From press at fsfe.org Tue Jan 10 12:48:18 2023 From: press at fsfe.org (press at fsfe.org) Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2023 12:48:18 +0000 Subject: Promising news from Belgium and Dortmund +++ IT Security +++ Job opportunity Message-ID: = Promising news from Belgium and Dortmund +++ IT Security +++ Job opportunity = [ Lexojeni online: https://fsfe.org/news/nl/nl-202301.sq.html ] In January’s Newsletter: Dortmund embraces Free Software, and Belgium is working to ensure Router Freedom. A cryptographer analyzes IT security. A digital health ecosystem licenses files with the REUSE tool. We are looking for an office coordinator. We look forward to seeing you in FOSDEM and I Love Free Software events. === Belgium Ready to Tick All Boxes for Router Freedom === Collaboration with supporters and volunteers brings us closer to victory. We addressed Router Freedom to privacy groups, consumer organisations, regulators, and telecommunications industry representatives. We want the upcoming legislation in Belgium to protect the right of all internet users to choose and use a private modem and router. We were not alone. 260 people from Belgium answered our survey which we could use to show potential barriers to Router Freedom. The Belgian telecommunications regulator drafted a framework that ensures Router Freedom for all connections [1], including optical fiber which was often excluded in other countries. Enforcement of the current proposal will mark a win for digital rights in Belgium. === Dortmund Becomes Exemplary Municipality for Free Software === By embracing Free Software, Dortmund becomes an example for other municipalities. The City of Dortmund, together with Berlin and Munich, is initialising the "Open Source Big 3" and setting up a "Coordination Office for Digital Sovereignty and Open Source". This Office in Dortmund will cooperate with the Municipal Joint Office for Administrative Management (KGSt) on Free Software governance. The involvement of KGSt makes this development relevant for all other municipalities in Germany. We will inform you about the developments in an online event on 11 January 2023, organised in cooperation with the Do-FOSS initiative and the Offene Kommunen.NRW. Register to join us [2]! === Podcast Episode: What Makes a Program Secure? === Achieving optimal security is a challenge for the average user; we need to decide what level of privacy we need and what we are comfortable with. Cryptographer and privacy specialist Cryptie explains what makes a program secure: it has to be audited, checked, and corrected. Free Software allows more people to audit as more people are allowed to read the code and discover vulnerabilities. Ultimately Free Software creates a culture in which people are ready to answer to criticism on systems and software. However there is also Free Software that is not audited, so its security is not confirmed. Conclusion: the best and most secure software is Free Software, but not all Free Software is secure. Listen to our new podcast episode with Cryptie [3]. === Digital Health Ecosystem Licenses Files With REUSE Tool === The combination of two ideas, universal access to healthcare and Free Software, gives us GNU Health. Created by GNU Solidario, a non-profit dealing with technology and social medicine, GNU Health is a community- driven Free Software project. While visiting schools in Latin America twenty years ago, the founder, Dr. Luis Falcón, realised that technology needs to support social changes. To make the licensing clear, the project has recently adopted the REUSE specification 3.0 in its components Hospital Management System (both server and client) and Thalamus (the message server for the GH Federation). Luis presented the project and the process of the REUSE implementation in a video interview [4]. === “Thank You for Your Support” Raffle === The FSFE needs your help to keep on working towards software freedom. Support us until February 12! We want to thank you for your support during these difficult times with a raffle [5]. If you donate, or donated in the past year, more than €128 you might receive a signed copy of ‘Ada & Zangemann - A Tale of Software, Skateboards, and Raspberry Ice Cream' Feeling lucky? === Celebrate I Love Free Software Day with a Meetup === On Tuesday 14 February let’s join to say thank you together to the awesome Free Software community; let’s express our love to the contributors behind Free Software. Their work is irreplaceable and does not go unnoticed. We invite you to organise a thematic meetup [6] with friends, colleagues, or FSFE local groups, and share your pictures with us. We also invite you to