Information Is Free

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Revision as of 16:39, 10 January 2007 by Phib (Talk) (Why Is Information Free?)

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This is part of the 3-line mantra propounded by Red1

 Information Is Free
 People Are Not
 Contributors Are Priceless


Why Is Information Free?

Without free information, Open Source becomes a mockery. This simple concept of Open Knowledge allows an Open Source application to achieve a greater adoption rate than otherwise, and gain the reach and brand-recognition that is well-deserved for the creators of such information and Open Source software.

Exceptions To The Rule?

There are seemingly no exceptions to the above rule including the knowledge on how to operate a certain business software is considered Free Information. However the 2nd principle of People Are Not has consequence on the first.


When People Are At Stake

A transactional or accounting information that has private value peculiar only between private parties in transaction are considered sacred and thus succumb to the People Are Not (Free) and falls out of the purview of the first Information Is Free principle.

Information such as a business practice or formula that is of competitive advantage for a client user falls also under the category of personal value too.

Security information that may expose a person or 'people' to harm or danger or legal threat can also be looked upon as not free information.

Such cases are considered 'People Data' .


Applying 'People Data'

When People Data exist within an application, they should be blanked out and commented such as "*** Password " or "*** Place Your Formula Here ". In contemporary programming practice using meta-data can resolve the need to hard-code such data into an application. Thus a database dump that contain such People Data can be kept private.

Other Open Policies

Any policy can be suggested by anyone but it has to be voted before it is adopted as policy. Reasons for exploring such policies is to reconcile with the prime principle of Open Knowledge, Open Business and Open Community against the 2nd principle that People Are Not (Open).