[Fsfe-uk] address@hidden: World Summit on the Information Society]

[Marc Eberhard]

Hi *,

anyone knows anyone from the UK going to the WSIS? Any contacts? If the
organisers themselves are aware of Free Software, that might be a nice
opportunity to raise our profile in general.

Bye,
Marc
_______________________________________________________________________________

email: address@hidden, address@hidden
email: address@hidden, web: http://www.aston.ac.uk/~eberhama/

----- Forwarded message from Sascha Brawer <address@hidden> -----
> From: Sascha Brawer <address@hidden>
> To: <address@hidden>,
>    Wilhelm Tux <address@hidden>, <address@hidden>,
>    <address@hidden>
> Date: Fri, 14 Mar 2003 04:09:49 +0100
> Subject: World Summit on the Information Society
> 
> Hi all
> 
> It seems that the Free Software movement has well-informed allies in
> rather unexpected areas.  At least to me, it was news that traditional
> development-collaboration organizations are concerned about Information
> Technology, to an extent that they are discussing software patents with
> the Patent Office.  So, please let me describe an experience before I ask
> a few questions.
> 
> Today, a number of Swiss non-governmental organizations met in Berne to
> discuss WSIS, the United Nations World Summit on the Information Society
> [1] whose first part will take place in Geneva in December 2003.  Most of
> the audience was rather remote from computing: Besides Alex Schröder and
> myself, who were both representing Wilhelm Tux [2], probably pretty much
> everyone else was from a media, development, women's, human rights, ...
> organization. Correspondingly, a big part of the discussion was about
> topics like the digital divide, community radios, or oppression of
> journalists -- all very important, but not immediately related to Free
> Software.
> 
> However, the official position paper ('platform') of the Swiss NGOs [3]
> does include short statements about Free Software and Intellectual
> Property rights.  The symposium brochure contains several paragraphs
> about these topics.  Actually, the organizers turned out to be quite
> familiar with the goals of our movement.  For example, Chantal Peyer of
> 'Bread for All' [4], who co-organized the symposium, has read the GNU
> philosophy pages and is well aware of the discussion around software
> patents.  Chantal told me that their position on the patent system
> actually is one of the areas where they got into a debate with the Swiss
> administration, so they had discussions with a representative from the
> patent office.
> 
> I was quite surprised and delighted to hear this, of course.  In my
> humble opinion, the least we as proponents of Free Software should do is
> to become more visible to these supporters of our goals.  While I
> personally doubt that big-scale events like WSIS can have very concrete
> effects, the world summit in December might be a good opportunity for
> getting publicity and more supporters. So, I'd like to ask a few things:
> 
> * Does the FSF have any plans with regards to the WSIS summit in Geneva?
> I've found a few postings on the Web containing both 'WSIS' and ('GNU' or
> 'FSF'), but nothing too concrete. The official list of WSIS participants
> does not seem to include FSF.
> 
> * Are people at FSF Europe aware of WSIS? Did the country chapters
> establish any contacts to the respective preparation groups in their
> area? Maybe other groups will be surprised, too, to hear about unexpected
> supporters of Free Software.
> 
> * Would it make sense to have more texts catering to NGOs, for instance
> explaining why Free Software is good for developing countries?
> 
> * Another area where NGOs might become our ally is encryption: Why is it
> that the likes of Amnesty International, Greenpeace etc. are not loud
> voices in the discussion about outlawing cryptographic technology? After
> all, one would presume that these people had an interest in crypto being
> legal.
> 
> * Wilhelm Tux could officially sign the Swiss NGO position paper [3].
> 
> Personally, I wouldn't mind going to some preparatory meetings,
> explaining the Free Software movement to NGO people, etc., but I'm sure
> there are people around who are better suited for this.
> 
> I'd be sorry if all this was old news to everyone but me. I did try to
> find information about FSF's participation at WSIS on the Web, but I had
> no real success.  I think it would be quite awkward if such a big-scale
> event about the "Information Society," which also is a chance to meet
> many potential supporters, was without the presence of one of the most
> important groups.
> 
> Best regards
> 
> -- Sascha Brawer, address@hidden [5]
>    Berne, Switzerland
> 
> [1] http://www.itu.int/wsis/
> [2] Swiss Campaign for Free Software, http://wilhelmtux.ch/
> [3] http://www.comunica-ch.net/ (cf. sections II.5 and II.6)
> [4] Development NGO funded by Swiss protestant churches; http://www.ppp.ch/
> [5] http://www.coli.uni-sb.de/~brawer/
>     (I'm not there anymore and should have moved my page a long time ago..)
----- End forwarded message -----