216 lines
9.8 KiB
HTML
216 lines
9.8 KiB
HTML
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
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<html newsdate="2011-12-04" type="newsletter">
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<version>1</version>
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<head>
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<title>FSFE Newsletter - December 2011</title>
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</head>
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<body>
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<h1>FSFE Newsletter - December 2011</h1>
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<h2>Your own web search - version 1.0</h2>
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<p newsteaser="yes">Who controls what you find on the internet? Search engines are a vital
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connection between you and information. In the eyes of the FSFE, it is important that users can
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be independent. That is why we spread awareness about the 1.0 release of YaCy,
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a peer-to-peer search engine. Read about YaCy at
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our <a href="/news/2011/news-20111128-01.html">press release</a>, <a
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href="http://blogs.fsfe.org/gerloff/2011/11/30/why-yacy-isnt-a-google-killer/">Karsten
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Gerloff's blog entry</a> or choose one of the <a
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href="http://blogs.fsfe.org/alessandro.polvani/2011/11/30/yacy-gets-an-extraordinary-press-coverage/">many
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news sites who wrote about it</a>, including Wall Street Journal, BBC News,
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The Telegraph or TAZ.</p>
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<h2>Dutch government hands over education's keys to Microsoft</h2>
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<!-- First paragraph copied from
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https://fsfe.org/news/2011/news-20111107-01.en.html -->
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<p>The Dutch government wants to tie the country's schools to a single software
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vendor for years to come. Dutch students using Free Software or devices without
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support for Silverlight will find themselves locked out of schools' online systems
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due to the use of proprietary technology and closed standards. Marja
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Bijsterveldt, the secretary of education, recently said that she is unwilling
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to enforce the Dutch government's own Open Standards policy on educational
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institutions. Instead, the government will accept long-term vendor lock-in of
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educational institutions.</p>
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<p>With <a href="/campaigns/nledu/nledu.html">our campaign</a>, FSFE's
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volunteers in the Netherlands <!-- starting from here it is the first paragraph
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of https://fsfe.org/campaigns/nledu/nledu.en.html --> want to enable all
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citizens to have free access to education and all other publicly-funded
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institutions, both online and offline, by pushing for a mandatory use of Open
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Standards and a guaranteed platform-independent access to all online
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environments. This would allow students and their parents to use Free Software, and in
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that way enable them to tap into their potential for growth and personal
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development.</p>
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<h2>Only the firealarm could end it</h2>
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<p>It's been a good weekend for Free Software advocacy: by the
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<a href="http://blog.padowi.se/2011/11/14/fscons-2011/">end of FSCONS</a>, the FSFE led a dedicated <a
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href="http://blogs.fsfe.org/mk/?p=840">Free Software in Politics track</a>,
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Richard Stallman gave a keynote, there were many other Free Software talks
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(e.g. read <a href="http://sny.no/2011/11/fscons-hacktivism.html">our
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webmaster's blog entry</a>), the FSFE staffed a booth both at FSCONS and at <a
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href="http://blogs.fsfe.org/stehmann/?p=359">the Open Rhein
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Ruhr (Germany)</a>, Erik Josefsson received the <a
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href="/news/2011/news-20111114-01.html">Nordic Free Software Award</a>, and
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we had a <a href="http://blogs.fsfe.org/mk/?p=836">FSFE workshop</a> one day
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before the conference. In the end it
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was only possible to terminate FSCONS's social event with a fire alarm. (Your
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editor still thinks this fire alarm is part of a bigger conspiracy.)</p>
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<p>At the workshop before FSCONS, Sam Tuke organised the <a
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href="http://blogs.fsfe.org/mk/?p=836">second PDFreaders sprint</a> after <a
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href="http://blogs.fsfe.org/samtuke/?p=191">the one in the UK</a>. The 11
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participants checked several websites from <a
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href="/campaigns/pdfreaders/buglist.html">our buglist</a>, and translated <a
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href="/campaigns/pdfreaders/letter.html">the form letter</a> and <a
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href="/campaigns/pdfreaders/petition.html">the petition</a> into Swedish.
