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contributing free software knowledge to Wikipedia
by Ciaran O'Riordan 31 Dec '05

31 Dec '05

There's now a free software portal on English Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Free_software Wikipedia has a lot of great articles about free software, but it also has gaps, and confusions about free software (and open source, GNU, Linux, copyleft, etc.) that are common in society are present in some corners of Wikipedia too. The goals of the free software portal are to provide a starting point for people reading about free software, and to highlight areas where people who would like to contribute are needed. ...and the portal itself needs contributors and suggestions. Free software portals on the French and German Wikipedia's have existed for a while: http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portail:Logiciels_libres http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Freie_Software (The other languages are still waiting for someone to start one.) Happy New Year's Parties! -- Ciarán O'Riordan, _________| Support free software: join FSFE's Fellowship http://ciaran.compsoc.com/ | & encourage others to do so: http://fsfe.org ___________________________| http://ciaran.compsoc.com/fsfe-fellowship.html

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ADAMI and SPEDIDAM on file sharing?
by Seth Johnson 25 Dec '05

25 Dec '05

Is there an English translation of the following statement from ADAMI anywhere? > http://www.adami.fr/portail/upload/gestion_fichier/Etude%20peer-to-peer2.pdf . . . and is there an analogous statement from SPEDIDAM? Thanks if anyone knows of any such things . . . Seth Johnson -- RIAA is the RISK! Our NET is P2P! http://www.nyfairuse.org/action/ftc DRM is Theft! We are the Stakeholders! New Yorkers for Fair Use http://www.nyfairuse.org [CC] Counter-copyright: http://realmeasures.dyndns.org/cc I reserve no rights restricting copying, modification or distribution of this incidentally recorded communication. Original authorship should be attributed reasonably, but only so far as such an expectation might hold for usual practice in ordinary social discourse to which one holds no claim of exclusive rights.

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Mobile Phone using Free Software??
by Henrik Sandklef 19 Dec '05

19 Dec '05

Hi I was offered a telephone (for free) the other day (when renewing my "account"). I saw that it had some DRM aware software in it, so I said no. I am now looking for a free (as in GPL) mobile phone that I will buy/get instead, if there is any such phone. Does anyone of you know if there is a mobile telephone with Free Software in it? ..... which will work in EU. /h

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Name for free software project?
by Hanno Böck 12 Dec '05

12 Dec '05

Hi, I hope this is the right place for such a question. While I was discussing a free software project with a friend, we came to the question how to name our project. The problem: It's nearly impossible to find a name that isn't used somewhere else. And even if the name is absolutely new, you can't be sure if someone thinks that it sounds similar to something else. Now, how can someone be sure to choose a name for a project and that I won't be sued for it? As there were a lot of strange lawsuits because of project names (e.g. the mobilix-case), it seems nearly impossible to be safe with it. Any suggestions about that? -- Hanno Böck Blog: http://www.hboeck.de/ GPG: 3DBD3B20 Jabber: jabber(a)hboeck.de

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FSF Europe Newsletter
by Free Software Foundation Europe 08 Dec '05

