beyond

open source, but not free

Free here means free-as-in-freedom. The free software definition and open source definition are almost identical, there are very few apps that are only one or the other.

It's the free software movement, though - the four freedoms are literally the cornerstone of the movement. They're not simply a "nice to have" they're the bare minimum of what we should ask for. If we promote non-free "alternatives" we are saying that these basic freedoms are not an expectation, but are optional and negotiable - we are moving the message away from the four freedoms and towards "evil" proprietary applications, while making exceptions for the "lesser evil" ones.

When I say Obsidian is non-free I am not saying Obsidian is evil or you are not allowed to use it. As non-free apps go Obsidian is probably one of the least-worst, as you and many others point out it is just a markdown editor so there is no vendor lock in or weird proprietary format. I am simply saying, this is a movement focused on "the four freedoms" and Obsidian does not meet those four very basic criteria.

Proprietary software is proprietary no matter how "nice" it is. It should not be advertised in FOSS communities and falsely presenting it as "FOSS adjacent" is harmful to the movement IMO.

There are many places so called "good proprietary apps" can be promoted and discussed.

This article is clearly about beans, not onions.

But they told me I can just not connect it to the internet and it'll be just like any dumb device.

Eventually these things will come with modems built in so you can't even do that.

If you trust the client that is encrypting and uploading the file - which runs on your computer and thus can be audited, modified, or even entirely replaced by you. You do not need to trust that the server (which ideally is also free software, but in practice is a black box you don't have any visibility into) is sending you trustworthy code.

I don't know if grouping disparate projects under the "community" label has any worthwhile benefit. Given the label is meant to classify related operating systems, the label should provide an accurate description of the basis of the system. A simpler solution would be to just say GNU/Linux is a subcategory of Linux (and maybe even sub-sub-categorize by package manager or init system or whatever makes the most sense). Similarly, I think Android and its derivatives are worthy of being its own classification of Linux operating system (as long as you don't try to claim "it's not real Linux" or whatever).

With regards to software compatibility, I think it's rather the other way around - software written for "Linux" usually works on any POSIX operating system, and sometimes even Windows. Unless you're talking about binary compatibility, which is meaningless in the Linux space anyway.

Why not also recognize systemd, or musl, or kde or gnome or any of the other millions of non GNU packages that are needed to make up a complete OS.

Unironically there might be some value in recognizing "systemd/Linux" as a subfamily of Linux operating systems.

And these days GNU makes up less and less of the core packages that most distros run anymore.

Linux makes up exactly one package on a so-called Linux system.

Not at all, really. Forking is fine and building a business off of it is fine (I don't personally see the value in it but apparently Y Combinator saw fit to invest in this so what do I know). Where they fucked up was replacing the existing free software license with some "AI" generated mumbo jumbo, because they were "too busy building" to "bother with legal."

You didn't have to "bother" with creating a license, because there already was one. No one in free software should be rolling their own custom license (GPT generation aside) because there exist perfectly good ones already.

I'll be "that guy":

F-Droid is a software repository, not an app store. The distinction is subtle but important. A software repository offers a community-curated collection of software packages whereas an app store is just a marketplace for software developers to offer products to end-users. A software repository serves the interests of its community first, whereas an app store is merely a means for developers to sell products to end-users.

There are those who believe that F-Droid's role as a "middle man" vetting and building packages from source instead of blindly shipping builds provided by upstream makes it a security risk, because you're trusting F-Droid in addition to (some say instead of) the upstream developer. Perhaps telling is that none of these critics can offer an alternative solution.

Before anyone mentions Obtainium and Accrescent, these are not alternatives to F-Droid, they solve completely different problems.

Apple intentionally makes iPhone-Android interoperability crap in order to sell iPhones. That's not conspiracy theorizing, Tim Apple blatantly admitted to it.

https://www.theverge.com/2022/9/7/23342243/tim-cook-apple-rcs-imessage-android-iphone-compatibility