246 lines
12 KiB
HTML
246 lines
12 KiB
HTML
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
|
||
|
||
<html newsdate="2013-10-04" type="newsletter">
|
||
<version>1</version>
|
||
|
||
<head>
|
||
<title>FSFE Newsletter - October 2013</title>
|
||
</head>
|
||
<body>
|
||
|
||
<h1>FSFE Newsletter - October 2013</h1>
|
||
|
||
<h2>Our movement turned 30!</h2>
|
||
|
||
<p>On 27 September 1983 Richard Stallman announced the <a
|
||
href="/freesoftware/basics/gnuproject.html">GNU project</a>. An initiative
|
||
that started with a <a
|
||
href="http://oreilly.com/openbook/freedom/ch01.html">programmer's frustration
|
||
over a broken printer driver</a> has changed our society. The idea of
|
||
software that everyone can <a href="/freesoftware/freesoftware.html">use,
|
||
study, share and improve</a> has proven powerful.</p>
|
||
|
||
<p>The GNU project has acted as the starting point of a movement that makes
|
||
sure we can control technology, and not technology controlling us. Today, Free
|
||
Software is everywhere: It powers the Internet, our mobile phones, televisions,
|
||
cars, routers, and electronic devices of all sorts. Free Software has
|
||
fundamentally changed the way people create software: instead of preventing
|
||
people to adapt the software to their own needs, they invite people to
|
||
participate in the development.</p>
|
||
|
||
<p>FSFE is grateful to Richard Stallman for sparking this epochal change, and
|
||
to everyone who has joined our movement to drive Free Software's progress for
|
||
three decades.</p>
|
||
|
||
<h2>Boost local activities: European Fellowship Coordinators Meeting</h2>
|
||
|
||
<p>For example our local Fellowship groups. During last month our groups in <a
|
||
href="https://wiki.fsfe.org/Referat19September2013">Aarhus hosted a talk</a>
|
||
and the meetings in <a
|
||
href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/guido/2013/09/fellowship-treffen-rheinmain-in-frankfurt-4-sep-2013/">Frankfurt</a>
|
||
are continuing. In <a
|
||
href="http://www.softmetz.de/2013/09/23/freie-software-beim-corso-leopold-2-0/">Munich
|
||
we had a public booth during a street festival</a>, during Software Freedom
|
||
Day our Fellows informed passers-by about Free Software in <a
|
||
href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/franz.gratzer/2013/09/22/software-freedom-day-2013-in-vienna/">Vienna</a>
|
||
and in <a href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/fast_edi/?p=393">Offenburg</a>, whereas
|
||
in <a
|
||
href="http://coss.fi/2013/09/17/lauantaina-vietetaan-kansainvalista-avointen-ohjelmien-paivaa/">
|
||
Helsinki</a> they helped others installing Free Software. Our Düsseldorf
|
||
Fellowship group was very active the last weeks as well: They had a booth at
|
||
the summer party of the <a href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/stehmann/?p=906">Pirate
|
||
Party</a>, and attended the summer party of the <a
|
||
href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/stehmann/?p=925">Green Party</a>, held a <a
|
||
href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/stehmann/?p=936">Software Freedom Day event</a>,
|
||
supported a <a href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/stehmann/?p=916">Cryptoparty in
|
||
Kempen</a>, held a <a href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/stehmann/?p=946">regular
|
||
meeting</a>, as well as <a href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/stehmann/?p=884">a
|
||
talk by Sam Tuke about Free Your Android</a>.</p>
|
||
|
||
<p>From 27-29 September 22 Fellows of FSFE from 10 countries
|
||
gathered in Berlin for the first European Coordinators Meeting. During the
|
||
weekend the coordinators got to know each other, presented their work, talked
|
||
about possibilities to promote Free Software, shared good practices, and
|
||
provided valuable feedback about our campaigns. If you are interested to see
|
||
who is promoting Free Software in local Fellowship groups <a
|
||
href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/lucile.falg/2013/10/01/first-european-coordinators-meeting-2/">have
|
||
a look at Lucile's blog entry</a>.</p>
|
||
|
||
<h2>Something completely different</h2>
|
||
|
||
<ul>
|
||
|
||
<li>Technology should be a means to freedom and creativity. Yet governments
|
||
around the world are turning computers and networks into tools of oppression.
