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<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
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<html newsdate="2017-01-09">
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<version>1</version>
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<head>
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<title>
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FSFE Annual Report 2016
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</title>
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</head>
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<body microformats="h-entry">
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<h1 class="p-name">FSFE Annual Report 2016</h1>
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<div class="captioned">
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<img src="/activities/15years/fsfe-15-badge.png" />
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<p>FSFE celebrating 15 years in 2016</p>
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</div>
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<p>
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It has been a busy year for the FSFE. Upholding the principles of
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Free Software and protecting citizens' from being exploited
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are ongoing challenges we tackled from a variety of angles.
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We (and by "we", we mean the staff and volunteers at the FSFE) pored
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over hundreds of pages of policies and legislations, looking for loopholes
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through which Free Software could be attacked.</p>
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<p>We travelled to events all over Europe, often carrying with us dozens
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of heavy boxes of merchandising, to explain what Free Software is all about
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as speakers and attendees. We have organised our own events too including
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our first international summit.</p>
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<div class="captioned">
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<img src="/events/2016/summit/pictures/Summit_ConferenceRoom2_400.jpg" />
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<p>MEP Julia Reda speaks at the FSFE Summit</p>
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</div>
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<p>And we have dreamt up and executed campaigns to spread awareness of
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the threats to Free Software and users' freedoms. This has entailed
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mobilising dozens of staff members and volunteers, contacting the media,
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and designing and ordering T-shirts, squishy stress balls/hearts, and balloons,
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lots of balloons.</p>
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<p>What follows are just a few of the highlights from 2016.</p>
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<hr />
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<p>Help us to grow bigger and make a difference in 2017:<a href="https://my.fsfe.org/donate?referrer=an116"> https://fsfe.org/join </a></p>
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<hr />
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<div id="toc">
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<ul>
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<li>
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<a href="#policies">Policies and Legislation</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href="#campaigns">Campaings</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href="#events">Events</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href="#network">Strengthening the Free Software Network</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href="#2017">Coming up in 2017</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href="#tl">TL;DR</a>
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</li>
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</ul>
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</div>
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<h2 id="policies">Policies and Legislation</h2>
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<p>We have been carefully monitoring policies and legislation in Europe
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and intervened when citizens' rights were in peril. We have formulated
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several proposals to EU institutions and EU member states containing concrete
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steps to <a href="/activities/radiodirective/">solve the
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issues with the EU Radio Directive</a>.
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</p>
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<p>This Directive threatens software
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freedom with its ambiguous phrasing that all but forbids users from
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installing unapproved software (read "Free operating systems") on
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radio-enabled devices. These devices include all modern laptops, wireless
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routers and every single smartphone in existence. Over 40 European
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organisations and enterprises support our concerns and demands.Max Mehl
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and Polina Malaja will be doing follow-up on this with along with our volunteers
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and other organisations to make sure you can still install Free Software
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on those devices.</p>
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<p>Another threat to Free Software is the EC's stance on the Digital Single
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Market strategy. We have patiently explained several times why <a href="/news/2016/news-20160428-02.html">FRAND licensing</a>, the licensing
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favoured by the Commission in its "ICT Standardisation Priorities for the
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Digital Single Market", is incompatible with Free Software and why a more
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liberal model should be used. This is still an ongoing battle.</p>
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<p>Staying with the EC, we tried to help out on the <a href="http://k7r.eu/fossa-now-we-need-feedback-by-the-real-experts/">"Free and Open Source
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Security Audit" (FOSSA)</a> project, commissioned jointly by the European
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Parliament. The project should have helped evaluate the suitability of the
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Free Software used in public administrations. A professional audit of Free
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Software tools and frameworks would seem a good thing at first glance, an
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excellent way to test run software and improve it when bugs and vulnerabilities
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pop up. At the very least it would help protect citizens' data stored on
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public servers.</p>
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<p>However, after reading the results, it was not clear the time and
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money invested into the study had been well-spent. The conclusions were
