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MJ Ray | 26 Jun 21:48
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fsfe-uk is now microbloggingly yours and a ukgovoss epetition response...

If you're on one of the *free* microblogging sites like identi.ca,
floss.pro, or any other on http://laconi.ca/trac/wiki/ListOfServers you
can now follow this email list at http://floss.pro/fsfeuk for a link to
the latest thread each day.

Also today, I got the Open-source-tic - epetition response from
http://www.number10.gov.uk/Page19789 which says "most of the authorities
concerned have already made a commitment to make these tools available
as open source software, or for use by their partner organisations,
and we are working to secure the commitment of the remaining."

Good result or weasel words, do you think?

OT: we've switched wholesale to the software.coop brand.

Best wishes,
--

-- 
MJ Ray (slef)  LMS developer and webmaster at     | software
www.software.coop http://mjr.towers.org.uk        |  .... co
Notice http://mjr.towers.org.uk/email.html        |  .... op
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Free Software Foundation Europe | 24 Jun 10:38
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Introducing FSFE's new president, vice president and executive team

Introducing FSFE's new president, vice president and executive team

During its General Assembly in Miraflores de la Sierra, Spain, the
members of FSFE elected new coordinators for several of the
organisation's activities, including strategy, legal and executive
coordination.

"The new team will continue FSFE's highly successful work with the
same long-term vision. We will work hard to justify the trust
which the Free Software community is putting into FSFE", says the
new president, Karsten Gerloff.

He continues: "Georg Greve and his team have done splendid work
over the past eight years, building FSFE out of nothing into an
organisation that is highly respected and trusted as an expert
group on Free Software, and as a reliable partner in policy making
and negotiations."

The newly elected Vice President Fernanda Weiden comments: "FSFE
has strong roots in the community. The people in this organisation
have a deep understanding not only of technology itself, but also
of its social and political aspects. Together, we can continue to
develop cutting-edge thinking on how we as a society handle
knowledge, and how we can best make the most of technology."

Christian Holz, appointed Executive Director, says: "Coming from a
business background and having worked with Free Software since the
early nineties, I am excited to become more involved in FSFE. The
team is highly motivated, and we have wonderful volunteers who
support our actions and cause."
(Continue reading)

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Free Software Foundation Europe | 9 Jun 23:24
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FSFE Newsletter - May 2009

Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) Newsletter - May 2009

May has been an hot month for us. Not only because the first real sunbeams
start showing up all-over Europe, but mainly because during the whole month
we run our first-ever voting process to elect a Fellow representative to FSFE 
General Assembly (GA). Moreover, we published our call for applications as
coordinator and staff positions in our legal department, and our Austrian
team concluded its challenging and satisfying tour across the whole Austria,
by participating to "Linuxwochen Eisenstadt".

Right now, while drafting this newsletter, Matthias Kirschner announced the
result of the election, therefore if you want to know who is the first Fellow
to sit at FSFE's General Assembly, just keep reading!

					Giacomo Poderi

1. FSFE participates to eLiberatica 2009, 22-23 May
2. Open Standards update in PDFreaders.org
3. FSFE seeking legal department coordinator and staff positions
4. Bernhard Reiter lectures at University of Stuttgart
5. Looking for input on the backpack of your dreams
6. The Fellowship interviews: Timo Jyrinki
7. FSFE participates at "Linuxwochen Eisenstadt", Austria 8-9 May
8. FSFE welcomes the launch of iUnika Libre UMPC at Libremeeting 2009, 13 May

IN THE SPOTLIGHT

9. Closing the Fellowship vote for the GA seat and announcing the result!

IT HAPPENED IN THE PAST
(Continue reading)

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Tim Dobson | 8 Jun 00:45

[ANN] DFEY-NW :: June 13th @ BBC Manchester

Details for the next DFEY-NW are enclosed... Please forward this to
anybody or any lists you think might be interested.

===================

DFEY-NW (Digital Freedom in Education & Youth - North West) is a group
focusing on young people and issues of freedom in the digital world,
currently based in the Northwest of England.

When
   Saturday June 13th 2009 12:30pm -> ~2:00pm

Where
   Drupal Camp UK,
   BBC Manchester, New Broadcasting House, Oxford Road, Manchester, M60 1SJ
   Photo: http://tiny.pl/z7bf
   Map: http://tiny.pl/z7b1
   Nearest train station: Manchester Oxford Road (3 mins walking distance)

Attending?
   Due to BBC restrictions, you need to tell us if you wish to attend:
     http://dfey-nw-5.eventbrite.com/
   or email us on team <at> nw.dfey.org.

