News
News Archive for 2022
The FSFE empowers users to control technology with its diverse activities and concrete engagement for
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20 December 2022
We are looking for an office coordinator for an open-ended 25-35 hours per week position in our
Berlin office. As part of our office management team you will be the
administrative backbone of our operations. Our ideal candidate has experience
as an office administrator, secretary, event organiser, or another relevant
administrative role.
19 December 2022
In the framework of the REUSE Booster initiative, the FSFE provides
individual assessments and direct assistance to Free Software projects
in the implementation of the REUSE best practices. GNU Health, a
project that combines social medicine with technology, has recently
become REUSE compliant. We have talked with Dr. Luis Falcón, its
founder.
15 December 2022
The Belgian regulator BIPT has decided to safeguard Router Freedom
for all connection types, including optical fiber (FTTx). The FSFE
engaged in the public consultation urging policy makers to make this
right a reality, and to improve monitoring over ISP practices.
15 December 2022
The City of Dortmund, together with Berlin and Munich, is initialising
the "Open Source Big 3" and setting up a "Coordination
Office for Digital Sovereignty and Open Source". The Free
Software Foundation Europe, the Do-FOSS initiative, and the Offene
Kommunen.NRW association will provide information about these current
developments in an online event on 11 January 2023.
14 December 2022
The 2nd Legal Education Day (LED), organized by the FSFE, took place in Bolzano to help Free Software developers understand legal topics on a basic level, so that they can avoid common pitfalls, allowing their software projects to reach full potential. The LED track featured sessions on the basics of copyright law, licenses, and other legal topics.
12 December 2022
Copyleft ensures that Free Software remains Free. Stockfish filed a
lawsuit when ChessBase distributed parts of Stockfish work under a
proprietary license, violating GNU GPL obligations. Checkmate!
Copyleft won. Stockfish secured numerous concessions from ChessBase
to respect the GPL.
09 December 2022
Are you thinking about registering for the second edition of Youth
Hacking 4 Freedom? But you are not yet sure? Two participants from
the last edition, Héctor and Leonardo, talked with us about the
projects they developed and their journey throughout the Free
Software world! Discover their experiences during the first edition
of YH4F.
06 December 2022
Member states, the European Parliament, and the Commission have reached
a consensus on the Declaration of Digital Rights and Principles.
Although it aims to serve as a reference point for the digital
transformation of Europe, it instead descends into murky waters,
causing ambiguity. Its wording is unclear and it overlooks existing
good proposals.
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05 December 2022
Your support and contribution for the promotion of Free Software are important for securing our continuous work, ensuring our independence, strengthening our democratic society, promoting and implementing concrete steps towards software freedom, and making it easier to use and develop Free Software.
22 November 2022
More than 100 civil society organisations across sectors have already
signed our open letter about “The universal right to install any
software on any device”. Now, in the European Week for Waste
Reduction, we open up the letter to be signed by individuals. Join
our cause and make your voice heard!
04 November 2022
The registration for the second edition of “Youth Hacking 4 Freedom”, the FSFE’s hacking competition for *****agers from all over Europe, has started. This contest offers ***** people aged between 14 and 18 the opportunity to challenge themselves, meet like-minded people and win cash prizes.
04 November 2022
The first edition of the Youth Hacking 4 Freedom contest has ended.
After 5 months of coding, over 35 ***** people came up with
outstanding projects. Three of them will be introduced to you in this
interview. Ekaterina, the mind behind Music Companion, Miquel who
developed Smart Table Assistant and Alexia, the creator of a basic
password manager.
26 October 2022
The sixth edition of EU Datathon, the
EU’s open data competition, came to a close last week with the awards
ceremony. The Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) won the first
prize in the challenge ‘transparency in public procurement’ with a
program that helps analyse how public administrations in the European
Union spend their money.
26 October 2022
Surely you have already heard about the controversial EU draft law on
mandatory chat control with the supposed aim to effectively tackle
***** *****ual *****. This law implies the monitoring and scanning of
the communications of citizens – even the securely encrypted
end-to-end one.
04 October 2022
After a year of coding and evaluation the Youth Hacking 4 Freedom
competition comes to an end, giving us amazing projects. Who won? The
six winning programs offer sign language transcription, a smart table
robot, a personal assistant, a music tutorial, file sharing, and a
homework manager. All Free Software.
