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[Fsfe-se] [FSFE PR][SV] AVM violating license of the Linux kernel
by press 20 Jun '11

20 Jun '11

= AVM violating license of the Linux kernel = [Read online: http://fsfe.org/news/2011/news-20110620-01.sv.html ] == Linux kernel at centre of battle for control of embedded devices == Berlin, 20th June - Tomorrow on June 21st a legal case will be heard before the District Court of Berlin which may have enormous consequences for the way that software is developed and distributed. The adversaries in the case are the manufacturer and distributor of DSL routers AVM Computersysteme Vertriebs GmbH (AVM), and Cybits AG (Cybits) which produces children's web-filtering software. Both companies use the Linux kernel, which is licensed under the GNU General Public License, version 2 (GNU GPL); a Free Software license permitting everyone to use, study, share, and improve works which use it. The case was brought to court by AVM with the aim of preventing Cybits from changing any parts of the firmware used in AVM's routers, including the Linux kernel. The Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) and gpl- violations.org consider AVM's action as a broad attack against the principles of Free Software, and thus against the thousands of individuals and companies developinging, improving and distributing Free Software. "I decided to contribute my work to the Linux kernel under the GNU GPL, and let others benefit from it. I'm happy if companies make a lot of money with software written by me and thousands of others. But in return, when they distribute our software I want them to give others the same rights they received from me", said Harald Welte, founder of gpl- violations.org and copyright holder of several parts of the Linux kernel. This is however exactly what AVM tried to avoid when in 2010 they filed two actions against Cybits. AVM claimed that when their customers install Cybits' filtering software on AVM routers it changes the routers' firmware and consequently infringes on AVM's copyright. In the opinion of AVM, even changing the Linux kernel components of the firmware is not allowed. The Court of Appeals of Berlin rejected this argument in its decision on the request for a preliminary injunction in September 2010, after Mr. Welte intervened in the case. Now, the District Court of Berlin will have to decide on the issue again, this time in the main proceedings. "This case has far reaching consequences for the future of Free Software and the GNU GPL. The GNU GPL is a legal license set by the original authors of the software. These terms are not optional" said Till Jaeger from JBB Rechtsanwälte who represents Mr. Welte in this case. If AVM succeeds in forbidding others from exercising the freedoms explicitly granted by the GNU General Public License terms, it will directly contravene the legal rights of the original authors of the programs, who decided that software freedom and cooperation is more important to them than directly receiving license fees. Moreover, there are also significant economic and business implications. First, it will give device manufacturers the chance to veto software from third parties on their products, resulting in worse products for the user and them being locked-in to purchasing future products from a particular vendor. Second, it will give companies like AVM an unfair advantage over their competitors who are in compliance with the Free Software licenses which they use. Third, it will threaten the cooperative software development model, which has been successfully used by many companies worldwide for three decades. "AVM is attacking the very foundations of Free Software: They want to take away freedom from others. We have to act when a company sues others for executing their right to modify Free Software. AVM's behaviour must not be tolerated. If they are successful in court it will be disastrous for the global market for embedded devices, which includes mobile phones, network hardware, and other Linux based products" says Matthias Kirschner, FSFE's German Coordinator. "Ironically, by preventing others from enacting the rights granted by the GNU GPL, AVM itself is in violation of the license terms. Therefore they have no right to distribute the software" says Till Jaeger. FSFE and gpl-violations.org are committed to encouraging the use of Free Software by companies and developers by making licensing and compliance as easy as possible. Generally it is considerably easier to comply with Free Software licenses than with EULAs and other license agreements for non-Free software. Often it is only necessary to add a copy of the GNU GPL license text to documentation, and add an offer to provide the software source code (see FSFE's compliance tips[1]). 1. http://fsfe.org/projects/ftf/useful-tips-for-vendors.sv.html - Link to Background Information[2] - Court decision 2nd instance (pdf, German)[3] - Intervention by Harald Welte (pdf, German)[4] - FSFE's legal page[5] - FSFE's legal team maintains a collection of documentation on Free Software Legal and Licensing topics. It also produces guides and handbooks.[6] - Frequently Asked Questions about the GNU Licenses[7] - GNU GPL version 2[8] and unofficial translations[9] 2. http://fsfe.org/projects/ftf/avm-gpl-violation.sv.html 3. http://fsfe.org/projects/ftf/kg-avm-vs-cybits.pdf 4. http://fsfe.org/projects/ftf/avm-nebenintervention.pdf 5. http://fsfe.org/projects/ftf/ftf.sv.html 6. http://fsfe.org/projects/ftf/documentation.sv.html 7. http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html 8. http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/gpl-2.0.html 9. http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/gpl-2.0-translations.html == Press contacts == Matthias Kirschner <mk at fsfe.org>, Free Software Foundation Europe Linienstraße 141, 10115 Berlin Phone: +49-30-275 95 290 Mobile: +49-1577-178 000 3 == gpl-violations.org == The gpl-violations.org project is taking legal and other means to make sure commercial users of Free Software are adhering to the GNU General Public License. gpl-violations.org has enforced the GNU GPL in hundreds of cases, most of them amicably and out of court. However, if neccessary, legal means such as warning notices, preliminary injunctions and civil copyright lawsuits are used in order to ensure companies are following-up with their obligations under the GNU GPL. gpl-violations.org was started by Free Software developer Harald Welte, who has received multiple awards in recognition of his legal efforts on enforcing the GNU GPL. == About the Free Software Foundation Europe == The Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) is a non-profit non-governmental organisation active in many European countries and involved in many global activities. Access to software determines participation in a digital society. To secure equal participation in the information age, as well as freedom of competition, the Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) pursues and is dedicated to the furthering of Free Software, defined by the freedoms to use, study, modify and copy. Founded in 2001, creating awareness for these issues, securing Free Software politically and legally, and giving people Freedom by supporting development of Free Software are central issues of the FSFE. http://fsfe.org/ _______________________________________________ Press-release-sv mailing list Press-release-sv(a)fsfeurope.org https://mail.fsfeurope.org/mailman/listinfo/press-release-sv

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[Fsfe-se] [FSFE PR][SV] FSFE Newsletter - June 2011
by press＠fsfeurope.org 04 Jun '11