Drupal Camp UK
   This is a special meeting taking place as a side session from Drupal 
Camp UK, which will be happening in the BBC at the same time. This will 
allow us to share their hospitality for lunch at about 1pm.

DFEY-NW Open Session at Drupalcamp-UK
(Continue reading)

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MJ Ray | 7 Jun 15:05
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Fwd: Free Software as a brand

Is this idea a go-er?  Is the slashdot description misleading?

-------- Original Message --------
Date: Fri, 5 Jun 2009 22:22:02 +0100
Message-ID: <c9f5f79e0906051422w4edbbd48yc3930ab75c51cf23 <at> mail.gmail.com>
From: Matthew Larsen <mat.larsen <at> gmail.com>
Subject: [Fsuk-manchester] Free Software as a brand

Just saw this on Slashdot, interesting idea!

http://blogs.fsfe.org/greve/?p=347

FTA (slashdot):

Georg Greve, founder and president of the Free Software Foundation Europe
(FSFE), has an insightful look at FOSS from a brand
perspective<http://blogs.fsfe.org/greve/?p=347>with urgings that the
community come together and strengthen open source as
a unified brand.

--

-- 
MJ Ray (slef)
Webmaster for hire, statistician and online shop builder for a small
worker cooperative http://www.ttllp.co.uk/ http://mjr.towers.org.uk/
(Notice http://mjr.towers.org.uk/email.html) tel:+44-844-4437-237
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Dave Page | 25 May 11:12

Fwd: [FSF] Free Software Action Alert!

This could do with propogating - the Euro elections are very close! This is a 
campaign started by Manchester Free Software, discussed at our admin 
meetings, and taken up by the FSF - which is a great victory for Manchester 
Free Software! Why not come along to our admin meetings and get involved?

http://groups.fsf.org/wiki?title=Euro_Elections_2009&oldid=5155 is my version 
of the sample letter, with explicit references to software patents and the 
Stephen Fry free software video.

Please propogate this link far and wide - the elections are not far away (and 
indeed the postal votes have already gone), but we can at least raise more 
awareness of free software among the new MEPs.

Dave

----------  Forwarded Message  ----------
Subject: [FSF] Free Software Action Alert!
From: Peter Brown <peterb <at> fsf.org>

Dear Free Software Supporter,

The upcoming European parliament elections give the free software
movement an opportunity to educate the candidates to the importance of
protecting free software from bad legislation involving software
patents, interoperability and net neutrality.  The French free software
association April has organized the Free Software Pact initiative, but
they need your help. In particular, candidates in the UK need to be
contacted immediately.

Mark Taylor, the coordinator for the Free Software Pact in the UK, said,
(Continue reading)

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Free Software Foundation Europe | 11 May 18:06
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FSFE Newsletter - April 2009

Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) Newsletter - April 2009

Do you know one thing that makes Free Software sustainable? You! Yes, it
is your support that allows us to operate across the whole Europe and at
different levels to promote and defend Free Software principles.
Amongst other things, your donations made possible the planning and
coordination of the Second European Licensing and Legal Workshop. They
allowed the Austrian team to participate in many public events across
the whole Austria and to continue having an intern in our Zurich office.

We finished the accounting work for the last year and we published our
financial figures. Take a look at them to see how we use your donations.

I want to conclude by introducing a couple of changes in the newsletter.
I hope they will improve your 'reading experience' of FSFE's ongoing
work. First, "In the spotlight" is a new section where I will treat in more
details a selected news. Second, since time passes by and the events
pile up, I will pick-up a noteworthy item from the past and mention it
under the "It happened in the past" section.

						Giacomo Poderi

1. Second European Licensing and Legal Workshop for Free Software, 23-24 April
2. FSFE at WIPO's 3rd Session of the Committee on Development and Intellectual Property
3. FSFE amicus brief to European Patent Office on Software Patents
4. The Fellowship interviews: Myriam Schweingruber
5. FSFE welcomes Thomas Jensch, new intern for Zurich office
6. Fellowship vote for GA seats - the election is ongoing
7. Renewal of Fellowship services
8. PDFreaders.org enjoys continued success
(Continue reading)

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Tim Dobson | 4 May 20:37

DFEY - Logo Competition - Cash Prizes

DFEY is having a Logo Competition.

