NLnet continues to support FSFE's Freedom Task Force
FSFE's Freedom Task Force was launched in November 2006 to help support
individuals, projects and businesses with Free Software licensing. The
initial phase of the FTF was possible thanks to support by the
Netherlands based philantropic organisation NLnet foundation. NLnet's
support allowed the FTF to provide training, consultancy and to work in
partnership with gpl-violations.org to resolve licence issues in the
European area. The FTF also formed networks of technical and legal
experts to foster cooperation between lawyers, projects and businesses
with licensing concerns. Now, after just over twelve months of
continual growth, NLnet is providing a second round of financial support
to this innovative legal project.
"The next twelve months are going to be pretty exciting for the FTF and
for Free Software in general," says Shane Coughlan, FTF Coordinator. "The
European anti-trust case against Microsoft was recently completed, the
amount of Free Software savvy lawyers is increasing and Free Software
adoption is rapidly rising. Free Software is no longer an alternative.
It's mainstream." The FTF will play a part in ensuring that this
mainstream technology is as simple to use and distribute as possible. We
will continue to produce knowledge, to train people, to connect people and
to resolve issues that occur. Thanks to NLnet I believe the FTF will be in
a position to help lead European Free Software licensing best practice."
"We consider the user-friendly legal framework behind the development of
Free Software to be one of the core assets, and a strong driver of
constant innovation," states Michiel Leenaars, strategy manager at
NLnet. "But as with any fine print it takes some work to understand the
opportunities. The Freedom Task Force is creating awareness and building
a network of expertise across Europe".
Today the FTF's legal and technical networks cover sixteen European
countries, have over seventy members and include contacts from the USA,
Canada, Australia, South Korea and Taiwan. The FTF delivers training
courses in Switzerland in cooperation with Digicomp, in Sweden with
Internet Academy and in The Netherlands with ATComputing. We have
identified an area of the Free Software community that needed further
development and we are determined to ensure that Europe has excellent
licensing knowledge available to the widest possible audience," says
Shane Coughlan. "I'm confident that the FTF will continue to deliver
high quality assistance to both non-commercial and commercial
stakeholders."
With NLnet's support, the FTF will continue to expand the European Legal
and Technical Networks to cover the entire EU and to help individuals,
projects and businesses understand Free Software licensing. The FTF's
current training courses will be expanded and delivered in Germany, Italy
and the UK.
"This is only the beginning," concludes Shane Coughlan, FTF Coordinator.
The Freedom Task Force can be found at http://www.fsfeurope.org/ftf/
The Freedom Task Force can be emailed at ftf(a)fsfeurope.org
About the Free Software Foundation Europe:
The Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) is a non-profit
non-governmental organisation active in many European countries and
involved in many global activities. Access to software determines
participation in a digital society. To secure equal participation in the
information age, as well as freedom of competition, the Free Software
Foundation Europe (FSFE) pursues and is dedicated to the furthering of
Free Software, defined by the freedoms to use, study, modify and copy.
Founded in 2001, 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.
Contact:
You can reach the FSFE switchboard from:
Belgium: +32 2 747 03 57 ext 408
Germany: +49 700 373 38 76 73 ext 408
Sweden: +46 31 7802160 ext 408
Switzerland: +41 43 500 03 66 ext 408
UK: +44 29 200 08 17 7 ext 408
Shane Coughlan, FTF Coordinator, FSFE extension: 408
Joachim Jakobs, Media Relations, FSFE extension: 404
mobile: +49-179-6919565
Further information: http://fsfeurope.org
Happy new year everyone. The last month of 2007 was pretty exciting, with the
biggest news being the release of interoperability information by Microsoft in
connection with the European antitrust case. The SAMBA project has arranged
full access to specifications necessary for communication competitive
alternatives to Microsoft's proprietary products. Of course, this does not
mean that Microsoft's monopolistic behaviour has been resolved. A new
antitrust case may be undertaken after complaints by Opera Software that
Microsoft has willfully distorted the web browser marketplace. It's
also important to note that this does not in any way solve the problem
with patents on software. Such patents are still being granted by the
European Patent Office (EPO) in violation of current law, and the FSFE is
encouraging the European Commission to take actions to permanently abolish
patents on software, both in theory and practice.
In other news, Google has committed to supporting FSFE's Freedom Task Force in
helping people understand Free Software licences. Free Software events in
Scandinavia and the Balkans showed the continued spread of Free Software
technology and values across Europe, and concerns about information control
and retention have been voiced in Germany. It looks like we are going to have
a very busy 2008! You can be part of it by contributing time and energy to
FSFE's activities, by telling people about Free Software and by using some
of the great free solutions out there. Check out
http://www.fsfeurope.org/contribute/ for some information on getting started.
- Shane, Zuerich Office
<coughlan(a)fsfeurope.org>
1. MS vs EU - Microsoft Releases Interoperability Information To SAMBA
2. FSFE Supports New Antitrust Case
3. Google Contributes To The FTF
4. Free Software Story In Berlin
5. FScons
6. Privatsphaere.org Meeting On Privacy
7. STACS Session In Belgrade
8. Serbian Ministry For Information Society Undertakes Localisation Efforts
1. MS vs EU - Microsoft Releases Interoperability Information To SAMBA
In 2004 the European Commission found Microsoft guilty of monopoly abuse
in the IT marketplace and demanded that complete interoperability information
be made available to competitors. Microsoft objected to this decision and was
overruled in September 2007 by the European Court of First Instance (CFI).