04 Jun '11

= FSFE Newsletter - June 2011 = [Read online: http://fsfe.org/news/nl/nl-201106.sv.html ] == The 899 Million question: Microsoft, European Commission, and Free Software == What would you do with a monopolist, who uses his dominant position in one area to create monopolies in other areas as well? The European Commission has decided in 2004 that Microsoft has to provide competitors with information how to connect a workgroup server with computers running Microsoft Windows. Since the main competitor to Microsoft’s workgroup server is the Free Software Samba project, the Commission made it clear that Microsoft had to release interoperability information in a way that is compatible with Free Software licenses like the GNU GPL. The Commission's 2004 decision did not require Microsoft to publish innovative information, it asked for simple information how Microsoft computers talk to each other. But Microsoft played for time, even when the Commission imposed a fine of two million Euro for every day that Microsoft did not make the required interoperability information and documentation available in a way that the Samba team could make use of it. That gave Microsoft three more years to gain profit from its monopoly position. After losing an appeal in October 2007[1], Microsoft finally made the required interoperability information available for a one-time fee of EUR 10,000. This gives Free Software groups access to Microsoft’s protocol specifications, but does not give them a license to the patents that Microsoft holds in this area. Microsoft only offers patent licenses under conditions that are fundamentally incompatible with the GNU GPL. So the Samba team has a license to use Microsoft’s protocol specifications, but not its patented technologies. At least those patents are identified, and the Samba team can work around them with considerable effort until we fix the problem of software patents as a whole. 1. http://fsfe.org/projects/ms-vs-eu/timeline.sv.html Microsoft appealed the fine. On the 24th of May another hearing took place. Like in the rest of the process, FSFE was again present, together with the Samba team, giving crucial input to ensure that Free Software can compete on market. Karsten Gerloff wrote about the hearing in his blog article"Samba case hearing: How Microsoft’s gamble backfired"[2], and you can also read Groklaw interview with Karsten Gerloff and Carlo Piana[3]. A ruling on the Microsoft’s appeal is expected in the second half of the year. 2. http://blogs.fsfe.org/gerloff/2011/05/27/samba-case-hearing-how-microsofts-… 3. http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20110530202005299 == Antifeatures + DRM == How many times have you been forced to watch those copyright notices at the beginning of a DVD, without the chance to fast-forward? Or would you miss it, if no mobile phone would have a SIM lock? On the 4th of May our American sister organisation organised the "Day Against DRM". There were several articles, events, and radio shows about this topic[4]. Your editor was interviewed by Dradio Wissen on the subject of Antifeatures, which also includes digitial restriction management (DRM). 4. http://www.defectivebydesign.org/highlights-2011-day-against-drm An antifeature is a feature, which is implemented by the developer on purpose, but which user does not want. So, it is not about bugs or missing functionality, but about functions which the vendor added intentionally to restrict the user. Your editor's interview and corresponding article[5] explain some examples, like how printer vendors prevent others from producing printers' cartridges, the sim lock in mobile phones, the option to get rid of additional software commercials on laptops, or the copyright notices and the region code for DVDs. 5. http://blogs.fsfe.org/mk/?p=797 With Free Software adding antifeatures simply isn't lucrative. Every user has the freedom to change the software and to share those changes with others. So when one person removes an antifeature, all other users will benefit from this work. In Free Software new features are implemented either if someone pays for them, or if someone is convinced that this is an important feature and s/he has spent spare time on it. Therewith Free Software is more honest and more transparent towards users. Benjamin Mako Hill wrote more about antifeatures[6] and also gave several talks about it, e.g. at Linux Conf Australia 2010 (Ogg- Theora)[7], or FrosCon (Ogg-Theora)[8]. 6. http://www.fsf.org/bulletin/2007/fall/antifeatures/ 7. http://projects.mako.cc/media/revealing_errors_lca2010.ogv 8. http://ftp.stw-bonn.de/froscon/2010/hs12/theora/hs12_-_2010-08-22_12:45_-_e… == Something completely different == - As British Telecom plan to roll out new music subscription service to their 5.5 million broadband customers, our UK Team has asked BT to make user freedom one of the product's key features.[9] - The German Foreign Office is turning away from Free Software, and the German Government is entangling itself in contradictions. The assessment of our German team is,[10] that the reaction of the Government to an inquiry by "Bündnis 90/Grüne" shows that the government either does not understand important aspects of Free Software or is deliberately offending Free Software in general as well as Free Software companies in particular. We set up a public comment plattform[11], and ask you to participate. - The Free Software in Education update is out for March/April 2011[12]. Besides, there is an education survey in the UK.[13] - The German team commented the replies to our question to the political parties in Bremen.[14] - From the planet aggregation[15]: - This month's Fellowship interview with Florian Effenberger[16], is out. He was the previous Marketing Project Lead for OpenOffice.org and now founding member and part of the Steering Committee at The Document Foundation. - There are again new issues of Free Software and law related links for 30.4.-6.5.[17] 7.5.-22.5.[18], and 23.5.-29.5.[19]. - Fellow Jan-Christoph Borchardt wrote about Free(ing) web games.[20] 9. http://fsfe.org/projects/os/bt-open-letter.sv.html 10. http://fsfe.org/news/2011/news-20110511-01.sv.html 11. http://etherpad.fsfe.org/1TyQlboVdF 12. http://blogs.fsfe.org/guido/2011/04/free-software-in-education-marchapril-2… 13. http://blogs.fsfe.org/guido/2011/05/free-software-in-education-survey-in-uk/ 14. http://fsfe.org/news/2011/news-20110520-01.sv.html 15. http://planet.fsfe.org 16. http://blogs.fsfe.org/fellowship-interviews/?p=308 17. http://matija.suklje.name/?q=node/245 18. http://matija.suklje.name/?q=node/246 19. http://matija.suklje.name/?q=node/247 20. https://jancborchardt.wordpress.com/2011/05/19/freeing-web-games/ == Get active: Translate our Ask your Candidates page == In the coming month we will do more in our"Ask Your Candidates"[21] activity. You can already help us by translating this page into your native language. Like on all pages click on the source code link[22] at the buttom of the page. Translate the page and then send it to translators fsfeurope.org. If you are interested to help us more regularly with translations, please take a look at our translator page[23]. 21. http://fsfe.org/campaigns/askyourcandidates/askyourcandidates.sv.html 22. http://fsfe.org/source/campaigns/askyourcandidates/askyourcandidates.xhtml 23. http://fsfe.org/contribute/translators/translators.sv.html Regards, Matthias Kirschner- FSFE -- Free Software Foundation Europe <http://fsfe.org> FSFE News <http://fsfe.org/news/news.sv.rss> Upcoming FSFE Events <http://fsfe.org/events/events.sv.rss> Fellowship Blog Aggregation <http://planet.fsfe.org/en/rss20.xml> Free Software Discussions <http://fsfe.org/contact/community.sv.html> _______________________________________________ Press-release-sv mailing list Press-release-sv(a)fsfeurope.org https://mail.fsfeurope.org/mailman/listinfo/press-release-sv