share a warm thank you message to your favourite Free Software project [7] in a video or an image. === Join our team and take care of our office === We are looking for an office coordinator [8] for an open-ended 25-35 hours per week position in our Berlin office. === Join us in one of our events === - 💻 *Online*: Do you want to organise a workshop on how to flash phones? We are here to help with an online train-the-trainers workshop. Learn about the Upcycling Android campaign, what to consider when organizing a workshop, and how we can help in promoting and implementing a workshop. F-Droid lead maintainer Hans-Christoph Steiner and microG main developer Marvin Wißfeld will present these two cornerstone projects. The workshop will take place in English on 19.01.2023 from 6-8pm (CET) online in a BBB room [9]. 💻🇧🇪 *Online & Brussels*, Belgium: FSFE goes to FOSDEM 2023! On Saturday 4 February come to our Legal and Policy Devroom [10], and our talk on TEDective [11]. On Sunday 5 February checkout our talks on REUSE [12] and ‘Public Money? Public Code!' policy [13] and community stories [14]. If you are in Brussels, come over to our booth, anytime in the weekend. 🇩🇪 *Cologne*, Germany: Upcycling Android is coming up on 20 January. You can extend the life of your phone by flashing it with a Free Software operating system. We will bring sample phones so participants can tinker around with Free Software operating systems and we will also help participants to flash their own devices. Please register [15]. === What we have done === - We had another fun Upcycling Android workshop in Berlin, this time in a library makerspace. Several people came to Pablo Neruda library for the event, and many dropped by out of curiosity. We flashed phones and, getting into the holiday spirit, we had biscuits and coffee. === Groups === *Denmark*: Local group Aarhus is meeting on 12 January. *Germany*: Local group Berlin had its online edu meeting and local group Hamburg had its monthly meeting. Local group Bonn met on 9 January. *Greece*: The FSFE country team Greece had its first meeting in December, with many participants and a lively discussion about Mastodon that lasted for hours. The meeting started with a long introduction round to get to know each other. Then the group discussed Mastodon tips. Nikos Roussos presented the Greek mastodon instance Libretooth. Fani Partsafyllidou, FSFE Communications Project Manager, gave updates from the FSFE. The group voted for ‘Translations and Documentation in Greek’ as the topic of the next meeting on 12 January. *Netherlands*: The FSFE country team Netherlands met online just before the holidays and discussed how to deal with proprietary educational tools and whether a meeting should be arranged during FOSDEM. Also, they talked about the public registry of AI systems in Amsterdam [16], the innovation of Open Hardware in Delft, and communication problems with Neutrinet VPN. Fani shared updates from the FSFE. *Switzerland*: The Zurich group is meeting on 19 January [17] to plan an I Love Free Software meetup and discuss the ongoing campaigns. *Women*: The Women’s group’s next meeting will be held on 20 January. == Contribute to our Newsletter == If you would like to share any thoughts, pictures, or news, please send them to us. As always, the address is newsletter at fsfe.org. We're looking forward to hearing from you! If you also want to support us and our work, join our community and support us with a donation or a monthly contribution [18]. Thanks to our community and all the volunteers, supporters, and donors who make our work possible. And thanks to our translators, who enable you to read this newsletter in your native languages. Happy New Year! Your editor, Fani Partsafyllidou Discuss this [19] -- Free Software Foundation Europe FSFE News Upcoming FSFE Events Fellowship Blog Aggregation Free Software Discussions 1: https://fsfe.org/news/2022/news-20221215-01.sq.html 2: https://fsfe.org/news/2022/news-20221215-02.sq.html 3: https://fsfe.org/news/podcast/episode-18.sq.html 4: https://fsfe.org/news/2022/news-20221219-01.sq.html 5: https://fsfe.org/news/2022/news-20221221-01.sq.html 6: https://fsfe.org/news/2023/news-20230104-01.sq.html 7: https://fsfe.org/news/2023/news-20230104-01.sq.html 8: https://fsfe.org/news/2022/news-20221220-01.sq.html 9: https://conf.fsfe.org/b/upa 10: https://fosdem.org/2023/schedule/track/legal_and_policy_issues/ 11: https://fosdem.org/2023/schedule/event/graph_tedective/ 12: https://fosdem.org/2023/schedule/event/sbom_reuse/ 13: https://fosdem.org/2023/schedule/event/publiccode_dpg_public_money/ 14: https://fosdem.org/2023/schedule/event/public_money_public_code/ 