28 September 2022
We continuously work to promote Free Software in Europe. In 2022
we addressed technological sustainability, advocated in the DMA and
AI act on European level, and defended Router Freedom in
Europe – among other activities. To reach *****er
people, we organised a coding competition for
*****agers and published a *****ren's book on software
freedom.
15 September 2022
We are looking for a working student to support our work in
empowering people to control technology. The person will support the
FSFE's technical infrastructure by working with our system
administrators. The work is 10 hours per week in the Berlin office
and home office is possible at a later stage.
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05 September 2022
A broad alliance of 13 organisations from the fields of environmental
protection, digital policy, development cooperation and academia
publishes a catalog of demands to show political solutions towards a
more sustainable digital society. This as a prelude to the upcoming
conference for digitization and sustainability "Bits &
Bäume".
23 August 2022
Since the launch of the “Public Money? Public Code!” initiative, it has grown a lot and experienced an increase of support. Now there is a new and fun way of showing your support for “Public Money? Public Code!”. With the new SharePic-Template, everybody can show their support of the campaign.
14 July 2022
We are looking for a reliable and driven intern to support the
FSFE's policy activities and contribute to our work to empower people
to control technology. The person will work 35 hours per week with our
team in the FSFE Berlin office for a six month period.
12 July 2022
Librem 5 runs the fully convergent PureOS, which means you can take
your desktop with you within your phone. Its dedicated graphical
environment, Phosh, is becoming a popular option for Linux phones.
Guido Günther, one of Purism’s main developers, reveals details of
Librem’s software development in this interview.
28 June 2022
Greece is one step closer to securing Router Freedom, but regulators
are excluding fiber (FTTH) connections from the legislation. A
coalition of organisations, allies of the FSFE, is now requesting
that lawmakers reconsider this and thus safeguard the freedom of all
users.
15 June 2022
We are looking for a Senior Project Manager Communication for 20-25
hours per week in our Berlin office. This is a great opportunity to
help amplify the importance of software freedom, so that every human
can use, study, share, and improve software and thereby support other
fundamental rights like freedom of speech, press, and privacy.
02 June 2022
A network of nine cities in Germany shows the benefits of ‚Public
Money? Public Code!‘
31 May 2022
Code paid by the people should be available to the people!
Volunteers will present the ‘Public Money? Public Code!’ campaign
in Trento, Bologna, and Caltanissetta. If you live in Italy, now you
have a perfect chance to learn more about the initiative and
support it.
20 May 2022
Students should not have to use proprietary software to participate in the
educational process. The FSFE joins the Dutch ‘Coalition Fair Digital
Education’ supporting privacy-respecting solutions involving Free Software in
schools.
16 May 2022
Together with the Alliance of Telecommunication Terminal Equipment
Manufacturers (VTKE), the FSFE organised the online event "The Future of
Router Freedom in Austria" where decision makers could debate with
industry and civil society stakeholders on the future developments
regarding the free choice of terminal equipment in Austria.
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10 May 2022
As a contribution to a consultation organised by the European telecom regulator, BEREC, the FSFE calls for increasing the level of digital sustainability in the telecommunications sector by safeguarding device neutrality and establishing the right to install any software on any device.
04 May 2022
Early this year, the Commission proposed a draft for an EU
Declaration on Digital Rights and Principles that aims to guide the
digital transformation in the EU. Now the European Parliament has
agreed on a text and Free Software makes part of it.
03 May 2022
Today the European Parliament passed a resolution on Artificial
Intelligence (AI) with a huge majority of 495 votes in favor, 34 against
and 102 abstentions. There are many references to the advantages of Free
Software included in the text - the FSFE now urges the Parliament to
transfer its own position into the AI regulation.
27 April 2022
The FSFE publishes an open letter, co-signed by 38 organisations and companies, to ask EU legislators for the right to install any software on any device, including full access to hardware. These rights support reusability and longevity of our devices. The alliance is composed of entities from environmental, economic, and technological sectors.
