It seems that OSCON 2006 has sparked discussion about the relevancy of free software in the software as service world that Web 2.0 is taking us to. If all collaboration and data is tied to remote web servers controlled by some commercial entity, where do the four freedoms fit?

We discussed this with Tuomas in our GUADEC feeds and synchronization talk and argued that as long as APIs and data are open, free software should attempt to integrate the with services.

While it means that there will be increasing reliance on proprietary services, it also means that we are not confining our users to the small box that is their desktop but instead let them collaborate and share data freely.

Later, if free peer-to-peer services for similar functionalities emerge we can easily start supporting also those, as the UIs and users are already adapted to the social way of working that Web 2.0 services can facilitate.