Legal Support Activities
As a non-profit, non-governmental organisation, Free Software Foundation Europe works to create general understanding and support for Free Software and Open Standards. The following activities are concrete actions that we take in the areas of public awareness, policy advocacy and legal support.
Since its foundation in 2001, the FSFE has been working every single day to further Free Software in Europe and beyond. With our concrete activities, based upon the three pillars of our work, we focus on protecting and extending user rights. Some of our actions run for many years, some are aimed at short-term developments, but all are part of our mission: empower users to control technology.
Another major part of our work consists of continuous engagement and background work. We are present at dozens of conferences per year, support and maintain an excellent community and provide it with helpful resources. Furthermore, we are a prominent contact point for all questions and enquiries around software freedom, Open Standards, and user rights. We also provide basic education resources on Free Software legal and licensing issues.
Learn more about legal issues in Free Software and our general approach in this area.
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REUSE Software
A FSFE está rodando um projeto para facilitar o licenciamento para humanos(as) e máquinas de modo parecido. Ele resolve um aspecto fundamental que o licenciamento de Software Livre tem muito em sua fonte: que licença é um arquivo sob licença, e quem detém o direito de cópia? REUSE porê recomendações fáceis em três passos que audam usuários(as), desenvolvedores(as) e profissionais da área legal.
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Legal Network
A Legal Network é um grupo neutro e apartidário de "experts" em diferentes campos do conhecimento envolvidos(as) com aspectos legais do Software Livre. Atualmente a Legal Network tam muitas centenas de participantes de diferetnes sistemas legais, arcabouços acadêmicos e filiações. O objetivo da Legal Network é promover discussão e fomentar têm a intenção de ser dinâmicas, provicativas no bom sentido (fazer as pessoas pensarem) e estarem alinhadas aos recentes desenvolvimentos tecnológicos. Desde 2007, temos conduzido o Seminário de Licenciamento e Aspectos Legais (LLW) que tem sido a mais avançada congregação de advogados(as), aficcionados(as) em tecnologia e líderes nos assuntos legais e de licenciamento referentes ao Software Livre numa atmosfera informal e confidencial.
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Questões Relacionadas às Licenças
A lista de correio eletrônico sobre Questões Relacionadas às Licenças é nosso grupo de voluntários(as) dedicado a prover ajuda referente a licenças e conformidade legal em Software Livre. Se você precisa de consultoria sobre o que as licenças de Software Livre você deveria usar, ou se você quer cohecer melhor sobre que direitos você tem sobre um pedaço de Software Livre, pode nos contatar.
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The ZOOOM Initiative
The FSFE is working with 9 European organizations to promote and raise awareness about the importance of Free Software, Open Data, and Open Hardware among academia, business, industry, and innovation supporting organizations. As a big part of our work with the ZOOOM Initiative, we are promoting the REUSE specification as an important element for licensing compliance.
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Internet da Próxima Geração
A FSFE é uma organização parceira da NGI, uma coalizção de várias entidades sem fins lucrativos Europa afora. Fundada pela Comissão Europeia, NGI provê garantias a pesquisadores(as) e desenvolvedores(as) avulsos(as), bemcomo equipes que desejam trabalhar em novas ideias e tecnologias que comtribuem para o estabelecimento da Internet da Próxima Geração. A FSFE provê apoio legal para projetos que melhorem o caraer aberto, inclusivo, transparente, cooperativo, que valorize a privacidade e proteção dos dados.
More Legal Activities
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Fiduciary Programme
The Fiduciary License Agreement (FLA) allows software projects to assign and consolidate copyrights to a named fiduciary, for the effective management of their copyright status by this fiduciary. This permits developers to focus on making great applications, rather than spending their time dealing with legal administration. While the FSFE no longer accepts new projects under the Fiduciary Programme, we continue to offer customisable versions of the Fiduciary License Agreement (FLA) for your use.
Software Patents in Europe
We are working towards a world where software does what software users want it to do. For this, software users must be able to participate in the development and distribution of the software. Software patents block this goal by adding legal and financial risks to software development and distribution and by giving the patent holders legal power to completely prohibit software developers from using the patented ideas.
Microsoft vs. EU Antitrust CaseConcluído
In 2001 the European Union started investigating Microsoft's dominant position in the market for desktop operating systems. The FSFE played two key roles in this case. First, we represented the interests of Free Software developers. Second, we are a public interest organisation who cannot be bought off. Thanks to the excellent work by all involved parties, the case has been won in all rulings up to the European Court of Justice in 2012.
EURA Slovakia caseConcluído
The Slovak company EURA Slovakia has been facing EUR 5600 in fines because it did not buy and use the Microsoft Windows operating system for submitting electronic tax reports. Slovak tax administration gave EURA only two options: either to buy and use Microsoft Windows or face the fines. The FSFE assisted in this case to advocate for platform-neutral solutions for such procedures instead. Unfortunately, the court decided against Free Software and Open Standards, but we were able to raise awareness about these wrongdoings in Slovakia and beyond.
AVM GPL violationConcluído
Can a company modify GPL-licensed software on a third-party device? The router manufacturer AVM accused Cybits of copyright infringement and trademark claims because they modify the original router firmware which is largely based on the Linux kernel. Together with gpl-violations.org we successfully convinced the court that the provisions in the GPL license are binding: software under this license can be freely modified and installed even if it is shipped as part of an embedded device's firmware.
MS-OOXMLConcluído
Since the very beginning of the standardisation process for Microsoft's Office Open XML - OOXML (hereinafter MS-OOXML), the FSFE has expressed serious doubts about whether MS-OOXML could be considered as open, if even as a standard at all. The FSFE first raised the issue in the community and led the movement against the standardisation of MS-OOXML, following closely over the years the relevant developments.
GPLv3Concluído
The June 29th 2007 release of version 3 of the GNU General Public License (GPL) marked the end of an eighteen month public consultation process. During this time, the FSFE worked to raise awareness of the changes proposed for the licence, to help the community to participate in the public consultation, and to document the ongoing discussion to make this topic as accessible as possible.
AGNULA: A GNU/Linux Audio distributionConcluído
The AGNULA project aimed at the creation of a fully functional, entirely Free Software GNU/Linux distribution for professional audio users. It is a project run by key players in the audio field with funding by the European Commission. The FSFE as a partner of this project is taking care of the legal issues, the long-term aspects and also making sure the Free Software community interests are heard.