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[Fsfe-se] [FSFE PR][SV] FSFE in Samba case: Microsoft's defiance backfired
by press＠fsfeurope.org 25 May '11

25 May '11

= FSFE in Samba case: Microsoft's defiance backfired = [Read online: http://fsfe.org/news/2011/news-20110525-01.sv.html ] Luxembourg, May 25 - FSFE played a key role at a Microsoft hearing before the European Union's General Court on Tuesday, helping explain the intricacies of Free Software servers. The hearing was called to consider Microsoft's challenge to a EUR 899 million fine imposed by the European Commission in 2008. Microsoft had failed to carry out remedies imposed for its violation of EU antitrust law. A ruling is expected for later in the year. Microsoft was required to provide interoperability information that would enable others to hook up to its products so they could compete with its workgroup servers. Key among those was the Samba team, which is the only surviving competitor in the workgroup server market. Only after a European Union court acted in 2007 to uphold nearly all of the Commission's 2004 decision did Microsoft finally meet the Commission's requirement to comply. "In order to compete, the Samba team only needed the mundane information about how Microsoft computers talk to each other," said Tridgell. "There is nothing innovative here. All the innovative bits are either already published by Microsoft's own researchers, or are contained in the Microsoft program source code – and we have no interest in seeing that. The innovation certainly isn't in the protocol specifications." Tridgell appeared before a panel headed by Chamber President Nicholas James Forwood of Britain, which also included judges Franklin Dehousse of Belgium and Juraj Schwarcz of Slovakia. Microsoft, the Commission, and outside intervenors on both sides were also represented. FSFE and the Samba team were represented by lawyer Carlo Piana. The problems date back to the Commission's 2004 decision that Microsoft should release interoperability information. After that, the company played for time and waited three years to comply with the Commission's demands. Explaining the significance of Samba for a competitive software market, Chamber President Forwood said: “Samba is the funnel through which the effects on the market will be produced.” Microsoft contended that the information it had to provide was valuable and innovative, and originally sought to charge high prices for it. Tridgell demonstrated that the valuable information had already been revealed by Microsoft in research papers and other public fora. By contrast, the information that Samba team needed to interoperate with computers running Microsoft Windows was neither original nor innovative. “Microsoft didn't keep this information secret because it was valuable; the information was only valuable because it was kept secret,” Piana told the Court on behalf of FSFE. He said it let Microsoft preserve its dominant position, because no other software was able to talk to the company's systems. “The company used these three years to further entrench its dominant position in the market.” “Microsoft is acting like a gambler who doubled up on a losing bet, and now wants his money back,” said Nicholas Kahn, the representative of the European Commission. By waiting three years before complying with the Commission's decision while the clock on the fine was ticking, Microsoft set the stakes very high – and finally lost. “In this case, Europe's competition regulators have shown their bite. We hope that the court will uphold the fine and make it clear that companies in Europe have to play by the rules,” said Karsten Gerloff, President of the Free Software Foundation Europe. “FSFE does many things to help foster the growth of Free Software. We're proud to help make the case for Free Software in a forum such as this, where we believe we are providing a public service.” Workgroup servers handle tasks used in small groups – printing, signing in, and allocating permission to access particular files. The Samba project not only provides an alternative to Microsoft's workgroup server. It has come up with an alternative that is better in many respects. For example, the Samba team used the trivial information provided by Microsoft to build an innovative system that runs on very small, cheap computers -- something that Microsoft's software cannot do. “The hearing established that Free Software is central to restoring competition in the workgroup server market,” says Piana. “Everyone agreed to this, including the judges. This case matters because it highlights that interoperability is more important than a company's interest in keeping its dominant position.” == About the Free Software Foundation Europe == The Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) is a non-profit non-governmental organisation active in many European countries and involved in many global activities. Access to software determines participation in a digital society. To secure equal participation in the information age, as well as freedom of competition, the Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) pursues and is dedicated to the furthering of Free Software, defined by the freedoms to use, study, modify and copy. Founded in 2001, creating awareness for these issues, securing Free Software politically and legally, and giving people Freedom by supporting development of Free Software are central issues of the FSFE. http://fsfe.org/ Contact: Karsten Gerloff, President, +49-176-96904298 _______________________________________________ Press-release-sv mailing list Press-release-sv(a)fsfeurope.org https://mail.fsfeurope.org/mailman/listinfo/press-release-sv

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[Fsfe-se] [FSFE PR][SV] FSFE Newsletter - May 2011
by press＠fsfeurope.org 04 May '11