25 April 2022
Technology experts and ecologists join forces in the Bits & Bäume
('Bits and Trees') conference in October 2022 in Berlin. This year
the FSFE is part of its organising committee. We look for exciting
talks and insights about how Free Software can help realising a
sustainable digital society. Share your expertise and apply until 7
June.
20 April 2022
Austria has introduced a reform law for the telecommunications sector which will affect the ability of consumers to choose and use their own routers and modems. Together with the Alliance of Telecommunication Terminal Equipment Manufacturers (VTKE) the FSFE is organising a session on "The Future of Router Freedom in Austria".
14 April 2022
On 26 January 2022, the European Commission presented its proposal for
the EU Declaration on Digital Rights and Principles which will serve
as a reference point in the future and as a common EU vision of our
digital rights. The declaration is now being discussed in the European
Parliament and Council, and Free Software should become part of it.
30 March 2022
In the effort of adopting digital policies aligned with
people's fundamental rights, the European Parliament is in the
process of finding a position on the legal framework for the
development and use of AI technologies. The FSFE is following this
process so Free Software is included, innovation is fostered,
control enhanced, and trust strengthened.
28 March 2022
The traffic light coalition must anchor its goals for the digitisation of Germany, based on Free Software, as set out in
the coalition agreement in the 2022 federal budget. Otherwise, there is a risk of cementing dependencies on individual
vendors and losing sovereignty and innovative power.
23 March 2022
What are my options if I want to run my phone with Free Software?
For our Upcycling Android campaign we interviewed Plasma Mobile
developer Bhushan Shah about running a privacy-respecting and
secure GNU/Linux phone ecosystem on your phone.
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16 March 2022
KDE's universal document viewer Okular is the first software to be awarded the Blue Angel ecolabel. The FSFE congratulates Okular to this milestone that confirms more environmental benefits of using and developing Free Software. Together with our Upcycling Android initiative we campaign for universal user freedoms in the EU in the upcoming months.
15 March 2022
At the end of the week, the new German government will have been in office for 100 days.
The coalition agreement contains ambitious statements on the use of Free Software (also known as Open Source), but so far
nothing has been implemented. On the contrary: dependencies are to be further cemented.
10 March 2022
Since 2010 the Free Software Foundation Europe has been
organising the yearly "I Love Free Software Day". Together
with hundreds of Free Software enthusiasts we celebrated our love for
Free Software on the 14th of February. To all of you who took part
and celebrated the "I Love Free Software Day", we would
like to thank you so much.
25 February 2022
At the Free Software Foundation Europe, we advocate for the universal right to
install and de-install any operating system and software on any device. The update
of the European ecodesign gives a historical chance to make this right part of
European legislation. Our Upcycling Android campaign marks the beginning of our
activities.
24 February 2022
At the prominent annual conference for Free Software, FOSDEM, we exchanged opinions and chatted with people from the
Free Software community. We raised awareness on wider issues that impact our movement in the Legal and Policy Devroom,
co-hosted by the FSFE. Enjoy the videos from the talks and stay in touch via Matrix until the next FOSDEM.
02 February 2022
The FSFE is eager to support its community with diverse Free Software
communication channels. We are happy to announce that we have recently added
Matrix to this list. After successful beta tests, every FSFE supporter and
volunteer can now create their own Matrix account. We will also use our
instance for the FSFE’s virtual booth during FOSDEM!
01 February 2022
Every 14th of February, people around the world celebrate the
“I Love Free Software Day”. On this day we show our love for Free
Software and thank all the people contributing to software freedom.
This year, we are organising a whole event dedicated to Free
Software games.
27 January 2022
As in 2021, this year's FOSDEM will take place online. But this is neither stopping
us from once again co-hosting the Legal and Policy Issues Devroom nor from being present
with a digital booth. We are excited and look forward to presenting you an interesting
programme throughout the whole weekend.
21 January 2022
In the final publication about 20 Years FSFE, we want to thank
everyone who has 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.
12 January 2022
A large part of our work is possible thanks to the contribution of
our volunteers. This was not the exception. Our Public Money?
Public Code! brochure is now translated into Spanish, and we
hosted an event to share this great news with our community.
GNUHealth, Pica Pica HackLab, Lliurex, Linkat, and KDE took
part in our event.