The CFI found Microsoft guilty of deliberate obstruction of interoperability
and upheld the obligation for Microsoft to share its protocol information.
The Samba Team has decided to make use of Micrsoft's obligation under the
European judgements. Through the Protocol Freedom Information Foundation (PFIF),
network interoperability information has been requested and a one-time access
fee of 10.000 EUR is being paid to give Samba team full access to important
specifications.
"This case is over and interoperability won. The European Court made clear that
interoperability information should not be kept secret and the agreement shows
that Microsoft saw no way to continue its obstruction of interoperability in
this area. This establishes a standard which everyone will have to meet from
now on," summarizes Georg Greve, president of FSFE.
http://www.fsfeurope.org/news/2007/news-20071220-01.en.html
2. FSFE Supports New Antitrust Case
Opera Software has formally complained about Microsoft's anti-competitive
behaviour in the web browser marketplace and there is the possibility of a new
antitrust case on this issue being launched by the European Commission. FSFE
has sent a letter to the European Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes offering
its support for any investigation undertaken on the basis of the complaint.
"Although Opera Software does not produce Free Software, we largely share their
assessment and concerns regarding the present situation in the Internet browser
market", FSFE president Georg Greve writes in the letter and continues: "Some of
the most successful browsers in the concerned market are Free Software or
contain large portions of Free Software. This includes, Mozilla Firefox and
Konqueror, a browser made by KDE. Those products are highly innovative and
widely recognized as more secure than the dominant application. They faithfully
implement major international Open Standards relevant to browser technology."
http://www.fsfeurope.org/news/2007/news-20071221-01.en.htmlhttp://fsfeurope.org/documents/20071219-opera-antitrust.pdf
3. Google Contributes To The FTF
FSFE's Freedom Task Force provides Free Software licence education,
training and consultancy. We do stuff like managing a pan-European
network of legal experts and working with gpl-violations.org to resolve
licensing issues. Basically, the FTF helps to build infrastructure
that encourages Free Software adoption and fair use.
Recently Google made a contribution to help the FTF deliver training
courses, attend conferences and translate documentation into more
languages. Like all NGOs we have limited resources and Google's
assistance makes a significant difference. We would like to thank Chris and
the rest of the team at the Googleplex for believing in what we do and
for making it possible for us to continue this work.
http://www.fsfeurope.org/ftf/
4. Free Software Story In Berlin
On the 13th of December the Berlin Fellowship group held a local meeting.
Amongst the up to 20 people in the room from Berlin, there were also
visitors from outside Berlin: Georg Greve (FSFE's President) and
Bernhard Reiter (FSFE's German Coordinator). During tea, gingerbread,
and other sweeties (plus beer) it was talked about the beginning of
FSFE, how the participants came to Free Software, and other nice, funny,
interesting stories, which fitted nicely into the pre Christmas mood.
Picture: http://www.fsfe.org/en/fellows/mk/weblog/teatime_in_berlin
5. FScons
In December close to 200 participants attended FSCONS (Free Software
Conference in Scandinavia). During the two days the participants could
listen to presentation ranging from Free Software licensing to Free
Software in embedded devices. FSCONS was arranged by FSFE, and will
become an annual event to gather people from the nordic countries.
http://www.fscons.org
6. Privatsphaere.org Meeting On Privacy
"The citizens should control the government instead the government controlling
the citizens!" was a spontaneous outcry of those attending an event called
privatsphaere.org - a joint initiative of UUGRN.org, the "Laboratory for
Dependable Distributed Systems University of Mannheim" and FSFE.
After six presentations tackling the European data retention directive, the
German "online searching" and the electronic health card from different
perspectives, about 80 people in the audience agreed that the building of
"data mountains" will not prevent terrorism in Europe but will cause
additional problems to the society as whole. One visitor asked: "Where are
all the local journalists, counsels, tax consultants and medical doctors?
They should have joined this great event!" Three speakers repeatedly
recommended the usage of Free Software to help ensure some minimum privacy,
and FSFE pointed out that people should be careful with regards committing
personal information to archives.
7. STACS Session In Belgrade
On the 4th of December, FSFE hosted a STACS project session in Belgrade. Civil
society representatives both the local area and the EU participated in workshops
and discussions, brainstormed interesting projects intended for future
development.
http://www.fsfeurope.org/projects/stacs/stacs.en.html
8. Serbian Ministry For Information Society Undertakes Localisation Efforts
According to the official website of Serbian Ministry for telecommunication and
information society, the ministry will invest in Free Software localisation in
Serbia to provides solutions to the public and business sector. Fedora and
Ubuntu GNU/Linux distributions will be localised along with GNOME, KDE, Mozilla
products (Firefox and Thunderbird) and OpenOffice.org. The work will be
undertaken in cooperation with Serbian universities. Initial contacts with
localisation teams and Free Software
community are currently being made.
Get active with FSFE:
http://www.fsfeurope.org/contribute/
You can find a list of all FSFE newsletters on
http://www.fsfeurope.org/news/newsletter.en.html
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