04 May '11

= FSFE Newsletter - May 2011 = [Read online: http://fsfe.org/news/nl/nl-201105.sv.html ] == Competition authorities: Free Software protects competition == 882 software patents, likely related to GNU/Linux, in the hands of people who could use them to pressure Free Software companies and developers? Maybe in the hands of Microsoft, which has for years used nebulous patent claims to extract licensing fees from companies that use the Linux kernel in their products. This month the German and the US competition authorities approved the sale of those patents to CPTN, a consortium consisting of Microsoft, Oracle, Apple, and EMC. But, barring nasty surprises in the still to be published detailed decision, we neutralised the danger for Free Software. Software patents are a very complex matter, and competition authorities are not used dealing with them. So beginning from December 2010 we explained to the German competition authorities why the patent sale was highly problematic. In our first[1] , and second[2] submission we explained the mechanics that some companies use to compete in the software market, and how they preserve their monopolies. 1. http://fsfe.org/projects/swpat/letter-20101222.sv.html 2. http://fsfe.org/projects/swpat/letter-20110406.sv.html In their press release the authorities have not only highlighted the importance of Free Software for competition, and that actual patent lawsuits are anticompetitive but also that threatening with patent lawsuits, like the fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD) strategies from some non-free software companies, can be anticompetitive. So for the first time, competition authorities have acknowledged the essential part of Free Software for competition, and that patent lawsuits by dominant market participants can be anticompetitive. This will also be important for future debates, when the behaviour of big non-free software companies has to be evaluated from a competition law perspective. As the devil is in the details, we hope to hear about the exact wording of the CPTN contracts to evaluate them[3] . Such work is very time consuming, and we would not be able to keep track of those activities, without the support of one time donations[4] and regular ones by our Fellows[5] . 3. http://fsfe.org/projects/swpat/novell-cptn.sv.html 4. http://fsfe.org/donate/donate.sv.html 5. http://fsfe.org/join.sv.html == Mission is possible == To date, 17 percent of the public institutions, we contacted[6] , already replied and removed the non-free PDF reader advertisements from their websites. The current progress of the campaign can be seen on our buglist[7] . Until now we have only received one negative reply. However, as about 83 percent of the contacted institutions have not responded yet, we want to remind them about the letter we have sent, and ask for a reply. This works only with your help. To take part, follow the actions from our follow-up guide[8] . In short this is: 6. http://fsfe.org/campaigns/pdfreaders/pdfreaders.sv.html 7. http://fsfe.org/campaigns/pdfreaders/buglist.sv.html 8. http://fsfe.org/campaigns/pdfreaders/follow-up.sv.html - have a look at organisations in your country which appear as not having answered yet, - contact and remind them of FSFE's letter on inadmissibility of advertising of proprietary software by public institutions, and - ask them to remove the proprietary software advertising from their websites. If you discover non-free PDF reader advertisement, and is not on our list, you are encouraged to contact them on your own. For public institutions use a modified version of our letter[9] , for companies and non-profits we are working on a template, after volunteers have convinced organisations like Greenpeace Germany[10] to link to pdfreaders.org instead. 9. http://fsfe.org/campaigns/pdfreaders/letter.en.html 10. http://www.greenpeace.de/themen/energie/nachrichten/artikel/deutschlands_en… == Something completely different == - Data stored per-user, and under the user's control. That is the aim of the unhosted web. This project is covered by this month Fellowship interview with Michiel de Jong[11] . If you want to discuss this in person with Michiel, he will help as one of our booth volunteers for one day during Berlin's Linuxtag[12] . - Free Software for the public sector: We have provided input for the European Commission on modernising the way in which public bodies buy software[13] and related services. - At the moment fellows are starting new Fellowship groups[14] in Augsburg[15] (Germany) and Manchester[16] (UK). For the Manchester group our British coordinator Sam Tuke created a good presentation template about the Fellowship which is now linked from the meeting howto[17] . - Noteworthy articles from the Fellowship planet[18] include: - Timo Jyrinki's article about his presentation of "tuning an old but free phone"[19] with corresponding videos from FSCONS[20] , - Carlo Piana's article "Doors opened at Openoffice"[21] about Oracle's announcement that they want to make OpenOffice.org a community developed project, - and Lena Simon's article about the old myths in a digital society[22] (German) which also covers some issues we have to explain often. 11. http://losca.blogspot.com/2011/04/tuning-old-but-free-phone-video-now.sv.ht… 12. http://www.fscons.org 13. http://piana.eu/it/node/265 14. http://www.stud.uni-potsdam.de/~leena/2011/04/alte-mythen-in-der-digitalen-… - Groklaw's well deserved pension. Groklaw is shutting down and like our sister organisation[23] we would like to thank them for their good work. - Free Software licensing, Free Software business, software patents, and other topics from a legal point of view are covered in Matija's Free Software and law related links. Editions are available for 29.03.-17.04.[24] , 18.04.-24.04.[25] , and 25.04.-29.04.[26] . 15. http://blogs.fsfe.org/fellowship-interviews/?p=299 16. http://wiki.fsfe.org/FellowshipEvents/Linuxtag%20berlin 17. http://fsfe.org/news/2011/news-20110418-01.sv.html 18. http://wiki.fsfe.org/groups/ 19. http://wiki.fsfe.org/groups/Augsburg 20. http://wiki.fsfe.org/groups/Manchester 21. http://wiki.fsfe.org/MeetingHowTo#General 22. http://planet.fsfe.org 23. http://www.fsf.org/blogs/licensing/farewell-groklaw-and-thanks 24. http://matija.suklje.name/?q=node/239 25. http://matija.suklje.name/?q=node/241 26. http://matija.suklje.name/?q=node/244 == Get Active - Internships at FSFE == We are looking for smart, motivated interns to join our team[27] . Apply for an internship position[28] yourself, or distribute the information about it. We offer: 27. http://fsfe.org/about/team.sv.html 28. http://fsfe.org/contribute/internship.sv.html - a challenging and exciting time with a dynamic NPO working internationally, - a close-up view of organisational and community processes, - a chance to take the initiative and put your ideas into practice, and - the opportunity to meet and work with Free Software advocates across Europe. Beside the current interns Natalia Evdokimova[29] , and Nicolas Jean[30] , past interns include our Italian coordinator Giacomo Poderi[31] , Fellowship representative Hugo Roy[32] , our president Karsten Gerloff[33] , UK coordinator Sam Tuke[34] , Swedish team member Stian Rødven Eide[35] , education team coordinator Thomas Jensch[36] , and your editor[37] , who was FSFE's first intern. So as you can see, the internship is a good start to get more involved in FSFE. 29. http://fsfe.org/index.sv.html 30. http://fsfe.org/about/jean/jean.sv.html 31. http://blogs.fsfe.org/poderi/ 32. http://fsfe.org/about/roy/roy.sv.html 33. http://fsfe.org/about/gerloff/gerloff.sv.html 34. http://fsfe.org/about/tuke/tuke.sv.html 35. http://blogs.fsfe.org/julipan/ 36. http://blogs.fsfe.org/riepernet/ 37. http://fsfe.org/about/kirschner/kirschner.sv.html Regards, Matthias Kirschner - FSFE -- Free Software Foundation Europe <http://www.fsfe.org> FSFE News <http://fsfe.org/news/news.sv.rss> Upcoming FSFE Events <http://fsfe.org/events/events.sv.rss> Fellowship Blog Aggregation <http://planet.fsfe.org/sv/rss20.xml> Free Software Discussions <http://fsfe.org/contact/community.sv.html> _______________________________________________ Press-release-sv mailing list Press-release-sv(a)fsfeurope.org https://mail.fsfeurope.org/mailman/listinfo/press-release-sv

