There’s a bunch of reasons why the capital F in “Free Software” matters (hint — it’s not about the $). Here’s an example that came by way of Slashdot. Apparently, Windows Media Center will now block you from 100% legal time-shifting. It’s not enough that we had to go to the Supreme Court in the 80s to confirm that this is a totally legal activity, but now the content producers have decided to use technology to end-run around the law. Heck, look at iTunes and the first-sale doctrine. Good luck trying to transfer music you’ve legally purchased in an after-market sale to someone else. In this case, the capital F in free software means that you’ve got a lot of Freedom associated with it. This sort of protectionist racketeering isn’t possible in a system that’s Free, and even if this MediaPC thing turns out not to be true, it doesn’t really change the bottom line that it could happen, and there’s not much you can do about it since you don’t control your machine.