to be able to do a lot with in a safe manner.

Empowering people using FLOSS...

As computers and OS become more advanced, many are left behind mainly because they don't have the money to make the upgrade. It can be because the new OS is just to expensive, and sometimes it's because they have to buy a new computer to run the latest version.

Sadly, for those not being able to run a modern OS on they computer are at a distinct disadvantage. With time, most of the software needed to interact and work with others stops being supported for their OS and they can't upgrade to the most current version because it won't run on their OS. Meaning that they won't be able to access much of the resources needed to remain current, lessening their chances to land new jobs or better their position.

On this area, FLOSS can help leveling the playing field significantly. Having little to no cost to the user, it empowers users to run modern OS's and all the software that comes with it. Not only that, since there are several distros out there than are targeted to computers with low resources, it means that the cost of entry becomes even lower.

Not only FLOSS can give access to more people to computers, it can also give them the chance to start learning to code, or other computer related abilities, from an earlier age. And also, it would help them to learn about other cultures and people that otherwise would be closed to them. By doing so, we could really start seeing the world becoming a global village.

FLOSS can be the perfect tool to truly empower people, and bring the world together. By giving them the chance not only to learn about the world, but actually engaging it, can make the difference to make it a better place to live in.

The power belongs to the people, and FLOSS can be a great way for the people to grab it.

Annoying tendency to over litigate...

For me it's quite annoying to see how some media treats Apple as the only innovative consumer tech company out there. And everyone else coming with products that even resemble one of Apple's is clearly stealing.

It seems that some hardcore Apple fan's have trouble acknowledging that other tech companies can come with their own implementations of software that end up looking like Apple's own their own. They seem to turn a blind eye, or just ignore the fact, that in many cases implementations look the same because there are only so many ways it's practical to do so.

As such, many of the answers end up looking similar even though each came to it own their own.

Many of the disputes, and courtroom battles, could and should be avoided taking this fact of life as it is. At the end, most of the people that goes to Android wouldn't have gone to Apple to begin with. As it turns out, there is enough market place for both the iPhone and Android ecosystems.

I would appreciate if Apple would get itself to innovate instead of litigate in order to win market share.

FLOSS has come a long way...

As a regular Linux, I use Ubuntu 12.04, and FLOSS user I can't but frown when I come across comments saying that FLOSS is not easy to use or that isn't stable for everyday use.

After using Ubuntu for more than two years as my main OS, I haven't had any problem at all. The few crashes I've experienced had been of particular programs, and those haven't affected the system as a whole. And since Unity came along in the 11.04 release, I think Ubuntu has become easier to use and it looks better.

There hasn't been a problem that I couldn't fix in an hour or less, and all came with easy to follow instructions to work the problem out.

Ubuntu is the one Linux distro that I can recommend to people with little experience around computers, let alone people that want to jump to the FLOSS boat. It's easy to use, stable and comes with all the software that most people is going to need out of the box.

And if you need to add something else, with the Ubuntu Software Center now is a lot easier to look for, and install, the software to do the task you need to get done.

Most arguments against FLOSS have been rendered mute, is just the matter of choosing the right distro for your needs.

The correct implementation...

When it comes to software, the most important thing are how innovative it is and how well it's implemented. And for most users the deal breaker is the implementation part, because it's what they see and use to interact with the software.

No matter how innovative a piece of software, if it isn't correctly implemented it won't take off. Most people don't care about the technical part since they want to be able to use they software with ease, and for it to do what it says without a hiccup.

All innovation should just work and do what it says without extra input from the user, the moment the user has to do things that aren't usually needed the magic is lost. It becomes a drag, and the user is most likely stop using the software.

That's why developers should be careful integrating new features to their software, and only release them to the public once they are fully backed. No matter how good idea is, or how innovative it is, if you don't do it right the user will most likely not going to give you a second chance.

It's a difficult balancing act, that's why there are so few truly innovative software companies out there. Many die trying to bring innovation, while implement it just right. In many cases, how the users see the implementations is a matter of perception.

No two users see things the same way, so it's a difficult task to find the implementation that will work for the target audience.

Yet, the most innovative software won't stand a chance if it isn't implemented correctly in the eyes of the users.

Filtering new information to get what you want..

It's amazing how much information can be accessed at this moment of time. And much of it can be accessed on the fly, either by laptops or smartphones at whatever place we might be at any given moment.

As a matter of fact, at the end of the day it's equally what you already know and if you have the ability to find relevant new information to solve problems on the fly. Experience is still valuable, and will remain so, but if you don't develop the ability to keep learning you'll find yourself at a disadvantage.

Equally important is to be able to filter all the information according to its relevance, not being able to filter it effectively can be costly and time consuming. Here is where experience come more handy, since it helps to have a better background to filter the new set of information with. Experience is one of the best tools to filter out the noise.

Information is a powerful tool if, and only if, we can correctly put it in the right context to make it relevant. If not, is just meaningless noise or have almost no use. At the end, no information is not useful by itself.

When information meets experience, they become a virtually unstoppable force. If we have the experience to better filter the information you get, the better choices you make. As with many other aspects of life, all comes to be able to balance.

All comes to applying the right filter to come to the information needed to solve almost every problem.

Open-source values...

If the open-source values of not only giving people access to the core workings, but also the ability to modify and redistribute, where expanded to all other facets of human experience things would be better.

Since all would have access to the core, solutions to the challenges we face would be a lot easier to get to with if we could modify them to work to the situation we face or want to solve. And if that new building blocks could be distributed too, the benefits of that work would reach a lot more people.

Hiding, or not allowing people, to modify the core of anything is not good in the long run for society at large.

Innovation is a lot easier if we all can access the core and work with it to make it better, or to make it work in different ways to better suit other set of parameters. Time after time a lot of projects have shown that the open-source paradigm has show that it work to foster innovation and as a business model.

If we could apply it to our communities, so that anyone can have access to the core working to work on the problem hand on could have the effect of solving our problems a lot faster.

By having the people who want to tackle the problem working directly on the core of what they are trying to solve, the answer will come a lot sooner. Not only that, we would be given the possibility to modify the workings to be better able to work it out, and then be able to redistribute it without any restriction. It would give everything a lot more transparency.

If we work like that, our problems would be a lot easier to sort out.

Control over your system...

On FLOSS the user can have a better fit on the configuration of their system, since the degree of control over the software is really up to the user.

Depending on the distro, the degree of control over what happens on your system is great. Even on the most basic distros, the degree of control is quite great since most of the most important features can be control by the user.

Having such control over what your system does, is important safe guard your privacy. Since there are many people interested on the data you have on your system, is important to be able to control how your system works and protects itself from malware.

Even if the user doesn't actually uses all the configuration options, those options should be there. There is no real reason for not including those options, or why the user shouldn't be able to have control over them. After all, the final word of what goes on the user's system should be the one of the user.

No other should have a say, other than to give information so the user can make a more informed decision on how to better configure his system.

Is our system, we should have the total control over it.