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[Fsfe-se] [FSFE PR][SV] Free Software crucial to competition, regulators in Novell patent deal say
by press＠fsfeurope.org 20 Apr '11

20 Apr '11

Free Software crucial to competition, regulators in Novell patent deal say Competition authorities in Germany and the United States today highlighted the fundamental role that Free Software plays for competition in the software market. After several months of discussions, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) and the German Federal Competition Office (FCO) have allowed a consortium of Microsoft, Oracle, Apple and EMC to acquire 882 patents from Novell only subject to conditions clearly intended to prevent their use against Free Software players. "This is an historic step", says Karsten Gerloff, President of the Free Software Foundation Europe, which was involved in the FCO investigation since the beginning. "The regulators acknowledge that Free Software is crucial to competition; that patent aggression can well be anticompetitive behaviour; and that fear, uncertainty and doubt serve to push smaller competitors out of the market." == Parallels to Microsoft case - no patent privilege == "FSFE has been highlighting the danger of software patents for a decade," says FSFE's legal counsel Carlo Piana. In the present transaction, patents play a similar role as they did in the European Commission's antitrust proceedings against Microsoft. Microsoft was forced to disclose its secret protocols, but refused to make them available under conditions that would allow their use in GPL-licensed Free Software. FSFE is glad to see that conversely in this situation antitrust authorities on both sides of the Atlantic are recognising the power of copyleft Free Software licenses to preserve competition. The decisions by the FCO and the DOJ are also an acknowledgement that regulatory intervention can be necessary to overcome vendor lock-in and create a level playing field for all market participants. "Patents are not an excuse to avoid antitrust scrutiny. Today's announcements make that clear as daylight" says Piana. In a hearing at the European Court of Justice next month, FSFE will state its objections to Microsoft's strategy of using patents to limit competition, as Microsoft is appealing the fine of 899 million Euro imposed by the Commission. FSFE will carefully review the actual decisions as they become available. "Today's announcements point in a very interesting direction. It is a success for the intense work done by FSFE and others, such as the Free Software Foundation and the Open Source Initiative. But the conditions we've seen are no panacea. The devil will be in the details," says Gerloff. Intense monitoring by the competition authorities will be required to ensure that the conditions for the transaction will have the intended effect. == Contact == Karsten Gerloff President, Free Software Foundation Europe Phone: +49 176 9690 4298 Mail: gerloff(a)fsfeurope.org == Resources == US DOJ announcement: http://7thspace.com/headlines/379849/usdoj_cptn_holdings_llc_and_novell_inc… German FCO announcement: http://www.bundeskartellamt.de/wDeutsch/aktuelles/presse/2011_04_20W3Dnavid… FSFE statement to German FCO from December 22, 2010 http://fsfe.org/projects/swpat/letter-20101222.en.html FSFE response to questions by German FCO from April 6, 2011 http://fsfe.org/projects/swpat/letter-20110406.en.html Overview of FSFE's work http://fsfe.org/projects/work.en.html == About the Free Software Foundation Europe == The Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) is a non-profit, non-governmental organisation active in many European countries and involved in many global activities. Access to software determines participation in a digital society. To secure equal participation in the information age, as well as freedom of competition, the Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) pursues and is dedicated to the furthering of Free Software, defined by the freedoms to use, study, modify and copy. Founded in 2001, creating awareness for these issues, securing Free Software politically and legally, and giving people Freedom by supporting development of Free Software are central issues of the FSFE. http://fsfe.org/ _______________________________________________ Press-release-sv mailing list Press-release-sv(a)fsfeurope.org https://mail.fsfeurope.org/mailman/listinfo/press-release-sv

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[Fsfe-se] [FSFE PR][SV] FSFE Newsletter - April 2011
by press＠fsfeurope.org 04 Apr '11

