is a very complicated point. some people think that ELITISM have the same efect. thats why ubuntu has a place where debian fails to be.

also, the existence of maemo has pushed a pack of open source modules to the kernel´s main tree AFAIK

some people thinks that the freedom of opensouce is the right to fork. also, that was killing the linux community by creating short lived distros here and there

i still dont know what kind of freedom will prevail