I love FS +++ 0 A.D.: Empires Ascendant +++ FOSDEM +++ FSFE20: Interns
In our February Newsletter, we invite you to our Games Event to celebrate the "I Love Free Software" Day on February 14th. Listen to our podcast episode with Stanislas Dolcini from the game '0 A.D.: Empires Ascendant'. FOSDEM was just concluded and the FSFE was there! We complete our celebrations for 20 years FSFE in an interview with past interns.
"I Love Free Software" Day: games, memes and more
Every 14th of February, people around the world celebrate the "I Love Free Software" Day by saying thank you to all the people contributing to software freedom. This year, we are organising a whole event dedicated to Free Software games on Monday 14 February at 18:00-20:00 CET. You can learn the ins and outs of the Free Software gaming world from our guest speakers, or just play Veloren in real time afterwards with others who are attending the event. Make sure you register; we are looking forward to hanging out with you on 'I Love Free Software' Day.
Before the event and during the day, create your own 'I love Free Software' image card with the help of our brand new sharepic generator, where you can upload your own picture along with a love dedication. Share your card online as a special way to thank Free Software creators.
Podcast: 0 A.D. with 0 proprietary software
The real-time strategy game of ancient warfare, 0 A.D.: Empires Ascendant, is a Free Software game created by an international group of volunteer game developers. Programmers, artists, and historians combined their skills to create this imaginary ancient world. In a new episode, the host of the Software Freedom Podcast, Bonnie Mehring, discusses the growing popularity of the game with the game's project lead. Stanislas Dolcini says that the decision to make the game Free Software made it last for so many years, as many people could contribute - and still can.
The FSFE at FOSDEM 2022
Thank you for joining our virtual booth in this year's online FOSDEM, it was fun to see the Free Software community come together once again. Also, we co-hosted the Legal and Policy Issues Devroom. Masafumi Ohta talked about his experience on teaching Free Software licenses and compliances at a university. Security expert Christopher Klooz addressed the role of international arbitration for security of Free Software.
Vittorio Bertola presented an update on the Digital Markets Act, the new European rules for online competition. Lucas Lasota, FSFE Project Manager, proposed Device Neutrality as the necessary principle to make sure we are able to run Free Software on our devices, without artificial barriers. Italo Vignoli showed how proprietary software gained ground during the pandemic. The Legal and Policy Issues Devroom organisers made closing remarks in a panel. The recordings will be published soon; find them first by subscribing to our Peertube instance.
Interviewing past interns for 20 Years FSFE
In the final publication about 20 Years FSFE, we wanted to thank everyone who worked for the organisation in an internship position. We contacted eight former interns and asked them about their time at the FSFE and their current involvement with Free Software. Diego Naranjo, George Brooke-Smith, Lucile Falgueyrac, Lyudmila Vaseva, Martin Husovec, Matti Lammi, Polina Malaja, and Stian Rødven-Eide reflected on what they learned during their internship. Since then, everyone has supported Free Software in their own way: as users, developers, researchers, advocates, FSFE donors, or FSFE volunteers.
'Public Money? Public Code' brochure, now in Spanish
In our Public Money? Public Code! initiative, we offer an exhaustive brochure dedicated to public administrations. Now it is also available in Spanish. Our volunteers recently translated the brochure, allowing the Spanish-speaking world to read about the benefits of modernising public infrastructure with Free Software in their own language.
In an event sharing the good news, we invited experts to join. Luis Falcón, founder of GNUHealth; Ricardo Muñoz from Lliurex; Alexis Puente Montiel from Pica Pica HackLab; Francesc Busquets in representation of Linkat; and Aleix Pol Gonzalez, president of KDE, discussed PMPC developments in Spain. The videos are available in Spanish.
Save the date!
- On Monday 14 February, join our "I Love Free Software" Day.
- On Friday 25 February, Matthias Kirschner, President of the FSFE, will read his book 'Ada & Zangemann'. The reading will be in German and will take place online. The event is part of the yearly Winter Congress, organised by the Digital Society. To join the Winter Congress please register for a ticket. The price of a non-member, regular ticket is 30 CHF.
What we have done
- During the first weekend of February, we co-hosted the Legal and Policy Issues Devroom and had a digital booth at FOSDEM.
- On 5 February, Lucas Lasota, the FSFE's Legal Deputy Director, followed up on his talk from last year at FOSDEM and explained why Device Neutrality is important for Free Software.
- On 26 January, the FSFE Country Team Netherlands had its monthly meeting online. A petition about Public Broadcasting Union (NPO) publishing some content only on YouTube, the Digital Ethics week in The Hague, and court case updates were among the topics discussed.
- On 20 January, the FSFE Women group had its monthly online meeting.
- On 11 January, the FSFE Spanish Team had its monthly meeting.
- On 10 January, Lucas Lasota gave an online lecture on software law and FLOSS licences at the Humboldt University of Berlin.
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@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. 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