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sometimes vague and some parts directly wrong. Despite our best efforts,
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the company employed to do the survey did not seem to know much about
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Free Software at all.</p>
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<p>That said, the EC and MEPs in charge of the project, were always open
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to our comments and able to push for improvements, although they were bound
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to a contract with consultants who were not too knowledgeable about Free
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Software matters. Viewed as a pilot, it helped everybody see where the
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pitfalls were. With a bigger budget and the lessons learnt, the EU is
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planning to follow our advice and improve the project in future iterations.</p>
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<p>We even put the law to the test, and our colleague Max Mehl, the FSFE
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coordinator for Germany, sent out <a href="https://blog.mehl.mx/2016/erste-testgeraete-fuer-routerfreiheit-versendet/">"alternative" routers to testers</a> so they could try them
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with their Internet provider. <a href="https://wiki.fsfe.org/Activities/CompulsoryRouters/Implementation/Germany">We published the results on our Wiki</a> to help others
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who are thinking of changing their devices.</p>
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<hr />
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<p>Join the FSFE to support our policy work in 2017: <a href="https://my.fsfe.org/donate?referrer=an216"> https://fsfe.org/join </a></p>
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<hr />
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<h2 id="campaigns">Campaigns</h2>
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<div class="captioned">
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<img src="/contribute/promopics/ilovefs-postcard-front-thumb.png" alt="I Love Free Software" />
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<p>I Love Free Software Postcard</p>
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</div>
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<p>
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But not all our campaigns have been so serious. We have also carried
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out a campaign to raise awareness about Free Software amongst the general
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public, and here "light-hearted" is literally the keyword. We launched
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our 6th <a href="/news/2016/news-20160222-01.html">"I love FS" campaign</a> on Valentine's day.
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During this campaign, we encouraged all our friends to make a display of
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love towards Free Software by telling the world, online with posts to
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social media, or offline, with public demonstrations of FS love.</p>
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<p>Online, we got tweets and blog posts from users, volunteers and
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sympathizers explaining what they loved most about their favourite Free
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Software project. Offline, we had at least one cake baked by the WikiMedia
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Foundation, gifs of people squeezing our #ilovefs stress heart, and pictures
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of people from all over Europe waving our "<3 Free Software"
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balloons.</p>
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<div class="captioned">
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<img src="graphics/news-20170109-01-social1_400.jpg" />
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</div>
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<p>In a similar vein, we wanted to help the general media, local newspapers, radios
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and TV stations, to know more about Free Software. To this end we started
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our "Meet a Free Software Hero" campaign. Part of our larger <a href="/activities/15years">15th Anniversary
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celebration campaign</a>, we encouraged volunteers and media outlets to
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get in touch with each other so that the "heroes" could explain
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what software freedom was all about, and bust a few myths at the same time.</p>
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<p>Thanks to the campaign, we managed to increase our profile with the
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media and it has now become much more usual for journalists to get in touch
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with us to comment on stories. This gives us more visibility and influence
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to affect changes in favour of Free Software.</p>
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<div class="captioned">
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<img src="graphics/balccon_400.jpg" />
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<p>FSFE booth at BalCCon 2016 (thanks to Nikola Todorovic)</p>
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</div>
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<h2>Events</h2>
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<p>Another way of reaching a wider audience was through events. Apart from
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participating in Free Software-specific conferences like FOSDEM, LinuxCon
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and different Linuxtage (we took the FSFE booth to all of these), we also
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participated in the <a href="https://blog.widerstroem.com/#res:ner-page=4om/weblog/10/wear-fair-2016">Wear Fair and more</a>. This event
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is Austria's largest textile fair for sustainable clothing and lifestyle,
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and covers from organic food, to DIY electronic repairs. The themes of
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sustainability, individual personal freedom and alternative economic
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models helped our Foundation fit right in and we sold plenty of
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T-shirts, bags and baby vests. We also collected contact information
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of people interested in our cause.</p>
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<div class="captioned">
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<img src="graphics/2016-09-ffm-rotlintstrassenfest_400.jpg" />
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<p>FSFE at the Rotlint street festival</p>
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</div>
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<p>But we are prouder of the two big events we organised ourselves. In April
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we held our annual <a href="/activities/ln/llw.html">Legal and Licensing Workshop</a>. This Workshop
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is set up by and for members of the FSFE's Legal Network. Legal experts
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from all sectors of the industry got together to discuss licenses, compliance
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and what constitutes derivative work for three days in balmy Barcelona.</p>
