The obvious common sense definition of "open source" is "I can see the source." This is probably what everyone in this thread automatically thought of, except those to whom the agenda of the Open Source Initiative is of extreme importance and who thus have memorized their definition.

I don't think anyone has memorized it, but everyone who was around when "open source" was first introduced and we debated it to death (compared to "free software") knows that the source being available isn't enough.

So it's not Open Source™, as defined by The Open Source Initiative. I'll still call it open source as there is source in the open that doesn't seem leaked maliciously.

Calling it that could be parsed in a way that would be technically true, but it would be intentionally obtuse, in the same way that a cowboy who rides off on a horse named Tuesday could be described as having "left on Tuesday," or a malware author fond of white fedoras might be described as a "white hat hacker."

"Open source" has been understood to mean "freely redistributable and modifiable" source for a couple of decades now, and if you used it to mean something else without clarifying, you should expect that they will misunderstand you.

> "Open source" has been understood to mean "freely redistributable and modifiable" source for a couple of decades now

I don't know if this is true universally, or only in certain communities.

Only certain communities. Such as... the general open source community. And maybe even software developers in general. I can definitely see this being misunderstood by end users or others because licensing and the related terminology is just plain confusing, but as long as I can remember it was very clear that there's a difference between shared source, 'available' source, and open source.

The same exact arguments can be made about free software, only worse because colloquially users have traditionally confused it with the term freeware.

Right, one of the strong arguments in favor of the term was that “open source” had no pre-existing meaning to constantly struggle against. Thus my frustration with the persistent confusion, where by “confusion” I mean “con men falsely claiming that their software is open-source in order to free-ride on the goodwill the open-source community has earned through decades of hard work and persistence against impossible odds in order to guarantee basic human rights to everyone in an increasingly computer-mediated world.”

>source in the open

That's not a normal sentence construction though, it sounds tortured.

You may be able to see through my windows into my home: that doesn't mean my home is open to you.

No, it is “source available”.

It’s the difference between UFC and MMA, or declaring that addition == subtraction (if only you negate all the terms).

If you don’t use the term correctly, then you’re muddying the waters.

Source Available - unknown license

Free Software - no cost, may or may not have source available

Open Source - OSI approved, there exists an automatic license to at least use or redistribute the code unmodified

Free Software doesn't mean no cost, it means software where "the users have the freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software".

Two commonly used definitions are the Debian Free Sotware Guidelines (https://www.debian.org/social_contract#guidelines) and the FSF's Free Software Definition (https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.en.html).

Nicely demonstrating that just as "open source" is open to multiple interpretations, so is "free software". Within certain communities, there are widely-accepted definitions (from OSI, FSF, Debian, etc) but not everyone automatically understands the terms according to these definitions.

> Nicely demonstrating that just as "open source" is open to multiple interpretations, so is "free software".

Not really, no. The FSF definition of 'free software' is accepted by the technical community as the definition of the term. Same goes for the OSI's definition of Open Source.

> not everyone automatically understands the terms according to these definitions

Not really, no. No-one knowledgeable about these topics is going to insist upon non-standard definitions of the terms. Marketing drones may abuse the terms, and ignorant people don't know any better than to be imprecise, but they are not the same thing as what you are suggesting.

Debian do not make up their own definitions. They explicitly mention both the FSF and OSI in their article on licensing. They certainly have their own ideas on intellectual property (their famous objections to Mozilla's rules about the Firefox trademark), but I don't see them redefining any terms. They are careful to use Debian Free Software Guidelines (DFSG) when referring to their own rules. [0]

Aside: it can be helpful to capitalise to emphasise that you mean the proper definitions of the terms, e.g. The software is neither Free Software nor Open Source. Clunky, sure enough, but people do occasionally make up their own definitions and run with them, often enough that it's a problem for clear communication.

I'm not really sure why. Making up your own personal definitions for terms already in common parlance, is usually treated as an exercise in obtuse silliness, for obvious reasons.

Usually, no exception is made for when an accepted technical term is misused in common parlance, e.g. using 'theory' for any explanation that pops into your head, or referring to an automatic rifle as a 'machine gun'. In those instances we separate the popular use of the term from the technical one, and still insist on correct terminology in technical circles.

[0] Point 31 of https://people.debian.org/~bap/dfsg-faq.html

> Nicely demonstrating that just as "open source" is open to multiple interpretations, so is "free software". Within certain communities, there are widely-accepted definitions (from OSI, FSF, Debian, etc) but not everyone automatically understands the terms according to these definitions.

At least for "free", it (used to be?) very common to add an "as in" after, like "free as in beer" (you don't have to pay) or "free as in speech" (you can do what you want with it).

Yes, it's true that some people misunderstand them, but it's a good thing that these terms have clear and widely understood meanings (compared to something completely vague like, say, "agile") and so we should promote correct usage rather than letting them drift.

Who benefits from watering them down? People who want to take advantage of confusion to release their software under weaker licenses while taking advantage of the "open source" or "free software" names.

Those three definitions are so similar that when they disagree it's usually because someone is misinterpreting something. The key disagreements between Debian and the FSF are about invariant sections in documentation and the mere existence of Debian’s non-free category, which it explicitly doesn't claim is free software.