[for immediate release]
Following up on the European Commission's "IPR in ICT Standardisation"
workshop two weeks ago in Brussels, FSFE president Georg Greve analysed
the conflicts between patents and standards. The resulting paper is
about the most harmful effects of patents on standards, the
effectiveness of current remedies, and potential future remedies.
>From the article:
"[...] Both patents and standards derive their justification from the
public benefit, yet upholding one deprives the other of its
function. Standards seek to counteract monopolies, patents establish
them. Or, as Tomoko Miyamoto, Senior Counsellor of the Patent Law
Section in the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) said
in her presentation: Patent thickets and patent hold-ups arise from
legitimate exploitation of the exclusive rights intentionally
conferred by patents. They are a normal and intended consequence of
the patent system. [...]"
The article is available in full text at:
http://fsfeurope.org/standards/ps
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.
You will find further information about the work of the FSFE at
http://fsfeurope.org/.
Contact
* Belgium: +32 2 747 03 57
* Germany: +49 700 373 38 76 73
* Sweden: +46 31 7802160
* Switzerland: +41 43 500 03 66
* UK: +44 29 200 08 17 7
October marked the beginning of a planning phase in FSFE. As well as
planning our campaigns for next year, we've been working on some
actions for around the upcoming festive season. Alongside the
internal discussions, we've been asking the community for ideas when
we go to events or hold Fellowship meetings. Nothing is concrete yet,
so if you have good ideas, please join our public lists and let us
know!
A minor change is that, starting next month, Shane will hand over the
newsletter task to me. So, thanks to Shane for almost two years of
newsletters! I'm looking forward to writing next month's, and if you
have suggestions for how the format might be changed, let me know via
ciaran[a]fsfe.org.
Ciaran O'Riordan, FSFE Brussels Office
1. Antitrust work bears fruit
2. Fellowship interview: Rolf Camps
3. Free Software licensing and Net TV in Italy
4. Behind the Scenes at the Freedom Task Force
5. Fellowship meeting in Geneva
FORTHCOMING EVENTS
5. Fellowship meeting, Bolzano, Italy (2008-11-15)
6. Fellowship meeting, Cologne, Germany (2008-11-18)
1. Antitrust work bears fruit
One year after the final court case was won, FSFE is pleased to hear that
the Samba development team is getting useful interoperability information
from Microsoft. FSFE's goal was always to ensure that Free Software
developers would benefit from any published information. This outcome comes
after 5 years of work from FSFE, the Samba team, and other organisations.
http://fsfeurope.org/projects/ms-vs-eu/http://fsfe.org/en/fellows/ciaran/ciaran_s_free_software_notes/fsfe_s_antit…
2. Fellowship interview: Rolf Camps
We interviewed Rolf Camps for some insight on what motivates volunteers and
how they get involved. Rolf is clearly one of our most active translators,
so he told us what that work involves, and about Free Software awareness in
Belgium.
http://www.fsfe.org/en/fellows/ciaran/fellowship_interviews/fellowship_inte…http://fsfeurope.org/contribute/translators/translators.en.html
3. Free Software licensing and Net TV in Italy
Shane Coughlan, FTF coordinator, attended the 'IP-TV 2.0 Conference' in Rome
on the 15th of October to deliver a speech entitled "The implication of Free
Software licenses for the future of IPTV." This event was organised by the
Telematics Freedom Foundation, run by Rufo Guerreschi. The chair of the event
was Arturo Di Corinto, Professor of Communication Science at the University of
Rome La Sapienza. The attendance was quite good and there were several quite
lively discussions. Most of the audience was still new to Free Software, and
opinions were quite divided regarding the importance and impact of increased
freedom in this field.
http://www.telematicsfreedom.org/en/project/14/event-ip-tv-net-tv
4. Behind the Scenes at the Freedom Task Force
Ciaran O'Riordan, FSFE's Fellowship Ambassador, published an exciting profile
article [1] about the Freedom Task Force (FTF), FSFE's legal project. Ciaran
looked at the main areas of the FTF's work, including building the world's most
successful Free Software legal and technical network, enforcing the GPL in
collaboration with gpl-violations.org [2], and offering licensing support to
Free Software projects. Shane Coughlan, FTF Coordinator, is also involved in
delivering consultancy and training to third parties on licensing best practice
and policy decisions.
The FTF is active behind the scenes on many legal and policy issues related to
Free Software, and Ciaran's article offers a rare glimpse into the goings on of
one of FSFE's most important ventures in this area. The article has recieved
significant media coverage, including Slashdot, Free Software Daily, FOSS
Bazaar, Linux.com and LWN.net.
Check it out!
[1] http://fsfe.org/en/fellows/ciaran/ciaran_s_free_software_notes/status_of_fs…
[2] http://www.gpl-violations.org/
5. Fellowship meeting in Geneva
On October 19th, 13 Fellows met in Geneva. Ciaran O'Riordan and
Benjamin Morant were there from FSFE to learn about the local Free
Software groups and activities, and to answer questions about FSFE and
discuss upcoming campaigns. We think this was the Fellowship's first
francophone meeting and look forward to many more.
FORTHCOMING EVENTS
This is only a partial list, and only contains events where our presence
has been confirmed at time of drafting this newsletter. For a more complete
list of events FSFE will be involved with, please consult
http://www.fsfeurope.org/events/
6. Fellowship meeting, Bolzano, Italy (2008-11-15)
On Saturday, 15th November at 14:00 h there will be a Fellowship meeting at
the TIS Innovation Park of Bolzano. The meeting is open to Fellows and all
persons interested in FSFE's work in Italy and the projects of the Fellowship.
