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FOSDEM 2025 Call for Participation: Legal and Policy Issues DevRoom

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We are excited to announce that the Legal and Policy Issues DevRoom will be returning for FOSDEM 2025! Join this DevRoom at the biggest annual Free Software event in Europe. This is your opportunity to submit proposals for a talk or a panel about Free Software legal and policy topics.

Legal and Policy Issues Devroom last year at FOSDEM. The picture shows four people, -three men and a woman-, sitting around a table on stage. In the background you can see a blackboard with a slide on it and in the foreground you can see the chairs from the seminar room with people sitting on them.

The Call for Participation for the Legal and Policy Issues DevRoom at FOSDEM 2025 is now open! We are inviting you to submit your proposals for talks and panel discussions about Free Software-related legal or policy topics by Sunday 1 December 2024 at 23:59 AoE (Anywhere on Earth). Whether you are deep into public sector use of Free Software, or navigating the legal complexities of licensing compliance, this DevRoom offers a unique space for meaningful discussions that can shape the future of Free Software.

Our community has substantial expertise in this area yet there are few opportunities to discuss these matters in a forum open to all. In the Legal and Policy Issues Devroom we come together for a fruitful exchange on relevant and pressing Free Software topics.For more details on the submission, visit the link of Call for Participation from the DevRoom’s organizers.

What to Expect

In past years, the Legal and Policy Issues DevRoom has tackled a wide array of critical issues that directly impact the Free Software ecosystem, including Openwashing and its repercussions on the community, trademark policy, national laws and their effects on the Free Software movement, the role of Free Software in public administrations, interoperability and more!

This year, the DevRoom community is in particular interested in exploring topics like LLM-generative-models, questions and discussions around current EU regulations (e.g. CRA, AI Act, PLD, DMA), how trademarks have been used as control mechanisms, funding schemes and market incentives for Free Software, license compliance experiences and strategies, export regulations and tactics, tax exempt status in different countries, and the evolution and decline in fiscal sponsorship.

See you there!

The Legal and Policy dev room will be held on Saturday, during the first day of the conference. FOSDEM is the place to exchange ideas, forge collaborations, and tackle the most pressing issues in Free Software and open policy. As always it will take place on the first weekend in February and as usual the FSFE will be present with a booth and talks.Stay tuned for more announcements about FSFE’s activities at FOSDEM.