|
||
FSFE <a href="/news/2013/news-20130923-01.html">joined a coalition of more
|
||
than 265 organisations</a> which launched a list of 13 International
|
||
Principles on the Application of Human Rights to Communication
|
||
Surveillance.</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>Ask Your Candidates: Our Austrian team <a
|
||
href="/news/2013/news-20130926-01.html">published their questions and
|
||
answers for the Nationalratswahl (federal election)</a>, and the German <a
|
||
href="/news/2013/news-20130918-01.html">published the
|
||
answers to similar questions for the state election in Hessen</a>.</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>After <a
|
||
href="/news/2013/news-20130729-02.html">FSFE
|
||
already spoke up against it</a>, KDE also rejected the Fairsearch
|
||
initiative claims, and <a
|
||
href="http://dot.kde.org/sites/dot.kde.org/files/KDE-Fairsearch-claim-response_0.pdf">stated
|
||
why Free Software is competitive</a>.</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>There is a <a
|
||
href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/guido/2013/09/free-software-in-education-news-august-2013/">
|
||
new edition of the Free Software in education news for August</a>,
|
||
including what Open Education Resources can learn from Free Software.</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>Together with Mirko Vogt from OpenWrt FSFE <a
|
||
href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/mk/?p=1124">wrote a letter to the German
|
||
Federal Network Agency</a> (German). We argued about the importance of
|
||
having the freedom to use every router you want to have for your internet
|
||
access.</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>CERN, which is publishing a lot of hardware design documentation, <a
|
||
href="http://ohwr.org/cernohl">has updated its Open Hardware License to
|
||
version 1.2</a>.</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>To celebrate GNU's 30th anniversary, FSF suggested <a
|
||
href="https://www.gnu.org/gnu30/gnu-a-day">software freedom actions</a> for
|
||
each day during September. Of course you can repeat that anytime you
|
||
want.</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>Public administration: the <a
|
||
href="https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/community/osor/news/french-gendarmerie-open-source-desktop-lowers-tco-40">French
|
||
Gendarmerie now maintains 37,000 GNU/Linux desktops</a>, and after the
|
||
planned switch next summer it will be 72,000. Officials say they are able to
|
||
lower the total cost of operation by 40% compared to the proprietary
|
||
solution. But the savings are just one point, the other one is more vendor
|
||
independence.</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>From the <a href="https://planet.fsfe.org">planet aggregation</a>: </li>
|
||
|
||
<ul>
|
||
|
||
<li>Hugo Roy asks for feedback on the <a
|
||
href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/hugo/2013/09/rfc-user-data-manifesto/">user
|
||
data manifesto</a>.</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>Georg Greve argues that software freedom advocates had it right all
|
||
along: <a href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/greve/?p=634">You cannot trust
|
||
proprietary cryptography, or proprietary software</a>.</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>Mirko Böhm and Paul Adams organised a <a
|
||
href="http://creative-destruction.me/2013/09/15/open-source-in-wirtschaft-und-gesellschaft-sommeruni-2013/">
|
||
seminar about Free Software in economy and society at the German
|
||
protestant student union</a> (German), where Karsten Gerloff also gave a
|
||
talk as a guest speaker in front of students of medicine, natural
|
||
sciences, or theology.</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>Lucile learnt <a
|
||
href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/lucile.falg/2013/09/23/check-your-regular-expressions/">
|
||
to appreciate regular expressions</a>, and <a
|
||
href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/lucile.falg/2013/09/04/schneier-on-risk/">
|
||
highlighted some quotes by Bruce Schneier</a>, including "We’re afraid of
|
||
risk. It's a normal part of life, but we're increasingly unwilling to
|
||
accept it at any level."</li>
|
||
|
||
<li> Thomas Løcke <a
|
||
href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/thomaslocke/2013/09/06/leashes-for-our-necks-and-whips-for-our-backs/">asks
|
||
if we want to live in a world where shadow agencies run amok</a> and
|
||
where our hard-earned taxes are being used to fund leashes for our necks
|
||
