I'm getting quite annoyed with our representatives for the Debian project arguing over the definition of `free'.

I don't think anyone can argue that the binary-only firmwares and licences which restrict use of a `corporate image' are not free in the sense of which the whole project is founded.

But debian already caters for non-free stuff in the non-free archive... which for most userspace programs, is just as convenient to use as the other archives. So whats the problem? We shift the non-free stuff into the non-free archive... most of the complaints are to do with the added difficulty of installing the software once in non-free.

So there's the problem: too difficult to use non-free in some circumstances. Thats what needs fixing - no need to say "yeah so this isn't free but it's too hard to live without".