The meeting has two parts. First Patrick Ohnewein, coordinator of the Italian
FSFE group, will talk about the activities of the FSFE and the Fellowship in
Italy. In the second part the Fellows will be invited to make proposals for
and discuss about future initiatives to promote and help Free Software.
7. Fellowship meeting, Cologne, Germany (2008-11-18)
On Tuesday, 18th november at 19.00 h again all fellows and people who want
to support FSFE or simply want to inform about Free Software will gather at
the Fellowship Meeting in Hallmackenreuther, Brüsseler Platz, Cologne.
You can find a list of all FSFE newsletters on
http://www.fsfeurope.org/news/newsletter.en.html
Copyright (C) FSFE. Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire
article is permitted in any medium, provided this notice is preserved.
This was an important month for Free Software. Not only was Software Freedom
Day held (as always) on the 20th, but this years marks the 25th anniversary of
the GNU Project. Celebrations took place across Europe and our Fellows
continued to support Free Software in local areas with enthusiasm and passion.
Other important events took place. On the policy level, FSFE engaged with
representatives of the World Bank to explain why Free Software continues
to be important in both economics and politics. On the legal level, meetings,
speeches, panels and training events continued to build infrastructure for the
future.
Shane, FSFE Zurich Office
1. The GNU's 25th Birthday in Berlin, Germany
2. The smallest unit of freedom: A Fellow - Sean Daly
3. Reach the people - Software Freedom Day in Berlin, Vienna and Utrecht
4. Fellowship events throughout Europe
5. Free Software for World Bank financed projects
6. Freedom Task Force activites - GPLv3 in The Netherlands, panels in Italy and speeches in Berlin and Winterthur
7. European Legal Network special interest group meetings in London and Brussels
FORTHCOMING EVENTS
8. FSCONS 2008, Gothenburg, Sweden (2008-10-24 to 2008-10-26)
9. NLUUG Autumn Conference and CELF Embedded Linux Conference Europe, Ede, Netherlands (2008-11-06 to 2008-11-07)
1. The GNU's 25th Birthday in Berlin, Germany
The GNU-project turned 25 on the 27th of September. FSFE and the Berlin Fellows
were at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin to pop a cork and have a party. The
event started at 3pm with some champagne and music to celebrate. A great time
was had by all!
2. The smallest unit of freedom: A Fellow - Sean Daly
"In Europe, Microsoft's foot-dragging in complying with the 2004 Monti
Decision concerned me, and I saw that with very few exceptions, the
mainstream and tech media seemed not to cover fully all that was going on,
in particular the important role of the intervenors like Samba and the
FSFE. I felt that since traditional journalists were missing a vital part
of the story, perhaps it was time for a nontraditional journalist to step
up and report on that part."
Read the whole Fellowship interview: http://fellowship.fsfe.org/interviews
3. Reach the people - Software Freedom Day in Berlin, Vienna and Utrecht
On Saturday the 20th of September, FFII and FSFE's Fellowship group from Berlin
had a barbecue and manned an information booth. At the booth they explained
what Free Software is and why it is important for society. Meanwhile, Vienna's
Fellows celebrate the annual "Software Freedom Day" in a Pub called Pint Pub
in Vienna. The highlight of the event was the performances of the bands "Club
Valat" and "Klaus (from Fadin' to Whiteout)". Finally, in The Netherlands,
Shane Coughlan, Freedom Task Force coordinator at FSFE, delivered a keynote
speech at the Dutch Software Freedom Day event at Liefland College, Utrecht.
4. Fellowship events throughout Europe
The Fellowship Group in Berlin met on the 11th of September at their usual
venue, the New Thinking Store on Tucholsky Strasse. In Vienna the local
Fellowship group invited Shane Coughlan, FTF Coordinator, to deliver a speech
entitled "The Professionalisation of Free Software. Where we are going next."
The new Zurich Fellowship group also had a meeting, once again getting together
at the FSFE Zurich office to discuss ways of spreading the word about Free
Software in Switzerland and to generally have a good time. In Lille, a
Fellowship stand was manned at the "Braderie de Lille" (Lille's flea market)
by our very own French intern, Benjamin Morant, and Rainer Kersten from the
Duesseldorf office.
5. Free Software for World Bank financed projects
FSFE president Georg Greve delivered a course as part of the annual
"Procurement of Information systems in World Bank-Financed Projects"
course at the International Training Center (ITC) of the
International Labour Organisation (ILO) in Turin, Italy. As in the
past years, the course provided insights to the World Bank project
managers on the economic and political basics of Free Software, as
well as practical issues such as licences, business models and best
practice examples.
6. Freedom Task Force activities - GPLv3 in The Netherlands, panels in Italy and speeches in Berlin and Winterthur
Shane Coughlan, Freedom Task Force coordinator at FSFE, hosted a three hour
workshop entitled 'Licensing questions and Legal issues in the light of
GPLv3' for the launch of the GPLv3 at the University of Tilburg, The Netherlands
on the 19th of September. This event is sponsored by NLnet. He also represented
FSFE on the 'NESSI Open Source Working Group' panel at the OSS 2008 conference
in Milan to explain Free Software and the reasons behind Free Software licences.
