Thanks to Mike Sax for pointing out that the Chicken Little’s over at the Free Software Foundation tried to grab some attention around the launch of the new iPhone by publishing 5 Reasons to Avoid the iPhone. Given that Apple sold more than a million of them in the first 3 days of availability, perhaps the FSF needed a whole lot more than 5 reasons to get people not to give in to their technolust.
More importantly, the FSF might have been more persuasive if its reasons were ACTUALLY TRUE.
The FSF’s number one reason for people to avoid the iPhone is:
iPhone completely blocks free software. Developers must pay a tax to Apple, who becomes the sole authority over what can and can’t be on everyone’s phones.
But wait a tick…doesn’t WordPress have an iPhone application that is open source?. Why yes! Yes it does!
If it isn’t true, why would the FSF say it? Despite all their protestations, the FSF seems to have fallen in love the tactic of FUD.