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
[ for immediate release and distribution ]
Fellow Me: No more Vienna Manipulations!
When FSFE's president first brought attention to the manipulation of
the "Vienna Conclusions" published by the Austrian government for the
United Nation World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) as part
of the World Summit Award (WSA) in his blog, many people were shocked.
When details of how Microsoft and IFPI managed to remove Free Software
and insert promotion of Digital Restriction Management (DRM) in its
stead became known, more media took notice.
On Friday, 2 December 2005, GROKLAW now published [1] the entire story
and its evolution, causing many people to voice their frustration and
anger in the comments about this obvious disrespect for democratic
procedures and the blatant way in which it was conducted.
Several people have expressed their desire to do something against
such conduct and let others know how much they are disgusted by it. So
Georg Greve, president of FSFE, has provided [2] a way in which you
can let everyone know what YOU think about this, a button saying
"Fellow Me: No more Vienna Manipulations!" to link to the story and/or
Fellowship site at http://www.fsfe.org. This button has already been
picked up by a couple of companies and individuals.
Help to make others aware of what happened to this prestigious United
Nations document! Express your feelings about the way the Vienna
Conclusions were turned into the "Vienna Manipulations," let everyone
know this is NOT the way you want politics to be done, and help make
sure to prevent this kind of manipulation in the future by joining the
Fellowship of FSFE [3] and encouraging others to do the same.
Please help us make sure this will not be accepted by silent consent,
and that our disagreement will not be forgotten!
[1] http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20051130185547876
[2] http://www.fsfe.org/fellows/greve/freedom_bits/fellow_me_say_no_to_vienna_m…
[3] https://fsfe.org/en/fsfeuser/register
About the Free Software Foundation Europe:
The Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE), founded 2001, is a
charitable non-governmental organisation dedicated to all aspects of
Free Software in Europe. Access to software determines who may
participate in a digital society. The the Freedoms to use, copy,
modify and redistribute software - as described in the Free Software
definition - allow equal participation in the information
age. Creating awareness for these issues, securing Free Software
politically and legally, and giving people Freedom by supporting
development of Free Software are central issues of the FSFE.
Further information about FSFE's work can be found at
http://fsfeurope.org, get active yourself at
http://fsfeurope.org/contribute/