Top Prize: £40
First Runner Up: £10

Brief for Entries
=================

* Should be easily recognisable, visually pleasing and easily reproduced 
in different mediums.
* Should echo themes of Digital Freedom, Technology, Young People and 
Education.
* All entries must be licenced under Creative Commons Zero Licence 
http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0
* Should be submitted in SVG format, though high resolution bitmap might 
be acceptable.
* Ideally, should be created solely using free software but entries 
created using non-free software will be accepted.
* Ideally, shouldn't use that many different primary colours.
* Have been emailed entry to logo <at> dfey.org with the SVG or other image 
file attached by 23:59, 31st May 2009

Eligibility of Entrants
=======================

* Anyone can enter, regardless of age, geographic location etc.
* There is no limit to the number of entries per entrant

How to Enter
============
(Continue reading)

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Rob Myers | 30 Mar 11:04

European Patents Once More

Via Groklaw:

http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/newsroom/cf/itemlongdetail.cfm?item_id=2539&tpa_id=146&lang=en

"[PJ: Uh oh. Is this moving toward an EU-wide patent system? Do they
understand the GPL? The FOSS development model? Note Towards an
increased contribution from standardisation to innovation in Europe
[http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=COM:2008:0133:FIN:EN:PDF],
page 10, "Communication from the Commission to the Council, the EU
Parliament and the EU Economic and Social Committee": "(7)Both
intellectual property rights (IPRs) and standardisation encourage
innovation and facilitate the dissemination of technology. However, as
they contribute to these common objectives by different means, due
regard needs to be paid to the interrelation between IPR and
standarisation.

"The Commission encourages the ESOs to continue their efforts to make
the FRAND [fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory] policy effective
and to develop mechanisms to prevent abuses of the standard-setting
process. The Commission will launch a fact-finding study to analyse
the interplay of IPR and standards."]"
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Rob Myers | 9 Mar 14:35

European Software Patents "Bilski"

("Bilski" being a recent US legal case that may have reduced the scope
of software patents.)

"# European Bilski: The Enlarged Board of Appeal of the EPO is looking
for third-party input on four issues:

  1. Is it only proper to exclude patents covering computer programs
as such when explicitly claimed as a "computer program"?
  2. Does a claim avoid the computer program as such exclusion by
mentioning a computer or data storage medium? (If not, what technical
effect is needed?)
  3. Can a technical effect be non-physical? Is it sufficient if the
physical entity is an unspecified computer?
  4. Does the activity of programming a computer necessarily involve
technical considerations?

# Input on the European questions are due by the end of April.
http://www.epo.org/topics/news/2009/20090219.html."

http://www.patentlyo.com/patent/2009/03/patently-o-bits-and-bytes-1.html

(via Groklaw)
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John¹ | 6 Mar 08:51

Payments into the AFFS bank account

I have been contacted by an individual who informs me that he recently 
renewed his membership. I am in the process of clarifying this with him.

Again I will point out:  I will be replying to no further posts or emails 
from any one subscribed to this list, other than those who I believe to be 
currently paid up members of the AFFS, or the current signatories of its 
bank account.

Let me make some points clear in order that there is no further loss of 
money to anyone who makes payments INTO the AFFS bank account.

1) Banks, as long as the destination account is given will accept any 
payment. The provisions of the AFFS constitution "...Any assets remaining 
after the satisfaction of any proper debts and liabilities shall be given 
or transferred to such other charitable institution or institutions having 
objects similar to the objects of the Association..." would seem to 
indicate that payments into the account be they subscriptions or donations 
are not returnable.

2) Unless one has been paying subscriptions continuously since the last 
valid AGM, then membership will have lapsed when the individual 
subscription was not renewed, either in the case of resignation, or in the 
cases of it not being made, or it being returned. All applications 
to 'renew' lapsed membership however they may have become lapsed, 
will/would have to be made to a new 'Executive Committee', made up of 
elected members having the power to vote, Honourary members do not have 
the power to vote.

3) Should the AFFS be wound up its assets will be disbursed as stated 
above, "... shall be given or transferred to such other charitable
(Continue reading)

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Gmane