This was followed by a speech entitled 'Free Software licenses and other
questions' at OSiM World at Berlin on the 17th of September another talk
entitled 'The strategic implementation of Free Software in business' at
the OpenExpo conference in Winterthur, Switzerland, on the 25th of September.
7. European Legal Network special interest group meetings in London and Brussels
FSFE's legal project - the FTF - coordinated a special interest group meeting
in London to discuss business processes and supply chain management. Another
meeting was held in Brussels on the 29th of September to discuss software
patents and other legal issues. These meetings were held for members of the
European Legal Network, and it is hoped that the discussions prompted by
them will lead to greater understanding and support for Free Software by
European legal decision-makers.
FORTHCOMING EVENTS
This is only a partial list, and only contains events where our presence
has been confirmed at time of drafting this newsletter. For a more complete
list of events FSFE will be involved with, please consult
http://www.fsfeurope.org/events/
8. FSCONS 2008, Gothenburg, Sweden (2008-10-24 to 2008-10-26)
For 2008, FSCONS is a collaboration of FSFE, Creative Commons, and Wikimedia
Sweden. There will be three tracks (Free Culture, Free Software, Free Content),
each lead by one of the main organisers. Topics will range from modern kernel
design over citizen journalism all the way across to licensing in the 21st
century.
http://www.fscons.org/
9. NLUUG Autumn Conference and CELF Embedded Linux Conference Europe, Ede, Netherlands (2008-11-06 to 2008-11-07)
The FSFE will be attending the NLUUG Autumn Conference on Thursday 6th
November. This year's theme is 'mobility'. Feel free to come to our booth
and ask about Free Software! Shane Coughlan, Freedom Task Force coordinator
at FSFE, will also deliver talk entitled 'The strategic implementation of
free software in business' at the CELF Embedded Linux Conference Europe 2008
at the same location on the following day, Friday 7th November. The successful
implementation of Free Software requires an understanding of the best policy
and processes applicable to its context. Shane will discuss how FSFE's legal
project and its European Legal Network have engaged with this issue by
producing generic market knowledge for supply and purchasing contracts,
work flow documents and deployment methodology. The location for both
conferences is Hotel en Congrescentrum De Reehorst, Ede, Netherlands.
http://www.nluug.nl/events/nj08/index.html
You can find a list of all FSFE newsletters on
http://www.fsfeurope.org/news/newsletter.en.html
Copyright (C) FSFE. Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire
article is permitted in any medium, provided this notice is preserved.
FSFE for Freedom Not Fear
The Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) supports Free Software so
that every
citizen can play an independent, active and responsible part in our
information society. However, censorship of content, violations of the
principle of 'Net Neutrality' and increasing online surveillance do not
fit with these goals. FSFE is therefore appealing for participation in
the world-wide day of action "Freedom Not Fear" [1], which takes place
this Saturday, the 11th October.
"Free Software grants us the right to use such software for any purpose,
to study it, to adapt it to our needs and to release improved versions
to the public. However, if our civil rights are more and more curtailed
by questionable legislation, we may end up with the absurd situation
that we cannot make use of these four freedoms without breaking the
law", warns Matthias Kirschner, German Deputy Coordinator for FSFE.
In Germany, the main demonstration for "Freedom Not Fear" day starts at
14:00 at Alexanderplatz in Berlin, Germany. The event is organised by
AK Vorrat (German Working Group on Data Retention [2]) and is being
supported by over one hundred organisations in Germany alone.
Demonstrations are also taking place in 21 other countries around the
world, such as in the cities of Paris, Stockholm, London, Sofia and
Luxembourg, among many others. Artistic events related to the day of
action will take place in Rome and Zürich, and discussion events are
planned for Washington, D.C. In the Netherlands, events are taking
place under the banner of "Volksopstand 2008" (Peoples' Revolt 2008)[3].
In The Hague, a demonstration is planned in the square front of the
second chamber of the Dutch Parliament, and afterwards various related
activities such as a 'privacy market' and discussion workshops will
take place.
More information on events planned worldwide can be found on the
"Freedom Not Fear" web site [4].
[1]
http://www.vorratsdatenspeicherung.de/content/view/242/144/lang,en/
[2] http://www.vorratsdatenspeicherung.de/
[3] http://www.volksopstand2008.nl/
[4]
http://wiki.vorratsdatenspeicherung.de/Freedom_Not_Fear_2008/International_…
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.
FSFE's homepage can be found at http://www.fsfeurope.org
You can reach the FSFE switchboard from:
* Belgium: +32 2 747 03 57
* Germany: +49 700 373 38 76 73
* Sweden: +46 31 7802160
* Switzerland: +41 43 500 03 66
* UK: +44 29 200 08 17 7
Today marks the twenty-fifth anniversary of the initial announcement of
the GNU Project, a pioneering initiative to develop an operating system
that gives all users the freedom to modify it and publish modified
versions, individually or working together. The Free Software Foundation
Europe (FSFE) commends the substantial achievements of GNU's first
quarter-century and look forward to furthering their shared goal of
facilitating software freedoms.
27th September 2008 — 25 years ago today, the GNU Project was launched
by Richard M. Stallman with the goal of creating an entire operating
system that anyone was free to use, study, share and improve. These
freedoms grant all users the independence and flexibility to use their
computer for any purpose, without the artificial restrictions which
proprietary software imposes, such as vendor lock-in, proprietary file
formats and Digital Restrictions Management (DRM). From its humble
origins in the Artificial Intelligence Lab at MIT, GNU has grown to be
one of the most popular operating systems in the world and fostered the
development of thousands of other Free Software applications.
