> OSX users do not have this freedom. Hence, prevalence of OSX reduces software freedom.

This doesn't follow. Like most arguments about proprietary software reducing, rather than not providing, software freedom, it seems to rest on the assumption that if proprietary software did not exist, it would be replaced use-for-use with Free software, that is, that license models have no impact on the creation or distribution of software.

That's why this rhetoric is dishonest. It's the use of this specialist meaning of the word freedom in a way which is opposite to it's conventional meaning.

If you stop using this misleading word, the whole GPL thing looks more reasonable, but also less like a moral crusade.

Not really. Freedom to modify your software is a kind of freedom which cannot exist when you are exercising your freedom to use proprietary software. Like many things in our world, it's a tradeoff.

This is doublespeak. You are conflating the words freedom and choice.

That seems like a narrow definition of software freedom , but in that case I'd argue that the utility gained from software freedom is not as valuable to users as the incentive gained by developers for being able to distribute their software under a more permissive licence.

There's never a need to distribute software under a more permissive license except enabling distribution of software under less permissive licenses.

That's a very important need.

You're going to need to elaborate, for discussion to be useful.

So that people can make money out of software and incentivize its development.

If such an amount of software is being produced under the GPL that inability to borrow from that pool of work is significantly hampering proprietary development, I'd say it's plainly false that this is the only way to incentivize software development and quite possibly the case that it's not the best way.

So your absolutist position about "there's never a need..." translates into a dislike for paid software as a business model.

What business models for software do you prefer, and why?

You removed my qualification, attributed the result to me, and called it an absolute position. I would not make, with confidence, the statement "There is never a need to release under a more permissive license." To get there from what I said, you would need "There is never a need to distribute under a less permissive license." I do think this need is exaggerated, but labeling that "absolutist" strikes me as odd.

I have no objection to "paid software" as a business model, because the term is too broad. Paying someone to add a feature I want to a GPL project and release the result is, I think, not something anyone would object to. I have objection to "proprietary software" as a business model, because it collapses the value that the software can provide; I am not convinced that this objection is sufficient to say that proprietary software is always the wrong choice. I have more objection to proprietary software where, having paid, I cannot see the source and make changes (or pay others to make changes).

There are a number of alternatives for funding development of mass-market software that are more compatible with copyleft licenses (donations, threshold pledge models, consulting) and I'm currently working on an innovative project in this space.