15: https://mobilize.berlin/events/e82582c1-149b-4fab-9995-655f5b81c16d 16: https://algoritmeregister.amsterdam.nl/en/ai-register/ 17: https://wiki.fsfe.org/Events/Zurich/2023-01-19 18: https://my.fsfe.org/donate?referrer=newsletter 19: https://community.fsfe.org/t/972 From press at fsfe.org Wed Feb 8 12:58:49 2023 From: press at fsfe.org (press at fsfe.org) Date: Wed, 08 Feb 2023 12:58:49 +0000 Subject: I Love Free Software +++ Public authorities in Fediverse Message-ID: = I Love Free Software +++ Public authorities in Fediverse = [ Lexojeni online: https://fsfe.org/news/nl/nl-202302.sq.html ] In this issue we invite public institutions to join free, decentralised social networks. Watch our info-session on German municipalities using Free Software. An FSFE volunteer doubts the reliability of AI-generated text. I Love Free Software Day is just around the corner. Celebrate with us! === I Love Free Software Day === We know you love Free Software. We do too. Think of the program that means the most for you, or one that positively surprised you this year. Share a ‘thank you’ message on the 14th of February with #ilovefs to show your appreciation to its contributors. We celebrate ‘I Love Free Software Day’ with events too. Join us here [1]: - 🇩🇪 Germany - Berlin, Frankfurt a.M., Bonn, Hamburg - 🇬🇷 Greece - Thessaloniki - 🇮🇹 Italy - online, Merano - 🇳🇱 Netherlands - Arnhem - 🇨🇭 Switzerland - Zurich === Invite public bodies to the Fediverse === If public bodies are on social networks they should also talk with Fediverse users [2]. FediGov, the campaign of the FSFE’s Swiss country team and GNU/Linux.ch, asks public bodies to use Mastodon, Pixelfeld and Peertube. Join the campaign and demand that your public institutions use ethical communication channels. The European Commission [3] and several EU public institutions [4] are already on Mastodon. === Video and mailing list on German municipalities === Dortmund is opening a new chapter in Free Software governance and inspiring municipalities across Germany. The recording of the dedicated event we hosted on 11 January 2023 is now online [5]. Are you interested in Free Software and working in a municipal administration or in politics? Join our new mailing list [6] to exchange information about Free Software in local institutions! === A word from the Planet === Watermarks that can verify whether a text was produced using AI, the provision of sources that led to the output of the text, or the count of back-references to a page can increase trust in AI- generated texts, according to FSFE suporter Vincent Lequertier [7]. You can follow the thoughts of members of the FSFE community in our Planet [8]. === Past events === - Last weekend we were at FOSDEM 2023 [9] with a booth and various talks. - We have held several Upcycling Android workshops and now it is your turn! Do you want to organise a workshop and teach others how to flash phones? Check out our train the trainers workshop [10]. Marvin, one of the speakers, said in a recent interview that despite the imperfections so far, GNU/Linux systems on phones have the highest potential to extend the life of devices [11] without running into security problems. - Raul Masu presented ‘Public Money? Public Code!’ at LibreItalia Conference in Empoli in December 2022. === Groups === *Germany*: The FSFE local group in Bonn [12] met online on 9 January. The group discussed how to make large amounts of data (JSONs) searchable in a browser and how to integrate Free Software Text-To-Speech into a blog. The question of coding without a 'real' computer led to a brief look at Android IDEs for mobile app development. Kilux and Chemnitzer Linux Tage might be good opportunities to meet besides FrOScon. The group is also interested in free musical instruments, this time featuring an opentheremin. Meanwhile, the FSFE local group in Berlin [13] was discussing with the youth Free Software in schools and the benefits of the AlekSIS [14] system. *Greece*: In January the group discussed practices about translating Free Software into Greek [15]. The group shared collaborative translation platforms and glossaries. *Netherlands*: The government released the code of DigiD, the identity verification app. This great news comes after some months of advocacy by the team. This victory was therefore the main topic of the last monthly meeting, in January [16]. *Switzerland*: After a successful launch of the FediGov campaign, the Zurich group discussed next steps [17]. Creating a Mastodon instance for public institutions in Switzerland or contacting data protection officers are ongoing ideas. *Women*: In January the FSFE Women group discussed