and whips for our backs?</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>Our Munich Fellowship coordinator Christian Kalkhoff <a
|
||
href="http://www.softmetz.de/2013/09/07/erlaubnis-zur-nutzung-deines-namens-profilbilds-deiner-inhalte-und-informationen/http://www.softmetz.de/2013/09/07/erlaubnis-zur-nutzung-deines-namens-profilbilds-deiner-inhalte-und-informationen/">explains
|
||
why he finally quit facebook</a> (German) after they changed their terms
|
||
of services.</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>On a technical level: if you have to dual boot GNU/Linux and Windows 8
|
||
on a machine with <a
|
||
href="/freesoftware/secure-boot.html">restricted
|
||
boot</a> read the <a
|
||
href="http://seravo.fi/2013/dual-booting-ubuntu-12-04-windows-8-machines-restricted-boot">
|
||
description from our Finnish Fellows</a>.</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>If you used GnuCash or HomeBank before for your finances, <a
|
||
href="http://danielpocock.com/postbooks-packages-available">Daniel Pocok
|
||
suggests to have a look at PostBooks</a>, and maybe support their
|
||
crowdfunding campaign for missing features.</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>He also looked into <a
|
||
href="http://danielpocock.com/mastering-calendar-and-contact-data-with-free-software-in-the-smartphone-era">
|
||
calendar and contact data with Free Software</a> in the Smartphone
|
||
era.</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>Paul Boddie wrote about the <a
|
||
href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/pboddie/?p=430">Neo900</a>, successor of the
|
||
famous N900 mobile phone.</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>Guido Günther is <a
|
||
href="http://honk.sigxcpu.org/con/Monitoring_the_temparature_values_of_a__kofen_Pellematic_using_munin.html">
|
||
monitoring a heating system</a> powered by Free Software, and</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>Henri Bergius was <a href="http://bergie.iki.fi/blog/noflo-ardrone/">
|
||
flying a quadrocopter with NoFlo</a>.</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>After many years Matija's laptop broke. <a
|
||
href="http://matija.suklje.name/after-many-years-new-laptop-after-a-decade-a-new-distro-and-thankfully-working-backups">Read
|
||
how he changed his distribution</a> after a decade and the good feeling
|
||
to have working backups.</li>
|
||
|
||
<li>Finally he is <a href="
|
||
http://matija.suklje.name/are-copyright-and-other-ip-rights-really-a-natural-right">
|
||
discussing if copyright, patents and state-given monopolies in general
|
||
are natural</a>.</li>
|
||
|
||
</ul>
|
||
|
||
</ul>
|
||
|
||
<h2>Get active: Talk to some friends about how it started!</h2>
|
||
|
||
<p>As you read on the first paragraph it is 30 years since <a
|
||
href="https://www.gnu.org/gnu/initial-announcement.html">Richard Stallman
|
||
announced to start with the GNU operating system</a>. Many people mistakenly
|
||
think of <a href="http://computerfloss.com/2013/09/happy-birthday-gnu/">this
|
||
30th anniversary</a> only as a success in a technical way but it is more: GNU
|
||
and the philosophy behind it is a social revolution as well.</p>
|
||
|
||
<p>More people should know about the importance and uniqueness of the development
|
||
GNU has started. So we ask you to talk with your friends, acquaintances and colleagues about
|
||
the <a href="https://www.gnu.org/gnu/gnu.html">history</a> and
|
||
<a href="https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/philosophy.html">philosophy</a> of GNU project and to reflect
|
||
about which positive side effect of GNU's invention you personally appreciate the most.</p>
|
||
|
||
<p>Please share your experiences with us, for example by <a
|
||
href="https://blogs.fsfe.org/about/">writing a blog post</a> about the talk
|
||
with the people you spoke with or sharing your experiences on our
|
||
<a href="/contact/community.html">public mailing lists</a>.</p>
|
||
|
||
|
||
<p>Thanks to all the <a href="https://my.fsfe.org/donate">Fellows</a> and
|
||
<a href="donate/thankgnus.html">donors</a> who enable our work,<br/>
|
||
<a href="/about/people/kirschner">Matthias Kirschner </a> - <a href="/">FSFE</a></p>
|
||
|
||
<p>-- <br />
|
||
<a href="/index.html">Free Software Foundation Europe</a><br />
|
||
<a href="/news/news.rss">FSFE News</a><br />
|
||
<a href="/events/events.rss">Upcoming FSFE Events</a><br />
|
||
<a href="https://planet.fsfe.org/en/rss20.xml">Fellowship Blog Aggregation</a><br />
|
||
<a href="/contact/community.html">Free Software Discussions</a> </p>
|
||
|
||
</body>
|
||
|
||
<tags>
|
||
<tag key="newsletter"/>
|
||
</tags>
|
||
|
||
|
||
</html>
|
||
<!--
|
||
Local Variables: ***
|
||
mode: xml ***
|
||
End: ***
|
||
-->
|