Hello,
TL;DR: we shouldn’t use the term smartphones but instead simply
refer to mobiles (or mobile devices).
You may have seen it on FSFE’s last newsletter (coming to
non-fellows soon) or on some other materials. Sometimes we use the
term “smartphone” to indicate mobile computers that we carry
around us and that we can use to phone, text, email, get spied
on, play, etc.
I don’t know how you feel about the term, but we can agree that
it’s just a marketing invention. What’s wrong with you if you
haven’t got a smartphone: maybe you’re just dumb, right?
I feel we should restrain from using this marketing term.
Especially, I think it’s misleading to say that the phone is smart
or for smart people. Moreover, the way these phones operating
systems are designed by contrast to classic operating systems,
they are actually less “smart”: the interesting computation does
not happen on the device itself, but on the
Google/Apple/Amazon/etc. server.
I also think that it’s not accurate to call these phones any more,
since they’re a lot more. So I suggest we just use the term
"mobiles" or "mobile devices".
Best,
--
Hugo Roy, Free Software Foundation Europe, <www.fsfe.org>
Deputy Coordinator, FSFE Legal Team, <www.fsfe.org/legal>
Coordinator, FSFE French Team, <www.fsfe.org/fr>
Get our monthly newsletter, sign up! <https://l.fsfe.org/nl>
Hello,
I was made aware of the following fosdem talk about EU research funding
and free software:
https://fosdem.org/2014/schedule/event/eu_research_funding/
My experience with EU projects is that it is infeasible for any small
project to manage the bureaucracy required by the EU. Could FSFE assume
that role? As far as I know all EU projects include funds for
secretarial work, so that could be assumed by paid positions within
FSFE. What do you think?
regards,
Nikos
Today our sister organisation, the FSF, published their e-mail self
defence guide and their infographic in 6 new languages. It is now
available in English, German, Brazilian Portuguese, French, Russian,
Turkish, and Japanese. They explain the installation of the necessary
programs for e-mail encryption under GNU/Linux, MacOS, and Microsoft
Windows; the key generation; the web of trust; as well as the usage of
those programs. All you need is a computer with an Internet connection,
an email account, and about half an hour.
- E-Mail self defence: <https://emailselfdefense.fsf.org/en/>
- Infographic: <https://emailselfdefense.fsf.org/en/infographic.html>
Please distribute them!!
At FSFE we plan to print the infographics and make them available like
other Free Software info materials on
<https://fsfe.org/contribute/spreadtheword.en.html#political-leaflets>.
Please send in your feedback, so FSF and we can include that before
printing the infographics.
If you like that we send those materials to activists around Europe, you
can also support us with a donation to cover printing and distributing
costs: <http://fsfe.org/donate>.
Best Regards,
Matthias
--
Matthias Kirschner - Vice President FSFE
Schönhauser Allee 6/7, 10119 Berlin, t +49-30-27595290
Weblog (blogs.fsfe.org/mk) - Contact (fsfe.org/about/kirschner)
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