Press Information

1. Contacting us
2. Press pictures (coming soon)
3. Press releases
4. Terminology we use
   1. Free Software
   2. Open-source software
   3. Libre software
   4. GNU/Linux
   5. Linux

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Contacting us

For information about how to contact us, see the contact details on the About IFSO page.

Also, our Press Releases should contain specific information at the end about who should be contacted about the area concerning that press release.

For general enquiries, Ciarán O'Riordan is usually available. His phone number and email address are included in the contact details on the About IFSO page (as linked above).

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Press pictures

(Coming soon.)

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Press releases

• FREE SOFTWARE MEANS BUSINESS IN IRELAND, MARCH 16th
• SOFTWARE PATENTS BAD FOR SMES

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Terminology

Free Software

This is the term we use for software that can be modified and redistributed, and which comes with source code. We capitalise the F and S to clarify that it's a proper noun with a definition.

Open-source software

This is a term we do not use. It is an alternative term for Free Software, however it is quite a confusing term and is generally misunderstood, so we strongly advise people to avoid this term, and we particularly ask people not to use it as a label for our work. We do Free Software.

Libre software

The European Commission coined this term in 2000 as another alternate name for Free Software. We prefer the term Free Software, because it's the term our movement has been using since 1983, but we find this term to be perfectly acceptable.

GNU/Linux

This is the name we use for the operating system that many people call "Linux". Linux is in fact just one component of the operating system. The largest part, and the project which worked to make the parts into an operating system, is GNU. So we credit GNU by calling the GNU-plus-Linux system: "GNU/Linux". We ask you to do the same.

Linux

This is the name of one part of the GNU/Linux operating system. Most people use this name as the name for the whole system, but this is only the name of a component called the kernel. If you are talking about the operating system, we ask that you use the term GNU/Linux.

Intellectual Property

This term lumps together patent law, copyright law, trademark law, and a number of other laws. By over-generalising, this term makes clear discussion impossible, so we ask that you avoid this term, and if you're talking about copyright, say copyright, if you're talking about patents, say patents.