the Python tools Conda, Poetry, and mypy [18]. *Translators*: 337 FSFE translations in 2022! Our exceptional translators team [19] has created 337 new files in 2022. The leader is Italian with 120 new pages, followed by Dutch, German, Spanish, and Portuguese. Get involved by proofreading or translating our material. == Contribute to our Newsletter == If you would like to share any thoughts, pictures, or news, please send them to us. As always, the address is newsletter at fsfe.org. We're looking forward to hearing from you! If you also want to support us and our work, join our community and support us with a donation or a monthly contribution [20]. Thanks to our community and all the volunteers, supporters, and donors who make our work possible. And thanks to our translators, who enable you to read this newsletter in your native languages. Your editor, Fani Partsafyllidou Discuss this [21] -- Free Software Foundation Europe FSFE News Upcoming FSFE Events Fellowship Blog Aggregation Free Software Discussions 1: https://fsfe.org/news/2023/news-20230126-01.sq.html 2: https://fsfe.org/news/2023/news-20230109-01.sq.html 3: https://social.network.europa.eu/@EU_Commission 4: https://social.network.europa.eu/directory 5: https://media.fsfe.org/w/n8e8zKHjMHukYmzb4pEWJQ 6: https://fsfe.org/news/2023/news-20230119-01.sq.html 7: https://vl8r.eu/posts/2023/01/29/artificial-intelligence-is-not-willing-to-be-correct/ 8: https://planet.fsfe.org/ 9: https://fsfe.org/news/2023/news-20230123-01.sq.html 10: https://media.fsfe.org/w/uZZYCA31SzTT5bMpNaDzz3 11: https://www.c-radar.de/2022/12/c-radar-dezember-2022-android-alternativen-hacking-in-parallel/ 12: https://wiki.fsfe.org/LocalGroups/Bonn 13: https://wiki.fsfe.org/LocalGroups/Berlin 14: https://aleksis.org/ 15: https://wiki.fsfe.org/LocalGroups/Greece/2023-01-meeting 16: https://wiki.fsfe.org/Events/Netherlands/2023-01-18 17: https://wiki.fsfe.org/Events/Zurich/2023-01-19 18: https://wiki.fsfe.org/Teams/Women/Notes 19: https://wiki.fsfe.org/Teams/Translators 20: https://my.fsfe.org/donate?referrer=newsletter 21: https://community.fsfe.org/t/989 From press at fsfe.org Tue Mar 7 11:16:38 2023 From: press at fsfe.org (press at fsfe.org) Date: Tue, 07 Mar 2023 11:16:38 +0000 Subject: Medical Devices Should Use Free Software +++ 25 New Videos Message-ID: = Medical Devices Should Use Free Software +++ 25 New Videos = [ Lexojeni online: https://fsfe.org/news/nl/nl-202303.sq.html ] In this issue we have a podcast episode about the need that medical devices have Free Software. Watch our talks from FOSDEM and videos about legal issues when developing. Participants of YH4F are already coding. Thanks to all your contributions, our fundraising ended successfully. We bring community news from 9 countries. === My Medical Device, My Software === Karen Sandler relies on a medical device to keep her heart pumping. She had a critical moment when her defibrillator misread her condition and she had no access to tweak the device. Since then, Karen has been on an odyssey to persuade doctors and manufacturers to embrace software freedom in medical devices. She recalls a case of a neurotechnology company that ended its support of retina implants. Despite such cases, things can improve in healthcare as more tech savvy people need medical devices. Listen to Karen’s interview in our Software Freedom Podcast [1] === Binge-watch our videos === We have published 25 videos this month! - What is copyright? Can I copy someone else’s work? Read and watch our explanatory videos on Frequently asked legal questions [2]. - ‘Refund of Payments for Pre-Installed Software’, ‘De-Monopolizing Access to EU Applications’ and many more hot topics from FOSDEM 2023 [3]. - 10 new ‘Thank you!’ videos [4] to Free Software programs from our I Love Free Software Day. In our own Peertube instance you can always find our latest videos [5] and leave comments! So, how to do it? If you have an account on any ActivityPub-compatible instance, e.g. PeerTube, Mastodon, or Pleroma, copy the URL of the video and paste it into the "Search" box of for example your Mastodon’s web interface. Comment from there! === Updates === - The coding period of the second Youth Hacking 4 Freedom competition is on! [6] Our 70 participants are meeting online regularly and engaging in discussions while helping each other and networking in a Matrix chat until the end of the coding period. - Thanks to your valuable contributions, we have reached our fundraising target [7]. Thank you for your confidence and support, even in these difficult times. - Check out the iheartsteam teachers’ podcast series which hosted Matthias Kirschner for the book Ada & Zangemann [8]. - Our community loves Free Hardware too! This ‘thank you’ note to the Libre-SOC project [9] is one of the latest articles you can find in our Planet [10]. === Events === Online & 🇩🇪 Germany: On 10 March 2023 Johannes Näder, FSFE Policy Project Manager, will participate in the workshop "Free and Open Software as a central component of diverse, sustainable digital ecosystems" in the German Bundestag [DE]. You need to register in order to watch it livestreamed. [11]. 