08 Dec '05

1. First Austrian Fellowship meeting 2. Tweakfest in Zürich 3. UN World Summit on Information Society 4. LinuxWorld Expo in Frankfurt/Main 5. Seminar in Dublin about preventing software patentability 6. Jornadas Regionales de Software Libre in Rosario (Argentinia) 7. LinuxDay in Italy 8. Removal of Free Software from WSIS "Vienna Conclusions" 9. Welcoming the Free Software Foundation Latin America 1. First Austrian Fellowship meeting Karin Kosina and Reinhard Müller organized the first Austrian Fellowship meeting, where Fellows and other people interested in the work of the FSFE could meet, get information about the FSFE and share experiences and opinions about Free Software. Due to the positive feedback from the participants, such meetings will be organized about bi-monthly in Vienna, and other members of the FSFE are starting to organize similar events in other cities. All these events will, as usual, be announced on the Fellowship website. http://www.fsfe.org/ 2. Tweakfest in Zürich The Zürich Academy of Design and Art was the location for the two-day digital media and arts conference "Tweakfest 2005 - Visions of Digital Life Style". Georg Greve gave a keynote about the significance of digital freedom, the global situation of knowledge regulation and afterwards participated in a panel discussion titled "Copy Right". He also enjoyed seeing dancing robots, which you can read about on his blog: http://www.fsfe.org/fellows/greve/freedom_bits/back_from_tweakfest_ch_2005 3. UN World Summit on Information Society (WSIS) The UN World Summit on Information Society (WSIS) has seen an impressing amount of media coverage during the last month; mainly because of the discussions within the Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG). The FSFE, however, has been involved in the WSIS process since its start, and much of the work involved over the last years has remained largely unrecognized by the public, even though it now turned out to be very valuable. In Bilbao in Spain, there was a Summit of Cities and Local Authorities in preparation of the WSIS in Tunis. Around 2000 local representatives from all over the world attended, and Jonas Öberg represented the FSFE. He made a presentation on freedom of information laws and how it relates to Free Software. FSFE's president Georg Greve participated in the second phase of the summit in Tunis, Tunisia, coordinating the drafting of the Patents, Copyrights and Trademarks (PCT) working group of Civil Society for the final Civil Society declaration, as well as documenting various of the interesting projects in his blog and having interesting discussions with many people. He also participated in a side event on the future of the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO), including WIPO deputy director-general Philippe Petit, which received much attention. http://www.fsfe.org/fellows/greve/freedom_bits/off_to_tunis 4. LinuxWorld Expo in Frankfurt/Main The FSFE was present with a booth at the LinuxWorld Expo in Frankfurt/Main, Germany. Volker Dormeyer, Joachim Jakobs, Myriam Schweingruber, Michael Kallas, Bernhard Reiter, Reinhard Müller, Cornelius Wasmund, and Matthias Kirschner were able to answer a lot of questions about Free Software on the booth. Again, Volker did a great job organizing FSFE's appearance at this event. 5. Seminar in Dublin about preventing software patentability Ciaran O'Riordan gave the keynote and participated in a lively questions and answers session, along with Gareth Bowker, in a seminar organised by O'Riordan with Irish Free Software Organisation. The audience included journalists, policy setters, and the largest of Ireland's pro software patent lobby groups. A transcript of the Questions and Answers session is online, and audio and video recordings should be online in the near future: http://ifso.ie/events/2005-11-18/ 6. 5th Jornadas Regionales de Software Libre in Rosario (Argentina) The Jornadas Regionales de Software Libre are a wandering event in Argentina, and the 5th edition was organised by a very dedicated group of Free Software activists in Rosario. Georg Greve gave a keynote titled "Digital Freedom - why it matters and how to protect it" and used the opportunity to spend some time with the Latin American Free Software community. Also, after most of the event had been spent peer-reviewing the statutes and giving all conference participants the chance to comment, it then saw the official launch of FSFE's new sister organisation, the Free Software Foundation Latin America (FSFLA). In the name of the FSFE, Georg Greve participated as a guest to the official introduction and welcomed the FSFLA in the global network of Free Software Foundations. 7. LinuxDay in Italy The LinuxDay is a group of Free Software events all over Italy which is coordinated by the Italian Linux Society and organised by local user groups. FSFE participated for the first time this year at the national level sending a video message from Stefano Maffulli, wishing everybody a great day for the Italian Free Software community. The 8 minute video covered the history of the Free Software movement, the successes and the future battles, including IPRED2 and the fight against the infamous Legge Urbani. The video, only in Italian, is available at http://www.italy.fsfeurope.org/it/events/2005/linuxday/linuxday.en.html 8. Removal of Free Software from WSIS "Vienna Conclusions" In June 2005, FSFE members Georg Greve and Karin Kosina participated in the "ICT & Creativity" conference in Vienna. The outcome of this conference were the "Vienna Conclusions", which were substantially different from the text that the working group had concluded in Vienna: All references to Free Software had been removed, promotion of Digital Restriction Management (DRM) had been added, and statements about the central role of software for the digital society had been watered down -- apparently on request of Microsoft and IFPI. A more extensive summary about the entire proceedings can be found in a groklaw article written by Georg Greve: http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20051130185547876 9. Welcoming the Free Software Foundation Latin America With its involvement in UN Organisations like WSIS or WIPO, the Free Software Foundation Europe has extended its work beyond the borders of Europe. Looking at these experiences, the FSFE is more than ever committed to the concept of a world wide network of equal Free Software Foundations working together in intense cooperation. The entire Free Software Foundation Europe is proud and happy for its new sister organisation and is glad that it could do its part in helping to bring it about. The FSFE warmly welcome the FSFLA in the network of Free Software Foundations and looks forward to fruitful cooperation. You can find a list of all FSF Europe newsletters on http://www.fsfeurope.org/news/newsletter.en.html

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FSFE's Vienna Conclusion features in ELER
by Ciaran O'Riordan 08 Dec '05

08 Dec '05

Brilliant: http://geekz.co.uk/lovesraymond/archive/microsoft-censorship -- Ciarán O'Riordan, ___________/ Support FSFE's campaigns against IPRED2 http://ciaran.compsoc.com/ _/ and software patents by joining the Fellowship ___________________________/ and encouraging others to do so http://fsfe.org

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German software licensing law
by MJ Ray 06 Dec '05

06 Dec '05

Can a software licence in the English language only be valid if it specifies that it is governed by German law? I've been told that the reverse isn't true: an English court would not normally consider a licensing agreement in German only that claimed to be under English law, without some special circumstances. I know even less about German law, so I'm hoping some kind soul on this list knows about this situation. Any pointers or references welcome. This seems to be a common situation with European software. There was also the QPL which was in English and specified Oslo courts, but I care less about that right now. There was a draft of something called the d-fsl published, which was in both English and German and was said to be seeking to satisfy all requirements of German law. Was being in German too part of that? Thanks for reading, -- MJ Ray (slef), K. Lynn, England, email see http://mjr.towers.org.uk/

