Translations:Essays:Why the FSF does not consider Debian as a free distribution/162/en

For a long time, Debian included a browser called Iceweasel, which was nothing more than a rebrand of the Firefox browser. The rebranding was carried out for two reasons. First, the browser logo and name are trademarks of the Mozilla Foundation, and the provision of non-free software contradicts the DFSG. Second, by including the browser in the distribution, the Debian developers had to comply with the requirements of the Mozilla Foundation, which prohibits the delivery of a modified version of the browser under the name Firefox. Thus, the developers had to change the name, because they constantly make changes to the browser code to fix bugs and eliminate vulnerabilities. But at the beginning of 2016 Debian was lucky to have a modified browser that does not fall under the above restrictions and can retain the original name and logo. On the one hand, this is a recognition of merit and a demonstration of trust in Debian. On the other hand, the software, obviously uncleaned from non-free components, is now a part of the distribution. If by this time Debian had been included in the list of free GNU/Linux distributions, the Free Software Foundation wouldn’t have hesitated to point this out.