The Free Software Foundation (FSFE's sister organisation based in
Boston, MA) was founded in 1985 to promote the core idea behind
Stallman's GNU Project: that the freedom to examine, modify, copy, and
share software is essential for a just, free society. Much of the work
was done between 1983 and 1991, and this laid the groundwork for many
third-party projects which later also brought these freedoms to computer
users. The operating system was completed in 1992 by the third-party
development of a core component called "Linux". The success of GNU/Linux
operating system encouraged the development of many other Free Software
projects such as Firefox, KDE and OpenOffice.org. Today, there are
hundreds of GNU/Linux distributions in the world, powering millions of
computers ranging from web servers and kitchen appliances to cellphones
and laptops.
"The contributions of the GNU project to the computing world are
difficult to overstate", says Georg C. F. Greve, President of the Free
Software Foundation Europe (FSFE). "For the first time there was an
awareness of Free Software, and the concept of Copyleft revolutionised
the way in which freedom is spread and protected. Both intellectual
achievements laid the groundwork for the immense success of GNU/Linux,
which has meanwhile established itself as the primary competitor to
proprietary operating systems across the gamut of computing, from
large-scale scientific research to affordable consumer laptops. In so
doing GNU was at the root of giving users control over their computing
environment and data."
The FSFE was established in 2001 to further the political and social
goals that also provide the basis of the GNU Project, and to support the
flourishing European Free Software community. "The FSFE works closely
with its partners around Europe and beyond to ensure that the spirit of
Stallman's original announcement is backed up with practise, and works
to promote awareness of the Free Software message", explains Shane
Coughlan, coordinator of the FSFE's Freedom Task Force.
More and more countries are turning to Free Software for use in the
public sector and education. While many businesses have long been using
and contributing to Free Software in order to gain marketplace
advantages and cost savings, governments are increasingly realising the
benefits of Free Software in terms of sovereignty, transparency, and
self-determination. By its very nature of promoting sharing,
collaboration, and sustainability, Free Software ensures that all users
have the ability to determine and shape their computing future.
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.
You will find further information about the work of the FSFE at
http://fsfeurope.org/.
Notes for editors
* The GNU Project seeks to enable and maintain the four fundamental
freedoms of software: to run software "for any purpose", to study and
adapt software according to individual needs, to distribute copies of
the software, and to improve the software, sharing the benefits with
others.
* The GNU Project pioneered the concept of copyleft licensing, which
preserves fundamental software freedoms by using copyright to enforce
the sharing of derivative software under the same license as original
software.
Contact
* Belgium: +32 2 747 03 57
* Germany: +49 700 373 38 76 73
* Sweden: +46 31 7802160
* Switzerland: +41 43 500 03 66
* UK: +44 29 200 08 17 7
Other ways to get in touch with the FSFE.
FSFE to make legal consolidation tool available in 10 languages
2008-09-26, Zurich - Shane Coughlan, FSFE
The Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) announced today that it plans
to make the Fiduciary License Agreement (FLA) available ten languages.
The selected languages are English, German, French, Italian, Swedish,
Serbian, Polish, Dutch, Spanish and Portuguese.
The FLA assists projects with re-licensing and license enforcement by
consolidating copyright into a single organization, and is effective in
jurisdictions based on both civil law and common law. It also transfers
a full set of rights back to the author, ensuring that both parties
maintain the maximum freedom possible. The translation of the FLA will
help provide the benefits of copyright consolidation to local projects
across Europe.
The FLA is available as part of FSFE's Fiduciary Programme. It can also
be customised for use by other organisations, and was recently adopted
by KDE e.V., the non-profit organisation representing the KDE Project in
legal and financial matters.
"This translation project contributes to a growing collection of
management tools for Free Software," says Shane Coughlan, the
coordinator of FSFE's legal project. "In the last two years such tools
have increased in importance and enjoy a broad spectrum of
non-commercial and commercial support. Projects are making plans for
the long-term development of their code and we want to assist with that.
Our current translation work is being partially supported by Google
through a generous donation made earlier in the year. I hope that
in the future other commercial users of Free Software will support
similar initiatives so we can continue building a strong foundation for
sustainable development."
More information on the FLA can be found at
http://fsfeurope.org/projects/ftf/fla
You can download a PDF copy of the FLA here:
http://fsfeurope.org/projects/ftf/FLA.en.pdf
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.
FSFE's homepage can be found at http://www.fsfeurope.org
You can contact us via email: FTF @ fsfeurope.org
You can reach the FSFE switchboard from:
Belgium: +32 2 747 03 57
Germany: +49 700 373 38 76 73
Sweden: +46 31 7802160
Switzerland: +41 43 500 03 66
UK: +44 29 200 08 17 7
Press contact: Shane Coughlan, FTF Coordinator, FSFE extension: 408
Further information: http://www.fsfeurope.org
The most exciting thing this month is the amount of Fellowship activity we
are seeing around Europe. It's great to see more and more local meetings,
giving Free Software supporters a chance to hang out together and share
views.
I've been lucky enough to attend several of the recent gatherings and what
impresses me most is that our Fellows discuss such a broad range of topics.
People talk about their local area, concerns about digital rights, business
perspectives and ideas for future strategy. It's a dynamic environment to
be working in. I'd love to see more meetings, especially in my own 'home'
countries of Ireland and the UK. If you would like to be involved (whether
you are a Fellow or not) please visit http://fsfeurope.org/contribute/ or
send an email to team(a)fsfeurope.org.