04 Apr '11

= FSFE Newsletter - April 2011 = [Read online: http://fsfe.org/news/nl/nl-201104.sv.html ] == A decade of Freedom: FSFE turned 10 == One room with a bed, a desk, and a sofa. That was the situation when your editor started working as an intern for FSFE in Georg Greve's one room appartment in Hamburg in 2004. FSFE started with its operations in March 2001[1] as the first sister organisation of the FSF in the US. We have come a long way[2] since then. First of all, our interns don't get Georg's mandatory cooking lessons any more, instead they now have their own desks and do not have to work from the sofa any more. Second, we now have the Fellowship which leads to a growth of volunteers and activities: - In the UK, Sam Tuke is currently busy setting up a punchy team. They are giving talks, organising events, and documenting the developments[3] in the future role of Free Software in the British public sector. - Our Italian team is currently supporting ADUC to get rid of the Windows Tax[4] . ADUC is an Italian association for users/consumers' rights who recently filed a class action request against Microsoft Italy's refusal of reimbursing unused OEM licences for its operating system. Carlo Piana is helping ADUC's lawyers and Giacomo Poderi with the Italian team will help to raise awareness on this issue[5] . - In Switzerland you have a confusing landscape of different Free Software organisations, which have problems with coordionation. It was nearly impossible to find out what is going on in the next weeks, or to find a date for an activity which does not interfer with another group. That's why the Zurich Fellowship group has now set up an event calendar on freie-termine.ch[6] to improve this situation. - Our Swedish team was actively publishing videos from FSCONS[7] . Last year in November, we hosted our own track at FSCONS around different topics of decentralised (social) networks and free network services. Now the videos of the talks[8] are finally online. - This year there are at least 8 Federal State elections in Germany. The German team already received replies from the parties in Sachsen- Anhalt[9] , Rheinland-Pfalz[10] , and Baden-Würrtemberg[11] on questions like general support of Free Software, problems of vendor lock-in, Open Standards[12] , non-free PDF readers advertisements[13] on public websites, the use of Free Software in education[14] , and software patents[15] . The same will be done for the remaining elections. 1. http://fsfe.org/news/2011/news-20110310-01.sv.html 2. http://fsfe.org/about/history/birthday10.sv.html 3. http://fsfe.org/uk/mapping-uk.sv.html 4. http://wiki.fsfe.org/WindowsTaxRefund 5. http://fsfe.org/news/2011/news-20110321-01.sv.html 6. http://freie-termine.ch 7. http://fscons.org/2010/news/fscons-2010-videos-finally 8. http://blogs.fsfe.org/torsten.grote/2011/03/28/fscons-2010-divide-and-re-co… 9. http://fsfe.org/campaigns/ayc/201103-germany-sachsen-anhalt.de.html 10. http://fsfe.org/campaigns/ayc/201103-germany-rheinland-pfalz.de.html 11. http://fsfe.org/campaigns/ayc/201103-germany-baden-wuerttemberg.de.html 12. http://fsfe.org/projects/os/os.sv.html 13. http://fsfe.org/campaigns/pdfreaders/pdfreaders.sv.html 14. http://fsfe.org/projects/education/education.sv.html 15. http://fsfe.org/projects/swpat/swpat.sv.html == Worldwide celebration of Open Standards == Open Standards are a common language, publicly documented, that computer programs can speak. They are central to interoperability and freedom of choice in technology. Open Standards allow Free Software developers to create programs that can interoperate with other solutions, so users can migrate away from proprietary solutions. Many of you followed our call to participate in this year's Document Freedom Day: in Brazil, the Federal Data Processing Company - Serpro - hold events in 10 cities. In the European Parliament, experts discussed Open Standards as a means to guarantee access to cultural works in the long term. Other groups participated in Argentina, Belgium, Brazil, Croatia, Greece, Germany, Italy, Mexico, Netherlands, Panama, Portugal, Spain and United Kingdom. Selected FSFE activities include: - The City Munich was awarded with the European Document Freedom Day prize for its LiMux project[16] . - Tagesschau.de awarded[17] for the use of Open Standards: The prize was awarded in Berlin and Hamburg by the Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure (FFII) and us for offering the broadcast shows also in the free video format "Ogg Theora". As you can see on the pictures[18] (DE) the cake was amazing (also available in French[19] ) - "A bright Document Freedom Day for Britain?" about Open Standards in Britain[20] . 16. http://fsfe.org/news/2011/news-20110330-02.sv.html 17. http://fsfe.org/news/2011/news-20110330-01.sv.html 18. http://blogs.fsfe.org/mk/?p=765 19. http://blogs.fsfe.org/nicoulas/?p=87 20. http://fsfe.org/news/2011/news-20110330-04.sv.html == Something completely different == - Redhat made $909 million with Free Software and Nokia is spreading FUD?: After Mirko Böhm wrote an interesting analysis[21] on the current Nokia move, your editor commented on Nokia's announcement[22] about selling the proprietary Qt business to Digia. This also led to interesting discussions on our public mailing lists about the meaning of "commercial". - Our freshly elected Fellowship representative Hugo Roy[23] wrote about IPRED[24] (FR). - Fellowship Interview with Dan Leinir Turthra Jensen[25] . Dan describes the aims of these exciting gaming projects, and discusses what Free Software could mean for gaming in future. - New Legal News available for 19.02.-25.02.[26] , 26.02.-04.03.[27] , 05.03.-13.03.[28] , 14.03.-20.03.[29] , 21.03.-28.03.[30] - 2010 Free Software Awards[31] go to: Rob Savoye and the TOR project. Savoye is a long-time free software hacker, who has worked on GNU and other free software for over 20 years. TOR is enabling people around the world to experience freedom of access and expression on the Internet while keeping them in control of their privacy and anonymity. - The FSF welcomed Debian's "Squeeze" release[32] . Debian GNU/Linux also received a prize at the Cebit, where Karsten Gerloff held the laudatio[33]. 21. http://www.kdedevelopers.org/node/4394 22. http://blogs.fsfe.org/mk/?p=736 23. http://fsfe.org/news/2011/news-20110301-01.sv.html 24. http://blog.hugoroy.eu/2011/03/28/ipred-remettre-en-question-la-politique-d… 25. http://blogs.fsfe.org/fellowship-interviews/?p=267 26. http://matija.suklje.name/?q=node/232 27. http://matija.suklje.name/?q=node/233 28. http://matija.suklje.name/?q=node/236 29. http://matija.suklje.name/?q=node/237 30. http://matija.suklje.name/?q=node/238 31. http://www.fsf.org/news/2010-free-software-awards-announced 32. http://www.fsf.org/news/debian-squeeze-makes-key-progress-toward-being-a-fu… 33. http://fsfe.org/events/2011/lnm-award-debian.sv.html == Get Active - Translations for free PDF readers == During our pdfreaders campaign[34] we received the feedback that it is difficult to use some free PDF readers, as the download pages, or the actual software is not translated. Since then our intern Nicoulas Jean is in contact with several free PDF reader developers. Take a look at our list of PDF readers[35] and how to help them with translation, and take action: - Help translating your favorite PDF reader and ask others to do so. - Find out how to help with translations of the missing readers and add this information it to the website. 34. http://fsfe.org/campaigns/pdfreaders/pdfreaders.sv.html 35. http://wiki.fsfe.org/PDFreadersTranslations Regards, Matthias Kirschner - FSFE _______________________________________________ Press-release-sv mailing list Press-release-sv(a)fsfeurope.org https://mail.fsfeurope.org/mailman/listinfo/press-release-sv

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[Fsfe-se] DFD - någon aktivitet?
by Josef Andersson 28 Mar '11

28 Mar '11

Hej, Jag är en rätt så (mycket) passiv medlem i FSFE/FSF Såg dock att det var document-freedom-day den 30:e Mars igen. Borde vår Svenska del försöka uppmärksamma detta på något kul sätt.. Finns ju flera sätt att göra det på: Kanske kontakta några myndigheter och se hur dom använder ODF:) Så jag provar här på listan o ser om någon är intresserad av att lägga några timmar på detta. J

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[Fsfe-se] [FSFE PR][SV] FSFE Newsletter - March 2011
by press＠fsfeurope.org 04 Mar '11

