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<html newsdate="2018-05-02" type="newsletter">
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<title>FSFE Newsletter - May 2016</title>
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</head>
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<body class="newsletter article" microformats="h-entry" id="nl-201605">
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<h1 class="p-name">FSFE Newsletter - May 2016</h1>
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<div class="e-content">
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<h2 id="eu-jeopardises-its-goals-in-standardisation-with-frand-licensing">EU
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jeopardises its goals in standardisation with FRAND licensing</h2>
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<p>As a part of the Digital Single Market strategy, the European Commission
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has <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/news/communication-ict-standardisation-priorities-digital-single-market">published the communication on ICT standardisation
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priorities</a> as one of the key factors in the digital economy. FSFE
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welcomes the overall approach taken in the communication in favour of
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more open standards and a greater inclusion of Free Software communities
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into standardisation processes.</p>
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<p>However, the document lacks proper understanding of licensing conditions
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of standard-essential patents in order to include Free Software into
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standard setting processes. In particular, FSFE <a href="fixme:link">expresses
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its concerns in regard to the promotion of so-called "fair, reasonable,
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and non-discriminatory (FRAND)licensing terms</a> that in practice are
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incompatible with Free Software. This way, the document jeopardises every
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effort set by the European Commission to integrate Free Software communities
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into standardisation.</p>
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<h2 id="european-commission-vs-google-android">European Commission vs Google Android</h2>
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<p>On April 20, the European Commission
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<a href="http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_STATEMENT-16-1506_en.htm?locale=en">outlined
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its charges in regard to Google's businesses practices relating to the
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Android operating system</a>. According to the Commission, Google is
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abusing its dominant market position by pre-installing and setting Google
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Search, Google Play Store and Google Chrome as the default on most Android
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devices sold in Europe. These practices close off ways for competitive
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search engines to access the market.</p>
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<p>FSFE has previously <a href="https://fsfe.org/activities/policy/eu/20130729.EC.Fairsearch.letter.en.html">raised
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its concerns in regard to the claim against the free-of-charge distribution
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of Android</a> that had been raised to the European Commission by a
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coalition of certain online service providers who claimed that this practice
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is harmful to competition. We argued against that claim as it undermines
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the whole essence of Free Software licensing, and are pleased to see that
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the Commission disregarded that claim in its antitrust case against Google.</p>
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<h2 id="fsfe-merges-offices-to-berlin">FSFE merges offices to Berlin</h2>
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<p>FSFE's history is deeply rooted in Düsseldorf and its surrounding area,
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given the fact that we opened our first office in Düsseldorf. This office
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was FSFE's first administrative center and later became the hub of our
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merchandise activities. Düsseldorf now is the epicenter of one of the
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oldest Fellowship groups and we are very grateful for the support which
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the Fellows and volunteers in the area have given to the FSFE through
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the years.</p>
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<p>However, after many years of maintaining two offices, we now concentrate
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our administrative activities in the Berlin office that has been used as
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FSFE's headquarters since several years now. With the closing of the
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Düsseldorf office, all merchandise, administration and <a href="https://fsfe.org/contact/contact.en.html">communication is handled via
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the Berlin office solely</a>.</p>
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<h2 id="from-the-community">From the community</h2>
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<ul>
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<li><p>Guido Arnold, our education team coordinator, summarised legal
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aspects and possible activities to take, when <a href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/guido/2016/04/public-schools-making-ms-office-mandatory/">public schools make MS Office mandatory.</a></p></li>
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<li><p>Vitaly Repin <a href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/vitaly_repin/2016/04/14/course-on-the-road-to-the-free-digital-society-is-available-in-moodle-and-ims-common-cartridge-formats-now/">published
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the course by Richard Stallman "On the Road to the Free Digital Society"
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in Moodle Backup and IMS Common Cartridge formats</a>, and invites everyone
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to give feedback and promote the course through their channels.</p></li>
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<li><p>Since Let’s Encrypt has left beta testing, Michal Nazarewicz <a href="http://mina86.com/p/tls-is-a-yes/">uses and promotes this new certificate
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authority which provides free TLS certificates</a>: "If you're running
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your own server there's no excuse not to use TLS".</p></li>
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<li><p>Björn Schießle <a href="http://blog.schiessle.org/2016/04/16/installing-wallabag-2-on-a-shared-web-hosting-service/">blogs about a self hostable application for saving web pages, "Wallabag",
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and about its maintenance on a shared web hosting service</a>.</p></li>
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<li><p>Marcus Moeller explains how to <a href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/mmoeller/2016/04/20/setting-up-a-freedombox-on-bbb-to-host-a-blog/">set up a Freedombox on a Beagle Bone Black in order to self-host a blog
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on freely designed hardware and without the need to use proprietary
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software</a>.</p></li>
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</ul>
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<h2 id="what-else-have-we-done">What else have we done?</h2>
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<ul>
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<li><p>We have been running the eighth annual election for a Fellowship
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representative who is to represent our community and the FSFE's Fellowship
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in <a href="https://fsfe.org/about/team.en.html#general-assembly">FSFE's
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general assembly</a>. Although we only had one candidate, we like to
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<a href="FIXME:%20Link%20to%20News-item%20of%20elections,%20still%20to%20come">thank
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and congratulate Mirko Boehm to run for the office and being elected</a>.</p></li>
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<li><p>We have now over 30 organisations and companies who joined us in
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proposing measures to EU institutions and EU member states to avoid negative
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implications on users' rights and Free Software imposed by the
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<a href="https://fsfe.org/activities/radiodirective/statement.en.html">EU
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Radio Equipment Directive 2014/53/EU, aka 'Radio Lockdown Directive'</a>.