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Intellectual property in the UK
by Alex Hudson 05 Dec '05

05 Dec '05

Controversial Subject: to get stuff going :o) Two things: ## Minor APIG inquiry. APIG is a group of our members of Parliament who take an interest in all things "Internet", which includes DRM (I don't know why :). They're currently making enquiries about problems with DRM; see: http://www.apig.org.uk/current-activities/inquiry-into-digital-rights-manag… It's a pretty narrow enquiry, and not really questioning the basic motivations behind the use of DRM. I've started a response, I would appreciate comments: http://www.alcoholicsunanimous.com/chod/apig.xhtml This isn't AFFS endorsed, but I'm hoping that it will be. There are a variety of problems with this initial version I know all too well, and the end version needs to be much improved (and much shorter...). What I really need, though, are real examples (e.g., the Sony rootkit) of DRM damaging user's freedoms under the headings I've listed (since these are the topics the MPs will address). Hopefully, if we do well with this limited document response (we're restricted to 1000 words, and I've already blown 2000... :o/ ) we'll get asked to give an oral presentation, which is the real chance to make an impact. ## Major Government study Our Chancellor has announced a large, 12-month study into intellectual property (i.e., all the various laws such as copyright, patents, etc.): http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/gowers This is very new, and hasn't started yet, so there is little we can plan right now, but we can certainly prepare. The UK Govt. has a real (usually negative) effect on EU policy, so I think we'd welcome all the help from our European friends we can get with this. Cheers, Alex.

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French Government Lobbied to Ban Free Software
by Jerome Dominguez 05 Dec '05

05 Dec '05

25 November 2005. FSF France press release. Friday November 18th, 2005, French Department of Culture. SNEP and SCPP tell Free Software authors: "You shall change your licenses." SACEM add: "You shall stop publishing free software," and warn they are ready "to sue free software authors who will keep on publishing source code" should the "VU/SACEM/BSA/FA Contents Department"[1] bill pass in the Parliament. URL: http://www.fsffrance.org/news/article2005-11-25.en.html -- Traduction philosophie GNU : http://wiki.april.org/TradGnu Lorsque la consigne est infame, la desobeissance est un devoir. http://www.cafeine.org/blog

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DADVSI law: author's right threatened with loss of balance
by MJ Ray 03 Dec '05

03 Dec '05

Veuillez trouver ci-joint un traduction en anglais d'un info sur la projet de loi DADVSI. J'espere que qqn le veut. [en] Another JFDI translation, this time of yesterday's announcement by FFII.fr http://www.ffii.fr/dadvsi - for the purpose of news reporting, so you might be able to ignore the non-free CC licence used by FFII.fr a bit. (If you want to be free, don't use CC. (yet?)) Errors and omissions excepted: DADVSI law: author's rights threatened with loss of balance Thursday 1st December 2005, by Gerald Sedrati-Dinet (gibus) The National Assembly should decide about the proposed "Author's Right and Neighbouring Rights in the Information Society" (DADVSI) law by urgent process in this month of December 2005. Before the threat of this law changes the balance of author's rights, the FFII calls its supporters to support the EUCD.info initiative to contact their representatives and to sign the petition launched by EUCD.info The FFII has always promoted the balance allowed by copyright to defend the rights both of authors and of software users. The proposed DADVSI law to translate the EUCD European directive (2001/29/CE) profoundly reopens the debate on this balance: If, tomorrow, a judge declares that judicial protection of technical measures covers the methods of processing data necessary for security of function of a technical measure, and in deducing that, everyone divulging such a method is a criminal, and that therefore the publication of a source code doing that is a crime, he should sanction punitively according to the instruction of the law-maker, and if, in good time, this jurisprudence becomes the norm, so some information essential to interoperability and mathematical demonstrations will be protected by secrecy, the ideas will not be in free circulation any more, free association will be lost, freedom of expression mutilated and free software prohibited. Source: EUCD.info The collection of arguments demonstrating the outcomes of this proposed law can be consulted on the web site of the EUCD.info initiative. The FFII therefore encourages its supporters to support the call of EUCD.info to defend their rights and freedoms, notably by alterting representatives and signing this petition. Pieter Hintiens, president of the FFII, comments: In our eyes, the use of copyright to protect author's rights is a key point in an open market, but this proposed law is a abuse of the law on author's rights. This biased interpretation of author's rights creates a dangerous precedent and is incompatible with a modern and working open market. ----- Hope that helps, -- MJ Ray - personal email, see http://mjr.towers.org.uk/email.html Work: http://www.ttllp.co.uk/ irc.oftc.net/slef Jabber/SIP ask

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