Shane, Zurich Office
1. FSFE welcomes KDE's adoption of the Fiduciary Licence Agreement (FLA)
2. FSFE at Akademy 2008
3. Swedish Fellows meet for talks and barbecue
4. Fellowship meeting in Nijmegen
5. Fellowship meeting in Duesseldorf
6. Zurich Fellowship meeting
7. New members of FSFE
8. Printable information material available for download
FORTHCOMING EVENTS
9. 'The strategic implementation of Free Software in business' speech at OpenExpo
1. FSFE welcomes KDE's adoption of the Fiduciary Licence Agreement (FLA)
KDE e.V. decided to adopt a customised version of FSFE's Fiduciary Licence
Agreement (FLA) during their recent general assembly. The FLA is a copyright
assignment that allows Free Software projects to assign their copyright to
single organisation or person. This enables projects to ensure their legal
maintainability, including important issues such as preserving the ability to
re-license and certainty to have sufficient rights to enforce licences in
court. KDE Project developers will in the future have the option of copyright
consolidation by assigning code to KDE e.V.
http://dot.kde.org/1218525921/
2. FSFE at Akademy 2008
Shane Coughlan, FTF Coordinator at FSFE, participated in the 'Driving
innovation with Open Desktop Technologies' at Akademy 2008 on Tuesday, 12
August 2008. Shane was also around the conference for a few days talking
with developers and sharing ideas. Armijn Hemel from gpl-violations.org
was also present, though he was running a USB plugfest rather than focusing
on licensing for this event.
3. Swedish Fellows meet for talks and barbequeue
Eight people were present at the meeting, which took place in
Slottskogen and lasted for about three hours. The weather was nice
enough to have a simple barbecue. Among the many discussion topics
were the usage of free software in non-core parts of businesses, the
BSA's crusade on unlicenced proprietary software as a golden opportunity
for free software and ways to increase visibility and knowledge of free
software for non-technical users. Some time was also devoted to talking
about FSCONS, both in terms of practical information and of long term
strategies. Two of the fellows present at the meeting volunteered to
help out at the conference.
4. Fellowship meeting in Nijmegen
Ciaran O'Riordan (Fellowship Ambassador) and Shane Coughlan (FTF Coordinator)
attended a meeting of the Dutch Fellowship at Café Jos, Daalseweg 309, 6523 CA
Nijmegen on the 28th of August. Adriaan de Groot from KDE was also present,
and in between discussions about KDE 4, the cultural expansion of Free Software
and baking muffins, plenty of beer was consumed. One of the main topics of
discussion was software patents, something that many feel will become a high
profile European political issue once the current European Commissioner's term
comes to an end.
5. Fellowship meeting in Duesseldorf
Ciaran O'Riordan (Fellowship Ambassador) and Shane Coughlan (FTF Coordinator)
attended the latest meeting of the Duesseldorf Fellowship at Gasttaette
"Suedstern", Bilker Allee 66, 40219 Duesseldorf on the 30th of August.
Discussion was lively and ranged from software engineering to usability
and political developments in Germany. As in Nijmegen, some discussions
centred around software patents and what we need to do to ensure we can
address the topic fully.
6. Zurich Fellowship meeting
There was a meeting of the Zurich Fellowship in the FSFE Zurich office on the
15th of August. This is the second meeting for our Fellows at this location,
and this time around we talked about the forthcoming Software Freedom Day
events. Ben, our office intern, is helping to coordinate the distribution
of information at a local university on the day. Shane Coughlan was also
at the meeting and briefed everyone on KDE and the adoption of the FLA.
7. New members of FSFE
The team is proud to welcome Fernanda G. Weiden, the coach for FSFE's
system administration team, and Björn Schießle, the official
coordinator for German translation. Graeme West is the new intern at
the Zürich Office. Congratulations to all these people.
8. Printable information material available for download
A folder with general information about FSFE and Free Software, and some
leaflets with specific information about FSFE's projects and activities
are now available online in HTML and PDF format. Everybody can
download, print, distribute!
http://www.fsfeurope.org/documents/printable/
All the downloadable PDFs are auto-generated from the same sources as the
HTML web pages, using technologies like XSLT and TeX, and of course
built on exclusively Free Software. Curious how that works? Interested
in hacks like this one? Join FSFE's team of webmasters!
http://www.fsfeurope.org/contribute/web/
FORTHCOMING EVENTS
9. 'The strategic implementation of Free Software in business' speech at OpenExpo
Shane Coughlan, FTF coordinator, will deliver a speech entitled 'The strategic
implementation of Free Software in business' at the OpenExpo conference in
Winterthur, Switzerland, on the 25th of September.
You can find a list of all FSFE newsletters on
http://www.fsfeurope.org/news/newsletter.en.html
Copyright (C) FSFE. Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire
article is permitted in any medium, provided this notice is preserved.
FSFE's activities have been varied over the last month. It's promising to see
the increase of Fellowship activities across Europe. We are looking forward to
seeing more local groups appear and to hearing about their activities on all
levels. One of the most important parts of supporting Free Software is sharing
knowledge in your own community.