🇩🇪 Germany: An author reading of “Ada & Zangemann – A fairy tale about software, skateboards and raspberry ice cream” will take place in the German city of Traunstein. Kulturforum Klosterkirche Traunstein on March 14 [12]. 🇸🇪 Sweden: On 24-25 April the FSFE invites you to join the foss-north conference [13]. 🇺🇸 USA: An author reading of “Ada & Zangemann” will take place in Boston at the Convention and Exhibition Center on March 18 [14]. === FSFE community === Our community celebrated ‘I Love Free Software Day’ all around Europe [15]. The FSFE local groups in Spain, England, Portugal, Greece, Germany, and Switzerland took up the call of the FSFE to get together and celebrate their love for software freedom in person. The Italian community organized an online event and even Free Software contributors from outside the FSFE joined the call and organised meetings like the ones in Austria and Barcelona. 🇩🇰 *Denmark*: The FSFE local group in Aarhus [16] gave a presentation about "Free Software and Permaculture" [17] at Højskolen Mors [18] discussing the importance of sustainability through refurbishment and resource-saving Free Software. In other news, one hot topic for the Aarhus FSFE local group is the current discussion by the Danish Data Protection Authority about whether the use of Chromebooks and Google Workspace for Education in schools is legal. 🇩🇪 *Germany*: The local group Berlin [19] and the LinuxWorks LUG discussed Berlin elections, addressed server configuration problems of private servers, and noticed that old accounts in the Fediverse revived after the recent changes at Twitter. 🇮🇹 *Italy*: The Merano group created its own wiki [20]. 🇳🇱 *Netherlands*: The FSFE country team Netherlands [21] had a core meeting to discuss its strategy and will meet again on 15 March. 🇨🇭 *Switzerland*: The next meeting is on 9 March [22]. 👩🏽‍🔧 *Women*: The FSFE Women team [23] discussed wiki software: Gollum, a git-based Wiki, and PmWiki, a wiki-based content-management system (CMS) for collaborative creation and maintenance of websites. == Contribute to our Newsletter == If you would like to share any thoughts, pictures, or news, please send them to us. As always, the address is newsletter at fsfe.org. We're looking forward to hearing from you! If you also want to support us and our work, join our community and support us with a donation or a monthly contribution [24]. Thanks to our community and all the volunteers, supporters, and donors who make our work possible. And thanks to our translators, who enable you to read this newsletter in your native languages. Your editor, Fani Partsafyllidou Discuss this [25] -- Free Software Foundation Europe FSFE News Upcoming FSFE Events Fellowship Blog Aggregation Free Software Discussions 1: https://fsfe.org/news/podcast/episode-19.sq.html 2: https://fsfe.org/freesoftware/legal/faq.sq.html 3: https://fsfe.org/news/2023/news-20230227-01.sq.html 4: https://media.fsfe.org/my-library/video-playlists/e31f08b8-e1bd-4fd2-9390-1849562adeb4 5: https://media.fsfe.org/videos/recently-added 6: https://fsfe.org/news/2023/news-20230220-01.sq.html 7: https://fsfe.org/news/2023/news-20230215-01.sq.html 8: https://iheartsteam.com/free-software-for-all-let-a-childrens-book-explain-the-concept/ 9: https://blogs.fsfe.org/tobias_platen/2023/02/14/i-love-free-fs-2023/ 10: https://planet.fsfe.org/ 11: https://www.gruene-bundestag.de/digitalkonferenz 12: https://www.chiemgauer-medienwochen.de/veranstaltung/bilderbuchkino/ 13: https://fsfe.org/news/2023/news-20230222-01.sq.html 14: https://libreplanet.org/2023/speakers/#6055 15: https://fsfe.org/activities/ilovefs/report/report_2023.sq.html 16: https://wiki.fsfe.org/LocalGroups/Aarhus 17: https://riversouldiers.dk/skyen/s/ymeBCPG3fy7HRXa?path=%2Fpermaopl%C3%A6g 18: https://hoejskolenmors.dk/en/permakultur/ 19: https://wiki.fsfe.org/LocalGroups/Berlin 20: https://wiki.fsfe.org/LocalGroups/Merano 21: https://wiki.fsfe.org/LocalGroups/BNL#FSFE_Nederland_.2F_Niederlande_.2F_Pays-Bas_.2F_Netherlands 22: https://wiki.fsfe.org/Events/Zurich/2023-03-09 23: https://wiki.fsfe.org/Teams/Women 24: https://my.fsfe.org/donate?referrer=newsletter 25: https://community.fsfe.org/t/1002