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First Impressions of Freespire 1.0

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the tapping-a-market dept.

Nate writes "Freespire 1.0 was released a few days ago, taking the desktop-oriented Linspire distribution and making it freely available (as in beer) to the world. Linux Format has some first impressions of the release, focusing on its much-trumpeted media playback facilities thanks to codec licensing. Flash, Java, DVD and WMV support out-the-box — could this climb to the top of the desktop distro ladder?"

12 of 201 comments (clear)

  1. OK, just how GPL compliant is it??? by advocate_one · · Score: 4, Interesting

    can I make a copy of the cdrom and pass it on to my friends and even charge for my time in making the copy??? do those licensed codecs conflict with my rights under the GPL for the rest of the distro?

    --
    Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
    1. Re:OK, just how GPL compliant is it??? by yuna49 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      No, you have no redistribution rights whatsoever for the proprietary components. See
      http://wiki.freespire.org/index.php/Summary_of_Pro prietary_Components. There's an "OSS" version that contains none of the proprietary items and is, presumably, redistributable.

      I'm really puzzled by all of this. First, why would Microsoft license its WMV technologies to a Linux distribution? I can understand someone like Sun licensing Java, or ATI/nVidia licensing their drivers, but Microsoft? Why would they want to make it easier for a Linux distribution to compete with Windows, especially in an area where Microsoft has the advantage, namely bundling proprietary software?

      Second, who is paying the licensing fees here? I presume that Linspire has to pay royalties for each download of Freespire. Where is the money coming from? On the wiki site, Linspire says it's paying for things like server space, etc., but doesn't really talk about the licensing fees. Are they really making so much money that they can afford to pay royalties but not be compensated by end-users in return?

    2. Re:OK, just how GPL compliant is it??? by JonJ · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I suspect the .wmv-thing has something to do with the settlement between the two companies back when it was still "Lindows".

      --
      -- Linux user #369862
  2. Re:KDE 3.3 ? Are they stuck in time?? by GreatBunzinni · · Score: 4, Interesting

    And have you noticed that since 3.3 there was 3.4 and now there is 3.5? Why is this distribution the only one having stability problems with KDE so that it can only ship with a version which is almost 2 years old? KDE 3.3 may be stable but so is 3.4. There is absolutely no need to ship with such a backward version.

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  3. Proprietary Codec Fun by ElleyKitten · · Score: 4, Interesting
    Flash, Java, DVD and WMV support out-the-box
    Mepis and a few other distros have these. What is special about Freespire? I rtfa, and the difference seems to be an older KDE. My friend wants me to install the new Mepis on her computer. Is there any reason I should look at Freespire?
    --
    "What is Internet Explorer 7? Are you saying we can't access the normal internet?" - I love tech support. Really.
    1. Re:Proprietary Codec Fun by ElleyKitten · · Score: 3, Interesting
      "Mepis and a few other distros have these. What is special about Freespire? I rtfa, and the difference seems to be an older KDE. My friend wants me to install the new Mepis on her computer. Is there any reason I should look at Freespire?"
      No. But then you're not who this is aimed at. I suspect this is geared more to the people wanting to try Linux for themselves having already used Windows.
      Well, so is Mepis. To clarify a bit on what I was saying in my first post: My friend, who doesn't have a lot of Linux experience, is interested in Mepis because I've told her it's good for Linux newbs, and she'll still have all the proprietary goodness without the install hassle (I used more words when describing this to her). Mepis and Freespire seem very simular, is there anything about Freespire that would make it better for my friend than Mepis?
      --
      "What is Internet Explorer 7? Are you saying we can't access the normal internet?" - I love tech support. Really.
    2. Re:Proprietary Codec Fun by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

      freespire paid for the propietary code or got permission. Mepis and some others that offer similar just slap it in and cross their fingers (AFAIK) for that stuff.

  4. Am I missing something? by WidescreenFreak · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I'm curious as to how this is going to help Linspire. I reviewed one of their books recently, and they said that the primary reason why they've had to charge for the software is to pay for the codec licensing. Okay, I understand that completely. But what the (insanely light) article doesn't go into is how the free version with codecs is comparable to the "commercial" version.

    Because this free version is DVD and WMV compliant at installation, that right there means that those are two technologies that supposedly have to be licensed. Linspire is now giving them away. So, wouldn't that mean that they're actively losing money on those licensing fees with every download? How is that going to benefit a Linux distro that already is not very popular?

    Is there some "between the lines" information that I'm just not seeing here?

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    The Overrated mod is for reversing inappropriate, positive mods, not for voicing disagreement with a post.
  5. Re:Wireless by AlexDeGruven · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I'm currently running a Broadcom wlan (Dell TrueMobile 1400). Uses the bcmwl5 windows driver and works like a champ. Some stuff is still WIP like WPA, but it does everything I currently need it to.

    --
    Randal Graves says: I'm a firm believer in the philosophy of a ruling class... Especially since I rule.
  6. Re:Why are these things even an issue? by Excelsior · · Score: 3, Interesting
    But seriously, Gentoo doesn't seem to have nearly the problems I hear of other distros having with licensing.
    Don't be confused. What Gentoo and most desktop-centric distributions are doing is being legal by putting it on the users to break the law to get the features they want. That's fine, and that's the best we can expect from a non-profit distribution. But don't confuse it with being all around legal. It simply works because no patent holder is going to attempt to extract royalties from the anonymous hordes of people that have downloaded and installed Gentoo or Ubuntu. That doesn't mean it's legal.

    Conversely, Linspire acquires licenses for encumbered software, then distributes the software licensed. I believe they are still tainting the kernel they distribute and losing GPL compliance, though.
  7. Re:Time will tell by joshier · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I think this is what we need.

    Linux gets a good name because the ease of use of this distro.

    People switch
    People realize that Linspire (free) is good, but there's better linux distros after getting used to Linux.

    People are now confident, acknowledged within the linux enviroment and open to try other distros if they wish.

    Mission successful.

  8. naw by zogger · · Score: 2, Interesting

    No, they haven't for a long time now. They listened to the kvetching (it was a good point after all) and changed. My impression is they really do listen, really want an easy desktop "just works" type distro that most anyone could use or OEM hardware vendors can use, and have tried pretty hard to pull it off. They need to make a buck somehow to work fulltime on it obviously, but most of the other larger distros do that as well. You can go to their forums and frequently see the ceo answering questions. Maybe not perfect, but it shows they are trying.