To contribute in spreading the word you can visit this page:
http://fsfeurope.org/contribute/contribute
Shane, FSFE Zurich Office
1. Speeches about SELF, Free Software and licensing at FKFT
2. Local Fellowship meetings
3. New interns for FSFE
4. Students' union organizes talk on political aspects of Free Software
5. FTF releases training documentation on the SELF platform
6. Zurich Fellowship meeting - 2008-08-15
7. 'Who Owns Free Software? The Copyright and Patent Debate' speech at OSiM World, Berlin - 2008-08-17
8. Official launch of GPLv3 in The Netherlands - 2008-08-19
FORTHCOMING EVENTS
9. First Fellowship meeting in Stuttgart - 2008-08-22
10. Fellowship's stand at the Braderie de Lille, Lille (France) - 2008-09-06 and 2008-09-07
1. Speeches about SELF, Free Software and licensing at FKFT
FSFE was present at the FKFT conference in Barcelona during July to talk about
the SELF project, Free Software and licensing. FSFE president Georg Greve
delivered a talk on the 16th of July to provide insight on how the SELF project
has helped advance the state of the art, and how the work done in the SELF
consortium will provide lasting benefit to the Free Software community. The
speech was entitled 'How SELF helped building structures for freedom'. This
was followed by a talk entitled 'Licences that support freedom' delivered by
Shane Coughlan, the FTF coordinator of FSFE. The events in Barcelona concluded
with a lunch for Fellows of FSFE and Free Software friends in Barcelona from
14:00 until 16:00 on the 17th of July with FSFE's Georg Greve, Jonas Öberg and
Shane Coughlan.
2. Local Fellowship meetings
Local Fellowship meetings have recently taken place in Dublin, Brussels,
Zurich, and Lille. At these meetings, Fellows have discussed the status and
needs of projects they're involved with, what local political problems need
work, and how to improve the Fellowship itself. In addition, these initial
meetings plus discussions on FSFE's public mailing lists are contributing to
the planning of larger, regular meetings. The UK, Belgium, and Ireland are
likely locations for these to begin in.
3. New interns for FSFE
Stian Rodven Eide and Johannes Tiemer are FSFE's new interns in Göteborg.
Stian's primary task is organising the Free Software part of FSCONS and a
booth to present FS and FSFE at the European Social Forum in Malmö in September.
Johannes studies Economics in Kiel (Germany). His main task consists of
compiling studies and analyses - among others about the Swedish market for
Free Software. Benjamin Morant is working as Georg's assistant at the FSFE
Office in Zürich (Switzerland). He is organising a booth during the Braderie
de Lille (France) in September and is drawing cartoons about the all-day
life within the FSFE.
We also would to thank Irina, who during her internship helped with organising
conferences and many administrative tasks. She was an invaluable contact point
for our activities.
4. Students' union organizes talk on political aspects of Free Software
The students' executive committee (AStA) of the University of Bochum,
Germany, organized a lecture on essential ideas and political issues of
Free Software with Bernhard Reiter. The event took place on the 23rd of
June and formed part of a series of lectures on IT and information
security. Particular attention was paid to the questions whether software
choices constitute political decisions, which benefits arise from the use
of Free Software and why MS Word is not the proper file format to be used
when sending documents to others. The lecture was followed by an inspiring
discussion with the audience (about 20 students). The AStA - being elected
by the students' parliament - represents the entire students' body and
therefore is the ideal board to promote Free Software in the environment
of a University. After all, Free Software complies best with academic
traditions of sharing knowledge. Special thanks go to Moritz Schulte for
organizing this event.
5. FTF releases training documentation on the SELF platform
FSFE's Freedom Task Force has begun to release its current Free Software
training documentation in SCORM elearning format through the SELF Platform:
http://beta.selfplatform.eu/SELF/collectionview/
Select 'Introduction to Free Software and Open Standards' in the left
hand menu and then choose 'The strategic implementation of Free Software
in business' when the option is presented. FSFE will be releasing one
section of the course per week until all of our existing material is
freely available on-line.
6. Zurich Fellowship meeting - 2008-08-15
There was a Fellowship meeting at the FSFE Zurich office from 18:00 until
19:30 on Friday the 15th of August. Some free (as in beer) beer was provided
for the around 10 Fellows and FSFE staff that attended. Ways of spreading the
word about Free Software in Switzerland were discussed, and the evenings host,
Shane Coughlan, told about Akademy '08 and the Fiduciary License Agreement (FLA)
which got quite some attention on that very conference. He even held his promise
of not talking about licenses.
7. 'Who Owns Free Software? The Copyright and Patent Debate' speech at OSiM World, Berlin - 2008-08-17
Shane Coughlan, Freedom Task Force coordinator at FSFE, delivered a speech
entitled 'Free Software licenses and other questions' at OSiM World at Berlin
on the 17th of August. The talk examined the question of ownership, the goal
of owning creative work, benefits to consumers and the community and the
relationship between ownership and Free Software licences.
8. Official launch of GPLv3 in The Netherlands - 2008-08-19
Shane Coughlan, Freedom Task Force coordinator at FSFE, hosted a three hour
workshop entitled 'Licensing questions and Legal issues in the light of GPLv3'
for the launch of the GPLv3 at the Univesity of Tilburg, Amsterdam, The
Netherlands on the 19th of August. This event is sponsored by NLnet.
FORTHCOMING EVENTS
9. First Fellowship meeting in Stuttgart - 2008-08-22
There will be a Fellowship meeting at the Unithekle, Allmandring 17, 70596
Stuttgart on Friday the 22th of August at 19:00. This is the first Fellowship
meeting in Stuttgart and all Fellows and Free Software supporters nearby are
invited to attend. It will be a good chance to get to know each other in
person, discuss the possibility of future Fellowship meetings in Stuttgart and
to generally have a good time.