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<p>Speakers included Harald Welte of gpl-violations.org fame;
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Miriam Ballhausen from JBB; and Eben Moglen, chairman of the Software
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Freedom Law Center.</p>
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<p>Our Legal Coordinator Polina Malaja together with our trainee Olga Gkotsopoulou
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are already busy planning next year’s conference which we expect to be at
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least as successful as 2016's.</p>
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<p>Similarly exciting was our first ever <a href="/events/2016/summit/event-20161106-02.html">FSFE Summit</a> in September,
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in which, Erik Albers, our community builder, commandeered a veritable
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army of volunteers and interns to make sure that everything run smoothly
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as a part of QtCon and in collaboration with Qt, KDAB, VideoLAN and our
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associate organisation KDE.</p>
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<p>Part celebration of FSFE's 15th anniversary, and everything we have achieved
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over the years; part <a href="/events/2016/summit/event-20160616-01">event to talk
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about the non-technical aspects of Free Software</a>, we covered the topics
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of Free Software in business, the public sector and as a force for
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social advancement in more than 50 talks. We also had our 15th
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birthday party.</p>
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<p>Speakers included, among many others, the two prior presidents and the
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one current president of the FSFE, that is, Georg Greve, Karsten Gerloff,
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and Matthias Kirschner; Sonia Montegiove and Italo Vignoli, the architects
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behind the migration to LibreOffice of the Italian Armed Forces; and Roberto di Cosmo,
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co-founder along with Stefano "Zach" Zacchiroli of SoftwareHeritage.org.</p>
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<p><a href="/news/2016/news-20160907-01.html">Julia Reda,
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MEP for the Pirate Party, closed the event</a> with a keynote on copyright
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reform and made the case for Free Software on machines critical in
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modern democracies. She explained, for example, why using inauditable
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proprietary software on voting machines was unacceptable.</p>
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<div class="captioned">
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<img src="/events/2016/summit/pictures/Summit_Booth2_400.jpeg" />
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<p>Booth at the FSFE Summit</p>
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</div>
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<h2 id="network">Strengthening the Free Software Network</h2>
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<p>Which brings us to the subject of how we used events to make the network
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of Free Software organisations stronger. The Software Heritage mentioned
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above, for example, collects programs, applications and snippets of code
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distributed under free license from several sources. It aims to preserve
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an encyclopedia of free code for posterity. It was clear from the start
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that the FSFE and SH had a lot in common, so we supported the initiative
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early on, helping them get coverage in the media and offering them a platform
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to spread the word about what they do.</p>
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<p>We also <a href="/news/2016/news-20160817-01.html">strengthened our ties with the Document Foundation
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by joining its Advisory Board</a>. At the same time, The Document Foundation
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became an associated organisation of the FSFE. This means that we will
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be offering advice, support and suggestions on one of the most successful
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Free Software projects out there: LibreOffice and all its ecosystem. With
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the Document Foundation as an associated organisation, we created official
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channels for the exchange of ideas, coordinate efforts, motivate each other,
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and find opportunities to work together on specific projects.</p>
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<p>Another thing we did was to <a href="/news/2016/news-20160126-01.html">hand over
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the running of the FSFE's Document Freedom Day to Document Freedom Foundation</a>. The DFD
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already organises the Software Freedom Day (SFD) campaign, the Education
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Freedom Day, and the Hardware Freedom Day. It seemed logical that they
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also organise the Document Freedom Day. Like that they widened the range
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of related events they offer, and it allows us to concentrate
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on core Free Software topics.</p>
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<div class="captioned">
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<img src="https://pics.fsfe.org/uploads/small/7d/fb/3f6b52839a05b7792c3466b0ad6c.jpg" />
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<p>FSFE Booth at 33C3</p>
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</div>
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<h2 id="2017">Coming up in 2017</h2>
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<p>But there is still a lot of work to do and 2017 is shaping up to be
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an interesting year. Although we have managed to get the ban on compulsory
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routers into law, we expect that ISPs will fight back, so we will have
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to be on guard for that. The threat of FRAND licensing and software
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patents is never far off and we will have to continue advising lawmakers
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on why these are dangerous for Free Software and the European software
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industry in general. Katharina Nucon, an experienced campaign coordinator, will be helping us with this campaign.</p>
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<p>Most of our efforts, however, will most likely be spent pushing for
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getting more public institutions to publish their software under a free
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license. We want public money to pay for public code, and only public code.