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The joint statement is open to new signatures against negative implications
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that the 'Radio Lockdown Directive' poses on software freedom, users'
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rights, fair competition, innovation, environment, and volunteering.</p></li>
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<li><p>FSFE also joined a coalition of organisations that fight the
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negative implementations of the 'Radio Lockdown Directive' in France.
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Together, we signed <a href="https://fsfe.org/news/2016/news-20160406.en.html">an
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open letter to the French government and French Telecommunications Regulatory
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Authority (ART)</a> to ensure that the implementation of the 'Radio Lockdown
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Directive' in France will not harm Free Software.</p></li>
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<li><p>On our way to become more transparent and inclusive, we published
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our <a href="https://fsfe.org/about/transparency-commitment.en.html">transparency
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commitment</a> in line with the guidelines from Transparency International Germany.</p></li>
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<li><p>A lot of our initial structure and founding documents have not
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been updated ever since the FSFE grew from being a small circle of volunteers
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into an organisation with hired staff, with a Fellowship program and a
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community of thousands of people. We now begun to <a href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/jonas/?p=60">revise our "Self Conception"</a>, to better reflect our grown
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decision-making process. Jonas Öberg, FSFE's executive director, is sharing
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his thoughts on and insights about <a href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/jonas/?p=50">potential future steps to FSFE's structure and membership</a>on his blog.</p></li>
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<li><p><a href="http://blogs.fsfe.org/jonas/?p=65">On the backend of our
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work, we have been introducing a ticket system built on OTRS</a>.
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Although at first sight not many people seem to be directly affected by
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this, our whole communication will profit over time from higher control
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of our workflow. Also, it shall be opened to be used by volunteers as well.</p></li>
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<li><p>13 - 15 April FSFE's annual legal licensing workshop LLW took place
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in Barcelona, Spain. The event is dedicated to gather legal practitioners from all over the world to dicuss the most challenging issues in and around Free Software
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licensing. This year it had a record number of participants, showing the
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increasing interest and importance of Free Software in software licensing.</p></li>
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</ul>
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<h2 id="take-action">Take Action</h2>
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<p>From September 2 – 4, 2016, there will be happening the first summit
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of FSFE, an event dedicated to our community. To make it a unique and
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appealing experience for everyone, we sent out a <a href="https://wiki.fsfe.org/Events/Summit2016/CallForParticipation">Call for
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Participation</a> last week to all our Fellows and on our mailing lists.
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Take your chance and be part of FSFE's main event in 2016 by becoming a
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speaker or a volunteer, by hosting a workshop or another event.</p>
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<h2 id="good-free-software-news">Good Free Software news</h2>
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<p>Spain's Ministry of Finance and Public Administrations <a href="https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/community/osor/news/spain-publishes-file-archive-tool-open-source">published its web-based solution for archiving electronic files under
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Free Software license</a>. France is also not lagging behind and recently
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<a href="https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/community/osor/news/france-unveils-source-code-income-tax-application">published the source code of the fiscal calculator used by the
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French fiscal administration to calculate the income taxes of individuals
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in France</a> as an outcome of the legal case in Paris' administrative
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court that concluded that a source code of a software written by and for
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public authorities can be considered as a public information that can be
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freely accessed.</p>
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<p>Thanks to all the
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<a href="/contribute/contribute.html">volunteers</a>
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<a href="http://fellowship.fsfe.org/join">Fellows</a>
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and
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<a href="/donate/thankgnus.html">corporate donors</a>
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who enable our work,</p>
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<p>your editors Polina Malaja and Erik Albers, <a href="/index.html">FSFE</a></p>
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</div>
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</body>
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<sidebar promo="about-fsfe"/>
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<date>
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<original content="2018-05-02"/>
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</date>
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<followup>donate</followup>
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<tags>
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<tag>newsletter</tag>
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</tags>
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</html>
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