04 Mar '11

(Hjälp oss att nå ut till människor på deras modersmål. Gå med i vårt svenska översättningsteam: http://fsfe.org/contribute/translators/.) = FSFE Newsletter - March 2011 = [Read online: http://fsfe.org/news/nl/nl-201103.sv.html ] == Revolution failed: Facebook not available in Egypt == "On 27th January facebook was shut down in Egypt. For the moment this stopped the protests. Media assumes that this is due to the influence of Mubarak's granddaughter who is Mark Zuckerberg's girl-friend." Of course this is not true. But with software which is controlled by one company, something like this can happen. What if the owner of the social network would have been an Egypt company? Would this company have been able to resist state pressure? For a long time dedicated people have been working on decentralised Free Software solutions, to make sure there is no vulnerable single point of control. We as citiziens should be in control of our tools, and as most of those tools today are comprised of software we do need decentralised software. That's why FSFE organised a related track at FSCONS[1] , and our staff as well as dedicated volunteers like Torsten Grote gather information[2] , give talks[3] or interviews[4] . 1. http://www.fscons.org/divide 2. http://wiki.fsfe.org/CloudComputing 3. http://wiki.fsfe.org/CloudComputing#Video 4. http://wiki.fsfe.org/CloudComputing#Audio Karsten Gerloff gave a talk on "Power Software Freedom"[5] (there is a good summary by Brian Gough[6] ) at FOSDEM this month, and one of the event's keynotes "Why Political Liberty Depends on Software Freedom More Than Ever"[7] by Eben Moglen targetted this topic as well, especially the so-called "Freedom Box"[8] which started to receive good media coverage in turn, and will hopefully push this topic even further. 5. http://blogs.fsfe.org/gerloff/2011/02/05/fosdem-talk-on-power-software-free… 6. http://blogs.fsfe.org/bjg/2011/02/decentralised-systems-and-the-tendency-to… 7. http://mirrors.dotsrc.org/fosdem/2011/maintracks/political.xvid.avi 8. http://wiki.fsfe.org/CloudComputing#Freedom_Boxes == Lawyered! - FSFE's legal workshop == More than 75 lawyers, for 2 days, in 1 room -- and all of this organised by the FSFE. What is it about? We do this to ensure that the best possible legal knowledge about Free Software is shared between everyone, no matter whether individuals, businesses or initiatives. As part of this, FSFE facilitates an annual event called European Legal Network Conference[9] to allow legal experts to discuss the future of Free Software law and governance. This has become the world's premier event for debating, discussing and sharing knowledge around Free Software legal affairs. 9. http://fsfe.org/projects/ftf/legal-conference.sv.html This year it will be held at the NH Barbizon Palace, Amsterdam, between the 7th and 8th of April, and will feature speakers like Carlo Piana from FSFE, Mark Shuttleworth from Canonical, Eben Moglen from SFLC, and Harald Welte from gpl-violations.org. == Something completely different == - Leaked documents highlight Germany's Foreign Office move back to non- free software: This move is intransparent, and the more we find out the more questions we have. See - Foreign Office: Will it switch off the Free Software beacon?[10] - Leaked Documents: Change of strategy in the Foreign Office against recommodations.[11] - "One study after the other"[12] . Interview from the German Newspaper TAZ with your editor - Without Free Software in the Foreign Office[13] - Dradio interview with Bernhard Reiter. 10. http://fsfe.org/news/2011/news-20110202-02.sv.html 11. http://mail.fsfeurope.org/pipermail/press-release-de/2011q1/000182.html 12. http://www.taz.de/1/netz/netzoekonomie/artikel/1/eine-studie-nach-der-ander… 13. http://ondemand-mp3.dradio.de/file/dradio/2011/02/28/drw_201102281034_netzp… - "Love love love": The Beatles sing about it, we wanted to have some for Free Software activists at Valentine's Day. As last year we run a campaign animating people to show their love for Free Software[14] . See Maëlle's blog post for this years summary[15] and mark February 14th for 2012. - Fellowship Interview with Italy's PDFreaders heart[16] : While your editor can inform more people about our our pdfreaders campaign[17] like in a FOSDEM talk[18] this campaign would not be such successfull without many dedicated volunteers. This month Fellowship interview is with Massimo Babieri, IT manager at the Earth Science Department, of the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, leader of the band The Radiostars, and "Mr PDFreader" in Italy. - What happens with your code "when you’re no longer coding. When your uplink is permanently disconnected. When you’re dead." Armijn Hemmel wrote an article why the Fiduciary Licence Agreement is an important tool][19] . - New editions of Matija Suklje's "Free Software and law related links" are available for 29.1.-4.2.2011[20] , 5.2.-11.2.2011[21] , and 12.2.-18.2.2011[22] . - At GoOpen 2011[23] the 22-23rd of March in Oslo, Norway, the Swedish FSFE team is helping to organise a special FSCONS[24] track. The track takes some inspiration from previous FSCONS conferences in Sweden and introduces speakers on Free Software and Free Society. 14. http://fsfe.org/campaigns/valentine/2011/valentine-2011.sv.html 15. http://blogs.fsfe.org/maelle/?p=228 16. http://blogs.fsfe.org/fellowship-interviews/?p=257 17. http://fsfe.org/campaigns/pdfreaders/pdfreaders.sv.html 18. http://blog.isabel-drost.de/index.php/archives/310/fosdem-saturday 19. http://blogs.fsfe.org/adridg/?p=1094 20. http://matija.suklje.name/?q=node/226 21. http://matija.suklje.name/?q=node/228 22. http://matija.suklje.name/?q=node/230 23. http://www.goopen.no/program/ 24. http://www.fscons.org == Get active - Activities for Document Freedom == Document Freedom Day (DFD)[25] is a global day for document liberation. March 30th will be a day of grassroots effort to educate the public about the importance of Free Document Formats and Open Standards[26] in general. This is how you can help: 25. http://www.documentfreedom.org 26. http://fsfe.org/projects/os/os.sv.html - Join and help a team![27] - Blog about it, and link to our campaign! - Donate money to DFD![28] - Sponsor the campaign![29] - Put a banner on your website with our Artwork"[30] - Use !dfd group on Identi.ca and #dfd2011 tag on Identi.ca and Twitter 27. http://documentfreedom.org/2011/teams.en.html 28. http://documentfreedom.org/2011/support.en.html 29. http://documentfreedom.org/2011/sponsors.en.html 30. http://documentfreedom.org/2011/artwork.en.html Regards, Matthias Kirschner - FSFE -- Free Software Foundation Europe <http://www.fsfe.org> FSFE News <http://fsfe.org/news/news.sv.rss> Upcoming FSFE Events <http://fsfe.org/events/events.sv.rss> Fellowship Blog Aggregation <http://planet.fsfe.org/sv/rss20.xml> Free Software Discussions <http://fsfe.org/contact/community.sv.html> _______________________________________________ Press-release-sv mailing list Press-release-sv(a)fsfeurope.org https://mail.fsfeurope.org/mailman/listinfo/press-release-sv