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Software used by public institutions is acquired, deployed and/or developed
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with taxpayers' money. Making it available under a Free license to all
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citizens is just the right thing to do. Furthermore, we hope we will raise
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awareness amongst politicians of the importance of using Free Software
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when they see its advantages.</p>
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<p>There are several important national and regional elections scheduled
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throughout Europe in 2017. Politicians are supposedly more receptive during
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campaigns, so we will do our best to make candidates and parties commit
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to Free Software and openness in their administrations.</p>
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<p>We need governments to commit to improving policies that favour Free
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Software across the board. It is not admissible any more that the
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administration pilfer taxpayers money on proprietary software.</p>
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<p>We need policies that help the European IT sector become much more competitive
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and sustainable. There is no better way to achieve this than incentivising
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the use and development of Free Software and Open Standards.</p>
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<p>Finally we need better policies to help promote Free Software amongst
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the general public. Every European citizen must be allowed to regain
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control over the technology they use once and for all.</p>
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<hr />
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<p>Join the FSFE to support our work in 2017: <a href="https://my.fsfe.org/donate?referrer=an316"> https://fsfe.org/join </a></p>
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<hr />
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<div class="captioned">
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<img src="/activities/15years/pictures/pmpc-group-500.JPG" />
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<p>FSFE campaign team preparing to show why public money should mean public code.</p>
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</div>
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<h2 id="tl">TL;DR</h2>
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<p>This has been a long report, but if you need a summary, here goes:</p>
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<p>Free Software improves everybody's life and the world. It is clear that
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everybody have been handed
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the short end of the IT stick for too long. SMEs need a level playing ground
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to prosper and create employment. Private citizens and business owners must
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be allowed to own and control the devices they pay for. Governments must be
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at the service of the people, as must the software they pay for with people's
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taxes. Free Software, Free Hardware and Open Standards solve all of the above.</p>
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<p>All of these things should be self-evident, but apparently are not.
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That is why we at the FSFE do what we do. Throughout this report we have
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mentioned some of the people that work to turn these things into reality. However, and
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it may sound cliché, but it doesn't make it less true, without the continued
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support from you, the volunteer, the fellow, the occasional donor, and the moral
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supporter, none of our staff would be able to do anything. We rely heavily on you,
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your activities and your donations to stay independent and fight for your rights
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when they are threatened, regardless as to where the threat comes from.</p>
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<p>Please help us make next year's report is as long as this one, and do
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consider <a href="https://my.fsfe.org/donate?referrer=an316">joining the FSFE.</a></p>
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<p>Best Regards,<br></br>
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Jonas Oberg (Executive Director) and Matthias Kirschner (President)
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</p>
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</body>
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<tags>
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<tag key="annual-report"/>
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<tag key="front-page"/>
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</tags>
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</html>
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