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Special thanks to Daniel Melin, Henri Nordstrom, and Josef Andersson for
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this!</p>
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<p>Our current success rate: 511 out of 2081 (24%) reported public websites
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have removed the non-free software advertisement. 1938 individuals, 58
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organisations and 56 businesses have signed <a
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href="/campaigns/pdfreaders/petition.html">the petition</a>.</p>
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<h2>Something completely different</h2>
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<ul>
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<li>The Regional Court of Berlin <a
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href="/news/2011/news-20111110-01.html">rejected AVM's claims opposing
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third party modifications of GNU GPL software</a>. <a
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href="http://gpl-violations.org">gpl-violations.org</a> and the FSFE welcome
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this decision. When we receive the reasoning of the court, we will inform you
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about it in <a href="/news/news.html">our news section</a>. </li>
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<li>Together with six other civil society organisations, <a
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href="/news/2011/news-20111122-01.html">the FSFE has urged the Parliament</a>
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to make the ACTA committee session public, so that European citizens can form
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their own opinions on ACTA.</li>
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<li>Mirko Boehm has been involved with KDE since 1997 and was a board member
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of KDE e.V. from 1999 to 2006. This month Chris Woolfrey <a
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href="http://blogs.fsfe.org/fellowship-interviews/?p=477">talked with him
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for the Fellowship interview</a>.</li>
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<li>From the <a href="http://planet.fsfe.org">planet aggregation</a>: </li>
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<ul>
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<li>The legal news update from <a
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href="http://blogs.fsfe.org/hugo/2011/11/free-software-legal-news-weekly-november-1-6-2011/">November
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1–6</a>, and <a
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href="http://blogs.fsfe.org/hugo/2011/11/free-software-legal-news-weekly-november-7-13-2011/">November
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7–13</a> is presented by Hugo Roy and Martin Husovec.</li>
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<li>How many principles exist for good practice in the undergraduate
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education? <a
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href="http://blogs.fsfe.org/guido/2011/11/seven-principles-for-good-practice-in-undergraduate-education/">Guido
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Arnold says there are seven</a>, just like in good fairy tales! Do you agree? Discuss it
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with <a href="/activities/education/education.html">our education
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team</a>.</li>
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<li>Karsten informs us about <a
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href="http://blogs.fsfe.org/gerloff/2011/10/28/free-software-policy-issues-at-linuxcon-europe/">the
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current Free Software policy issues</a>, which he presented at Linuxcon
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Europe.</li>
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<li>Are you interested in a 100% Free Software phone? And what phone do you
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use at the moment? Timo Jyrinki has an <a
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href="http://losca.blogspot.com/2011/11/on-discussing-free-software-mobile.html">
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interesting comment about free phones</a>.</li>
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<li>Erik Josefsson talked about Free
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Software tools for the European Parliament at FSCONS, now Karsten wrote about it <a
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href="http://blogs.fsfe.org/gerloff/2011/11/12/scraping-data-from-the-european-parliament/">in
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his blog</a>.</li>
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<li>You want to make your own panorama pictures during winter? <a
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href="http://blogs.fsfe.org/mkesper/?p=148">Michael Kesper describes</a>
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how to do that. While visiting Michael's blog, you can also read <a
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href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/mkesper/?p=145">how to install Debian the
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easy way</a>.</li>
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<li> <a href="http://blogs.fsfe.org/boukouvalas/?p=384"> Kostas Boukouvalas
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writes</a> about the development in his Greek Free Software group from
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2007–2011.</li>
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<li>Fellowship representative <a
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href="http://blogs.fsfe.org/hugo/2011/11/add-duck-duck-go-as-a-search-engine-in-gnome-shell/">Hugo
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Roy explains</a> how to add Duck Duck Go as a search engine in Gnome
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Shell.</li>
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<li>And <a
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href="http://autoverse.net/2011/08/05/open-web-apps-its-not-just-the-future-its-also-cool/">
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Nikos Roussos argues</a>: Free Software web applications are not not just
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the future, but they are also cool.</li>
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</ul>
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</ul>
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<h2>Get active: Ensure it is Secure Boot, not Restricted Boot!</h2>
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<p>Microsoft has announced that if computer makers distribute machines with the
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Windows 8 compatibility logo, they will have to implement a measure called
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"Secure Boot." This measure is meant to increase security on your computer,
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but we are very concerned that hardware manufacturers will implement these boot
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restrictions in a way that will prevent you from booting any other operating
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system than Microsoft Windows. That is why we ask you for help:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>Participate in the translation of <a
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href="https://www.fsf.org/campaigns/secure-boot-vs-restricted-boot/statement">this
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statement</a>. (<a
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href="http://blogs.fsfe.org/repentinus/english/2011/11/15/estonian-translations-personal-experience-and-an-appeal-for-co-translators/">Heiki Ojasild
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gave some good reasons</a> why to join our <a
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href="/contribute/translators/">translators team</a>, but you can also just
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send the translation to <a
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href="mailto:translators@lists.fsfe.org">translators@lists.fsfe.org</a>.)</li>
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<li>Sign <a
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href="https://www.fsf.org/campaigns/secure-boot-vs-restricted-boot/statement">the
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statement</a> yourself, and ask your family, friends, colleagues to do the
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same.</li>
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</ul>
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<p>Currently 20,562 people have signed the statement, making it clear they want to have
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the choice. We need more signatures to send a clear signal to hardware vendors that
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they have to enable us to install Free Software on our
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computers.</p>
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<p>Thanks to all the <a href="https://my.fsfe.org/donate">Fellows</a> and
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<a href="donate/thankgnus.html">donors</a> who enable our work,<br/>
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<a href="/about/kirschner">Matthias Kirschner </a> - <a href="http://www.fsfe.org">FSFE</a></p>
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<p>-- <br />
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<a href="/index.html">Free Software Foundation Europe</a><br />
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<a href="/news/news.rss">FSFE News</a><br />
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<a href="/events/events.rss">Upcoming FSFE Events</a><br />
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<a href="http://planet.fsfe.org/en/rss20.xml">Fellowship Blog Aggregation</a><br />
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<a href="/contact/community.html">Free Software Discussions</a> </p>
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</body>
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<tags>
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<tag key="newsletter"/>
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<tag key="matthias-kirschner"/>
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</tags>
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<timestamp>$Date$ $Author$</timestamp>
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</html>
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