= A restriction on technological restrictions =
[ Read online: https://fsfe.org/news/2015/news-20150506-01.en.html ]
== The right to install other software on your computing devices ==
Safecast is a global project to map radiation data from around the world and release this information openly. When the project just started out, they used modified hardware, together with their own custom software and a few clever tweaks, to allow anyone to participate in the project. This kind of ingenuity, the ability to re-purpose or adapt existing technology by replacing or supplementing its software, should be permitted and encouraged by the law. In the example of Safecast, fortunately nobody prevented them from being innovative.
But all of us depend on the possibility to install or replace programs that we use every day, to increase our security, privacy or convenience -- or just because we happen to like using a different program on our laptop, tablet, phone, router, television, car, or on other devices.
Today, on the International Day Against DRM, the undersigned organisations are calling on lawmakers to safeguard the right to tinker for everyone. To make sure that the owner of every device is allowed to replace or supplement the software in that device if they so choose, thereby empowering owners to control their own property. Many manufacturers today add technological restrictions that prevent device owners from changing their devices, or having someone do so for them. This can be in breach of the licences on the devices (as with Free Software/Open Source Software licences, which grant the rights to use, study, share, and improve the software for any purpose). It is clear that any right to tinker must also be coupled with a legal provision that prevents technological restrictions of the same right.
To successfully guarantee that device owners are in control of their own technology, the following organisations ask that the right to tinker be guaranteed for everyone, and that technological restrictions that interfere with this right be limited by law.
- L'Association Francophone des Utilisateurs de logiciels libres (AFUL) https://www.aful.org - Chaos Computer Club https://www.ccc.de - Deutscher Konsumentenbund https://www.konsumentenbund.de - Digitalcourage https://digitalcourage.de - Digitale Gesellschaft https://digitalegesellschaft.de - European Digital Rights https://edri.org - Free Software Foundation Europe https://fsfe.org - KDE e.V. https://ev.kde.org - Associazione LibreItalia ONLUS https://www.libreitalia.it - Open Rights Group https://www.openrightsgroup.org - Open Source Business Alliance https://www.osb-alliance.de - Open Source Initiative https://opensource.org - The Document Foundation https://www.documentfoundation.org - UFC-Que Choisir https://www.quechoisir.org - VideoLAN https://www.videolan.org - Vrijschrift https://www.vrijschrift.org
== Press contact ==
Matthias Kirschner press@fsfeurope.org Vice President, Free Software Foundation Europe Schönhauser Allee 6/7, Berlin, Germany Phone: +49-1577-1780003
== 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.