Further information: Bjoern Schiessle (schiessle(a)fsfe.org) or on the web:
http://wiki.fsfe.org/FellowshipGroup/Stuttgart
10. Fellowship's stand at the Braderie de Lille, Lille (France) - 2008-09-06 and 2008-09-07
The so-called "Braderie de Lille" (Lille's flea market) is a big outside-event
which has taken place every year since the 12th century during the first
week-end of September. chtinux, a Linux User Group which is installed around
there, has proposed to the Fellowship to take part in the Braderie. The FSFE,
and especially the Fellowship's stand, will get much visibility, since
millions of people of numerous nations take a walk on Lille's streets. Come
to discover this beautiful city and to eat some Braderie's culinary
specialities like clams ! And above all, come in order to support the
Fellowship ! Fellowship's stand will be situated on Place du Vieux Marché
aux chevaux. If you want more information about this event please send an
email to Benjamin: morant(a)fsfeurope.org
You can find a list of all FSFE newsletters on
http://www.fsfeurope.org/news/newsletter.en.html
Copyright (C) FSFE. Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire
article is permitted in any medium, provided this notice is preserved.
FSFE welcomes KDE's adoption of the Fiduciary Licence Agreement (FLA)
Free Software Foundation Europe welcomes the adoption of the Fiduciary
Licence Agreement by the K Desktop Environment project. The FLA is a
copyright assignment that allows Free Software projects to assign their
copyright to single organisation or person. This enables projects to
ensure their legal maintainability, including important issues such as
preserving the ability to re-license and certainty to have sufficient
rights to enforce licences in court.
"We see the adoption of the FLA by KDE as a positive and important
milestone in the maturity of the Free Software community," says Georg
Greve, president of Free Software Foundation Europe. "The FLA was
designed to help projects increase the legal maintainability of their
software to ensure long-term protection and reliability. KDE is among
the most important Free Software initiatives and it is playing a central
role in bringing freedom to the desktop. This decision of the KDE
project underlines its dedication to think about how to make that
freedom last."
Adriaan de Groot, Vice President of KDE e.V., the organisation behind
the KDE project, said "KDE e.V. has endorsed the use of a particular FLA
based directly on the FSFE's sample FLA as the preferred way to assign
copyright to the association. We recognise that assignment is an option
that individuals may wish to exercise; it is in no way pushed upon KDE
contributors. There are also other avenues of copyright assignment
available besides the FLA, but we believe this is the easiest way to get
it done, with little fuss. Enthusiasm for the FLA was immediate --
people were asking for printed versions of the form before the week was
out so that they could fill one in."
"The FLA is a versatile document designed to work across different
countries with different perceptions of copyright and authorship,"
says Shane Coughlan, Freedom Task Force coordinator. "As a truly
international project, KDE provides a great example of how the FLA can
provide legal coherency in the mid-to-long term. It's been a pleasure
to help with the adoption process and FSFE's Freedom Task Force is ready
to continuing supporting KDE in the future."
KDE's adoption of the FLA is the result of cooperation between
KDE e.V. and FSFE's Freedom Task Force over the last year and a half,
part of the deepening collaboration between the two associate
organisations.
About the FLA:
The FLA was written by Dr. Axel Metzger (Ifross) and Georg Greve
(FSFE) in consultation with renowned international legal and
technical experts. Parties involved in the evolution of the FLA at
some point or another included RA Dr. Till Jaeger, Carsten Schulz,
Prof. Eben Moglen, RA Thorsten Feldmann, LL.M., Werner Koch,
Alessandro Rubini, Reinhard Muller and others. The latest revision
was compiled by Georg Greve and FSFE's FTF coordinator Shane M
Coughlan based on feedback provided by Dr. Lucie Guibault of the
Institute for Information Law in the Netherlands.
About KDE:
KDE is an international technology team that creates free and open
source software for desktop and portable computing. Among KDE's
products are a modern desktop system for Linux and UNIX platforms,
comprehensive office productivity and groupware suites and hundreds
of software titles in many categories including Internet and web
applications, multimedia, entertainment, educational, graphics and
software development. KDE software is translated into more than 60
languages and is built with ease of use and modern accessibility
principles in mind. KDE4's full-featured applications run natively on
Linux, BSD, Solaris, Windows and Mac OS X.
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.
The Freedom Task Force can be found at http://www.fsfeurope.org/ftf/
The Freedom Task Force can be emailed at ftf at fsfeurope.org
Contact:
You can reach the FSFE switchboard from:
Belgium: +32 2 747 03 57
Germany: +49 700 373 38 76 73
Sweden: +46 31 7802160
Switzerland: +41 43 500 03 66
UK: +44 29 200 08 17 7
Shane Coughlan, FTF Coordinator, FSFE extension: 408
Further information: http://fsfeurope.org
Housekeeping items are the least popular of all tasks in any
organisation, and any organisation that is working under pressure has
a tendency of accumulating them.
That is why after the intensive work of the past year to build up and
grow the Freedom Task Force, work on antitrust and OOXML issues, and
various other activities, FSFE had some of them as well.
Fortunately, after substantial preparation and three intensive days,
FSFE's General Assembly in June managed to take care of them and send
everyone home highly motivated and with a full task list. The results
of this will become slowly visible throughout the coming year.
But this does not mean that FSFE's teams have been inactive meanwhile,
quite the opposite. The STACS EU project produced good news, FSFE
continued to spread education about Free Software and licenses, and
the Fellowship was active as ever with meetings in Vienna and Berlin.
