water cooler :: Phrases and sayings....

Been thinking about this since I read Roberts say "I eat my own dog food" in one of his posts (I'm waiting for the tee shirts with his picture and that caption to go on sale..). What does "eat my own dog food" really mean and where did it come from?

Another one that I see a lot on Linux websites is "Free, as in beer". Does that mean it's not free? It is free?

"Free, as in beer." means that it costs somebody something, but they are willing to share it for nothing, and you can do whatever you want with it. It's not free of cost, but free of restrictions.

Eat my dog food= use my own programs, also sometimes = not willing to share feedback with strangers.
Alternatively, too lazy to go shopping , hungry enough to litteraly eat your dog food

See the wikipedia for more information on the subject:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_software

The word "free" can have multiple meanings.

For example, "free" can mean "freedom" in the sense that you have approval to say or do anything that you want to say or do.

Or "free" can mean "free of charge", where you do not need to pay a purchase price to aquire an object or service.

Free "freedom" and free "free of charge" are different concepts.

For example, Microsoft may give you a "free of charge" copy of an Internet Explorer install disk, but they maintain control of the software through a very restrictive "End User License Agreement" that prevents you from doing certain things to the software product.

While we're at it, how about the dog food reference. I love wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eat_one%27s_own_dog_food

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