[FSFE PR][EN] FSF Europe Newsletter

FSF Europe press at fsfeurope.org
Thu May 5 20:38:51 CEST 2005


1. Ciaran O'Riordan working full-time for FSFE
2. IFSO becoming associate organisation
3. WIPO IIM on "Development Agenda"
4. FSFE office in Hamburg
5. Fellowship SmartCards being sent out
6. Freedom party in Milano
7. Teaching the World Bank
8. FSF Latin America on its way
9. Nordic University Computer Club Conference in Sweden
10. Alessandro Rubini speaks at University in Lecce
11. Web pages translated to 14 languages


1. Ciaran O'Riordan working full-time for FSFE

Thanks to the success of FSFE's Fellowship campaign, Ciaran O'Riordan,
long-time Irish Free Software advocate, is now working full-time for
Free Software Foundation Europe in Brussels. Among other things he is
working with FSFE's associate organisation FFII on the software patent
issue and the other FSFE activities at European Union level. FSFE
hopes that with the increasing number of Fellows it will be possible
to make this a permanent activity.


2. IFSO becoming associate organisation

The FSFE is happy to welcome Irish Free Software Organisation (IFSO)
as its latest associate organisation. IFSO was founded on 5 January
2004, the 20th anniversary of the GNU project, and works to protect
Free Software developers and users from harmful changes in legislation
as well as promoting awareness of Free Software in Ireland.


3. WIPO IIM on "Development Agenda"

Last month, the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) met in
Geneva for its Intersessional-Intergovernmental-Meeting (IIM) on the
establishment of a "Development Agenda for WIPO." That title refers to
the idea of establishing a critical review process for WIPO policies
in terms of their beneficial and harmful effects with specific regard
to developing country needs.

As this is the kind of reform the WIWO declaration [1] is pushing for,
Georg Greve and Karsten Gerloff participated in the IIM. Georg Greve
also staid for the Permanent Committee on Cooperation for Development
related to Intellectual Property (PCIPD) and both statements are
available online [2][3]. More information is available in Karstens
Blog [4].

 [1] http://www.fsfeurope.org/documents/wiwo.en.html
 [2] http://www.fsfeurope.org/projects/wipo/statement-20050413.en.html
 [3] http://www.fsfeurope.org/projects/wipo/statement-20050415.en.html
 [4] http://www.fsfe.org/Members/gerloff/blog/


4. FSFE office in Hamburg

To handle the growing organisational needs, especially regarding the
Fellowship, the FSFE rented a small office in Hamburg, Germany, where
Georg Greve and Karsten Gerloff are located when they are not
travelling.


5. Fellowship SmartCards being sent out

After weeks of preparation, the first batch of 250 Fellowship
SmartCards has been sent. For security reasons, a unique random admin
pin is generated for each card, and sent via snail mail from a
separate location, independently from the card. Each Fellow will
receive two envelopes from two different senders, one containing the
card, and the other containing the admin pin.

  https://www.fsfe.org/card/


6. Freedom party in Milano

The Fellowship of FSFE is a huge success and the team is proud of it.
With Georg Greve available in Milan, FSFE hosted a small aperitif with
some journalists and few of the first Fellows in town.  It has been a
nice evening with very relaxed chats and exchange of opinions with old
and new friends.  The Italian Chapter of FSFE is preparing a new,
bigger event during the upcoming GNU/Linux World Expo still in Milan.
If you want to host a Fellowship party please get in contact with the
Italian team.


7. Teaching the World Bank

After the good experience of last year, the World Bank again invited
FSFE's president Georg Greve to teach about "Free Software in World
Bank financed projects" at an internal course for World Bank employees
held at the International Training Center (ITC) of the International
Labor Organisation (ILO) in Torino, Italy.


8. FSF Latin America on its way

After some months of discussions including FSFE president Georg Greve,
a team of Free Software advocates in Latin America have published
their declaration of intent to join the global network of Free
Software Foundations.

  http://www.fsfla.org/doi-en.html


9. Nordic University Computer Club Conference in Sweden

Jonas Öberg participated in the Nordic University Computer Club
Conference in Uppsala, Sweden, which gathered participants from
Norway, Sweden and Finland. Jonas gave a lecture on the philosophy and
law of Free Software, which was followed by several interesting
discussions with the participants.


10. Alessandro Rubini speaks at University in Lecce

Alessandro Rubini has been invited in Lecce, where there is a strong
GLUG and the University is launching "Sistemi Operativi 3", a course
on kernel internals, the third course in the Engineering Faculty
completely about Free Software. There he had a talk about "Developing
Free Software in the Technological Market", and has been interviewed,
together with Prof. Tommasi who organized the events, at the local TV
station.


11. Web pages translated to 14 languages

After some new volunteers from Eastern Europe joined the translation
team, the FSFE homepage is now available in no less than 14 languages!
However, the Czech, Greek, and Portuguese translations have not been
updated for quite a while, and the translations to other languages are
incomplete and need maintenance. So any help with translations to
virtually any language is always highly welcome.

  http://www.fsfeurope.org/contribute/translators.en.html


You can find a list of all FSF Europe newsletters on
http://www.fsfeurope.org/news/newsletter.en.html


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