Fellowship meetings are excellent gathering points to meet others and
get active. And of course we plan to provide some more also from
FSFE's side on this front. But if you want your Fellowship meeting in
the area, you need not wait. Just call a meeting yourself!
If you don't know where to start, contact fellowship(a)fsfeurope.org.
Georg Greve, FSFE President
1. FSFE general assembly in Zürich, Switzerland
2. STACS reveal Citizens Science web site
3. FSFE welcome to release of WINE 1.0
4. Examining the importance of Free Software licenses at IOTC 2008, Ireland
5. Fellowship meeting in Vienna
6. Fellowship meeting in Berlin
7. FSFE welcomes new system administrator
FORTHCOMING EVENTS
8. 'How SELF helped building structures for freedom' speech at FKFT,
2008-07-16
9. 'Licences that support freedom' speech at FKFT, 2008-07-16
10. Zurich Fellowship meeting, 2008-07-18
1. FSFE general assembly in Zürich, Switzerland
FSFE's General Assembly came together for its annual meeting in
Zürich, Switzerland. During three days from June 6th until 8th,
participants were locked into FSFE's Zürich office to discuss past,
ongoing and future projects and reviewed FSFE's employee and budgeting
situation. The General Assembly also agreed upon constitutional
changes that will be published after filing with the authorities.
Stay tuned.
2. STACS reveal Citizens Science web site
The STACS project is proud to announce the launch of the website
Citizens Science. The aim of the website is to provide a common meeting
ground for researchers to come together with NGOs to discuss and find
common projects to work on for the future. Citizens Science is run by the
STACS project, which consists of FSFE and five other NGO organisation, each
dedicated to their own area of expertice, for instance free software,
democracy, public health and biomedicine.
You can find the Citizens Science website on
http://citizens-science.org/
3. FSFE welcome to release of WINE 1.0
Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) acknowledges the importance of the work
being done by the Wine developers, whose efforts help many users to migrate to
Free Software. Matthias Kirschner on the topic: "It's the same support that
training wheels provide when learning to ride a bicycle, they take away the
fear and help the children to learn to ride by themselves - Just as Wine
'balances' the burden proprietary software puts upon its user."
http://mail.fsfeurope.org/pipermail/press-release/2008q2/000212.html
4. Examining the importance of Free Software licenses at IOTC 2008, Ireland
Shane Coughlan represented FSFE at IOTC 2008 in Dublin, Ireland. He delivered
a speech on the 18th of June discussing Free Software in business. Other
speakers at the event included Graham Taylor from Open Forum Europe, Adam
Jollans from IBM and Stephen McGibbon from Microsoft. Discussions were
lively and quite a few different opinions were offered regarding the future
of the software market in North Western Europe.
5. Fellowship meeting in Vienna
The twenty-third Austrian Fellowship meeting took place on the 20th of June in
Vienna. The informal meeting began at 6pm and the official agenda began at
7pm. As well as Fellows, the Austrian Fellowship extended an invitation to
all
people interested in FSFE or Free Software. The event is continuing to grow
in popularity.
6. Fellowship meeting in Berlin
The Fellowship Group Berlin met on the 12th of June in the NewThinking Store.
The meeting began at 7:30pm and was open to everyone interested in discussing
Free Software.
7. FSFE welcomes new system administrator
FSFE's system need are too large to survive purely on voluntary love
alone, they require professional care. After a search around Europe,
the choice fell on Emil Radulovic from Serbia and member of FSFE's
Serbian Team and associate organisation, FSN Serbia. After getting an
overview of FSFE's systems, Emil will start overhauling some of the
infrastructure, starting with the Fellowship.
FORTHCOMING EVENTS
8. 'How SELF helped building structures for freedom' speech at FKFT,
2008-07-16
SELF has contributed on various levels to freedom in software and education.
The work of the SELF Legal Experts Group (LEG) has helped to evolve a better
understanding of Open Standards and provided a reference line for free
educational materials. The coordinator of the SELF LEG, FSFE president Georg
Greve, will provide an insight on how SELF has helped advance the state of
the art, and how the work done in the SELF consortium will provide lasting
benefit to the Free Software community.
9. 'Licences that support freedom' speech at FKFT, 2008-07-16
Shane will talk about the types of licence that provide and protect freedoms
of
use, study, sharing and improvement in the context of both technology and
education. He will review the main challenges that platforms like SELF may
encounter from the legal point of view and what kind of mechanisms help
support
reliable legal infrastructure. He will also discuss the work of FSFE's Freedom
Task Force in providing education and support services relating to legal
support for Free Software in Europe.
10. Zurich Fellowship meeting, 2008-07-18
There will be a Fellowship meeting at the FSFE Zurich office from 18:00 until
19:30 on Friday the 18th of July. Some free (as in beer) beer will be provided
and all Fellows nearby are invited to attend. It will be a good chance to get
to know each other in person, to discuss ways of spreading the word about Free
Software in Switzerland, and to generally have a good time. This meeting will
be hosted by Shane Coughlan, the coordinator of FSFE's legal activities.
However, he promises not to talk about licences unless someone asks. If you
are coming to the meeting please let Shane know by sending an email to
coughlan(a)fsfeurope.org.
You can find a list of all FSFE newsletters on
http://www.fsfeurope.org/news/newsletter.en.html
Copyright (C) FSFE. Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire
article is permitted in any medium, provided this notice is preserved.