What cost? You're stating this as a fact, when it certainly isn't. As I've pointed out in another comment, the claim that usability is an orthogonal concept to Freedom is a false dichotomy.
Yes, there are quite some issues at the moment, I'm not going to deny that. The thing is, a lot of those, like missing hardware support, are not the fault of the Free Software community, it's the fault of the very things we're trying to stop: closed/locked hardware, proprietary drivers, non-open file-formats or Freedom-denying practices like DRM or tivoization, and finally plain and simple FUD (named as the single most critical problem GNU/Linux faces in an infographic released by the Linux Foundation last year[1]).
Before someone points out that shifting the blame doesn't make the problems go away, let me add that I'm perfectly aware of this. I just want to make it clear that it's unfair to blame Free Software for a lot of the problems it faces, when in fact we fought and tried to prevent a lot of them for more than two decades.
This IS clear to everyone; it's simply irrelevant. Life's not fair. We all have to deal with unfair problems. Emphasizing the unfairness of your problems only makes the FSF look less "idealistic as in principled" and more "idealistic as in naive."
Relatedly, your most critical problem is not external, it's that the FSF is now associated more closely with non-issues like "GNU/Linux" nomenclature than solving serious problems.
Suck it up, grit your teeth, and press on. That's what it takes to be successful in just about any field of life. Anything else ends with you sitting on the sidelines, impotently complaining about how unfair it all is and how bad all the successful organizations are.
It's us hopeless dreamers that have built the world you say has no place for us. And we will continue to dream, and make our dreams reality, no matter how much you tell us we should accept defeat and just face the "reality of life", whatever that is.
So no, we're not going to "suck it up", but we're going to press on, to make a better world for future generations.
Don't misread me as a visionless hack. I would never discourage dreaming. My point was not that you are thinking too big, but rather exactly the opposite: that the FSF so often gets caught up in trivial distractions.
"Suck it up" does not mean "accept defeat," it means to accept the blows that come with contesting the arena of ideas, and get serious about effectively pursuing your mission. You don't get to just pretend the arena of ideas doesn't exist.
Free software is an ideology, and as an ideology it badly needs a prophet, someone who can inspire reverence for the cause the way that Carl Sagan or Neil deGrasse Tyson can inspire reverence for science.
rms is wasting his influence. Just look at the primary GNU Project About page; it's a disaster of anxious dissembling, fussing over terminology, scolding people who only 95% agree with him, and taking pages and paaaaages to do it. That is not how you lead.
"If you want to build a ship, don't drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea."
When the FSF has a message other than "the waves are choppy and all the boats are unsound so you better stay close to shore," maybe they'll find that people start listening.
What cost? You're stating this as a fact, when it certainly isn't. As I've pointed out in another comment, the claim that usability is an orthogonal concept to Freedom is a false dichotomy.
Yes, there are quite some issues at the moment, I'm not going to deny that. The thing is, a lot of those, like missing hardware support, are not the fault of the Free Software community, it's the fault of the very things we're trying to stop: closed/locked hardware, proprietary drivers, non-open file-formats or Freedom-denying practices like DRM or tivoization, and finally plain and simple FUD (named as the single most critical problem GNU/Linux faces in an infographic released by the Linux Foundation last year[1]).
Before someone points out that shifting the blame doesn't make the problems go away, let me add that I'm perfectly aware of this. I just want to make it clear that it's unfair to blame Free Software for a lot of the problems it faces, when in fact we fought and tried to prevent a lot of them for more than two decades.
[1]: http://content.linuxfoundation.org/20th/images/linuxthennowi...