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Free Software & IFSO 2005-11-18

Speakers notes from Glenn Strong's introduction to Free Software and Irish Free Software Organisation.

• IFSO is a membership organisation;
  • advocating use of FS in Ireland
  • ensuring the legal framework to write and use FS exists
• June 2003: several groups begin coming together with shared concern for pending EU legislation, and an interest in FS. Work on swpats.
• Jan 2004: IFSO launched (20th anniversary of GNU).
• associate organisation of FSFE. Focus of FS work in Ireland.
• much work participating in discussions about european law; 1 committee member is based now in Brussels and works closely with fsfe & MEP's
• Context for our work: what is FS?
  • Not about money
  • Software Libre (liberty), open source. We prefer the term "free"
  • Four freedoms:
    • Run the program. Any purpose, no further permission needed.
    • Study, adapt to needs. Find out what program really does. sensitive data. adapt - program, or hire a programmer. Need source for this (hence "open source") but this is only 1 freedom.
    • redistribute copies. No compulsory charge. Share, build community.
    • Improve, release improvements. make own versions, take over development.
  • Freedoms embodied in licences. GPL, BSD, MIT, etc.
  • No compulsion. We don't say you must do this, but we want to be free do do it.
  • It's these freedoms we are worried about when we talk of swpats.