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[Fsfe-se] [FSFE PR][SV] FSFE: Declare your love for Free Software!
by press＠fsfeurope.org 14 Feb '11

14 Feb '11

(Hjälp oss att nå ut till människor på deras modersmål. Gå med i vårt svenska översättningsteam: http://fsfe.org/contribute/translators/.) = Declare your love for Free Software! = [Permanent URL: http://fsfe.org/news/2011/news-20110214-01.sv.html ] Why not make this February 14th a very special Valentine's Day? On Valentine's Day, FSFE calls on Free Software users everywhere to show their love for Free Software[1] . It is the perfect occasion to show our love for Free Software and the possibility to use computers in freedom. On its campaign page[2] , FSFE suggests what users can do to show that they appreciate Free Software. Simply sending a developer a mail to say “Thank you”, taking a picture illustrating one's love for Free Software, declaring your love by microblog[3] with the tag #ilovefs or donating to a Free Software project[4] is all among the options. Behind every Free Software initiative and organisation are real, passionate hard-working people. Just for one day, on Valentine's Day, FSFE invites all Free Software advocates around the world to send a thank you message to the people that work to make Free Software happen. "Without Free Software, there would be no KDE. Free Software gives KDE life. KDE loves Free Software" declared Cornelius Schumacher, President of the KDE e.V. "No Free Culture project would be able to enjoy the full freedoms without the infrastructure created by Free Software projects[…]. To everyone engaged in supporting this infrastructure: thank you! We love you!", adds Jonas Öberg of the Society for Free Culture and Software (Föreningen fri kultur och programvara)[5] You can see what people have posted so far: http://identi.ca/ilovefs[6]. Add your own declaration there ! 1. http://fsfe.org/campaigns/valentine/2011/valentine-2011.html 2. http://fsfe.org/campaigns/valentine/2011/valentine-2011.html 3. http://identi.ca/ 4. https://wiki.fsfe.org/DonateToFreeSoftwareProjects 5. http://www.ffkp.se/ 6. http://identi.ca/tag/ilovefs -- Free Software Foundation Europe <http://www.fsfe.org> FSFE News <http://fsfe.org/news/news.en.rss> Upcoming FSFE Events <http://fsfe.org/events/events.en.rss> Fellowship Blog Aggregation <http://planet.fsfe.org/en/rss20.xml> Free Software Discussions <http://fsfe.org/contact/community.en.html> _______________________________________________ Press-release-sv mailing list Press-release-sv(a)fsfeurope.org https://mail.fsfeurope.org/mailman/listinfo/press-release-sv

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[Fsfe-se] [FSFE PR][SV] European Patent: FSFE urges European Parliament to wait for legal advice
by press＠fsfeurope.org 09 Feb '11

09 Feb '11

(Hjälp oss att nå ut till människor på deras modersmål. Gå med i vårt svenska översättningsteam: http://fsfe.org/contribute/translators/.) = European Patent: FSFE urges European Parliament to wait for legal advice = [Permanent URL: http://fsfe.org/news/2011/news-20110209-01.sv.html ] Free Software Foundation Europe is asking the Members of the European Parliament to wait for legal advice before voting on a unitary patent for Europe. While a proposal is on the Parliament's agenda for the coming week, a legal opinion by the European Court of Justice is expected later this month. "Software patents hurt innovation and are an unnecessary burden on European software developers," says Karsten Gerloff, President of the Free Software Foundation Europe. "Legislators need to take charge and make sure the patent system contributes to the public good. As the European Patent Organisation has acknowledged, this is a decision that cannot be left to bureaucrats and the judiciary." FSFE is concerned that the European Parliament will lose legislative competence regarding patents, which will then be controlled by the European Patent Organisation. This clearly creates a conflict of interest, as the EPO will be responsible both for awarding patents and for defining what is patentable. The EPO's expansionist record in this regard gives cause to worry that this will lead to software patents being validated. The European Court of Justice is expected to publish its opinion about the proposed "enhanced cooperation" of EU member states towards creating a single patent system for Europe. Documents published so far indicate that the Court will find the proposal in conflict with the EU treaties. Resolving these will require fundamental changes to the proposal. The Parliament's vote should take place after these changes so that the Parliament can review the actual proposal. FSFE hopes that the vote will be delayed until the Parliament can read the Court of Justice's opinion and has had time to analyse this proposal. == Contacts == Free Software Foundation Europe E-Mail: press at fsfeurope.org Karsten Gerloff, President +49-176-96904298 More contact information[1] 1. http://fsfe.org/contact/ == About the Free Software Foundation Europe == The Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) is a non-profit non- governmental organisation active in many European countries and involved in many global activities. Access to software determines participation in a digital society. To secure equal participation in the information age, as well as freedom of competition, the Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) pursues and is dedicated to the furthering of Free Software, defined by the freedoms to use, study, modify and copy. Founded in 2001, creating awareness for these issues, securing Free Software politically and legally, and giving people Freedom by supporting development of Free Software are central issue of the FSFE. Regards, Karsten Gerloff - FSFE -- Free Software Foundation Europe <http://www.fsfe.org> FSFE News <http://fsfe.org/news/news.sv.rss> Upcoming FSFE Events <http://fsfe.org/events/events.sv.rss> Fellowship Blog Aggregation <http://planet.fsfe.org/sv/rss20.xml> Free Software Discussions <http://fsfe.org/contact/community.sv.html> _______________________________________________ Press-release-sv mailing list Press-release-sv(a)fsfeurope.org https://mail.fsfeurope.org/mailman/listinfo/press-release-sv

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