On Wed, Aug 03, 2016 at 04:49:00PM +0000, Alison wrote: [snip]
Here's the suggested rewrite from a few mails ago. I think it addresses all the points made here:
Suggested rewrite:
- Our tools are universally available to access, use, adapt, and distribute
The more diverse our users, the less simply being a user of Tor implies about any user, so we aim to create tools that anyone can access and use. We will make most of our tools free of cost. We do not restrict access to our tools unless it is for the security of all users, and we design, build, and deploy our tools without collecting identifiable information about our users. We expect the code and research we publish to be improved by many different people, and that is only possible if everyone has the ability to use, copy, modify, and redistribute our tools.
The added line is "we will make most of our tools free of cost". Is that descriptive enough?
"Most" might invite people to contemplate what fraction of the tools are free of cost: Is it 51%, three-quarters, all but a few exceptions, etc.? This is a distraction from the point being made.
How about, "We will generally make our tools, documentation, trainings, research results, services and support free of cost to users."
I also thought it useful to underscore here that we're not by omission implying that Tor is following some 'give away the razors, sell the razor blades' approach wrt support etc. Hence the mention of other things besides tools. If that's a can of worms not to be touched at this time, drop all that other stuff and revert to just 'tools' with the 'generally' vs. 'most' switch. Also, perhaps I'm being pedantic, but we're not making our tools free of cost. Making our tools costs a lot, we're just not charging the end users. I rephrased that aspect as well.
Also, maybe use 'typically' instead of 'generally'? The important point is that this is the norm, the usual, but we don't want to imply precluding the sorts of integration or deployment that Mike mentioned. I think 'generally' works best here but your intuition may vary.
aloha, Paul