Hi all, here is the final version of the text for the FSF Europe flyers, there will be no more content-changes now (even if changes to improve the English spelling will of course still be welcome). For the translators: There are only few changes. Some wording has been changed, but that is probably irrelevant for your translation. Two major things (but relatively quick to translate) have changed, however: * The section "Work of the FSF Europe" now contains examples that should be translated. * The section "How can you support the FSF Europe" has been rewritten. Note: Please make sure that you have used the "preferrable" form in your languages (libre logiciel, software libero etc.) throughout the text. The only exception to this should be "What is Free Software," the title of which should also contain the form in your language, but it should contain "Free Software" in two places like this: FREE SOFTWARE (engl. Free Software) - sometimes also referred to as Libre Software or Open Source Software - is best defined by the following four freedoms: [...] Therefore the FSF Europe recommends using the term Free Software or the equivalent term in the local language, in [YOURLANGUAGE] FREE SOFTWARE. Software not meeting the freedoms mentioned above is properly called proprietary or non-free. where "FREE SOFTWARE" means the best form in your language. I hope you get the idea. Andreas will layout the flyers throughout Monday, so if he receives everything on Monday, he should be able to create all these languages. Also I asked him to mail the layouted flyers in the different languages to the according lists to give you a chance to find last second bugs to fix before it goes into print. Thank you all very much for your help! Regards, Georg ------ What is Free Software? Free Software - sometimes also referred to as Libre Software or Open Source Software - is best defined by the following four freedoms: 1st freedom: The freedom to run the program, for any purpose. 2nd freedom: The freedom to study how the program works, and adapt it to your needs. Access to the source code is a precondition for this. 3rd freedom: The freedom to redistribute copies. 4th freedom: The freedom to improve the program, and release your improvements to the public, so that the whole community benefits. Access to the source code is a precondition for this. Although some languages have an ambiguity in terms of free referring to price, attempts to find a better term have failed; for more details, please see http://fsfeurope.org/documents/whyfs.en.html. Therefore the FSF Europe recommends using the term Free Software or the equivalent term in the local language. Software not meeting the freedoms mentioned above is properly called proprietary or non-free. --- What is the GNU Project? The GNU Project was announced in 1983 by Richard M. Stallman in order to create a complete UNIX-like operating system based on Free Software. The name GNU, which stands for "GNU's Not Unix", was chosen to indicate that it would be a system similar to UNIX, but not directly connected to the product UNIX. Work on the GNU system began in 1984 and in 1985 Richard M. Stallman also founded the Free Software Foundation (FSF) s a legal entity to represent the GNU Project. Being almost complete in the early 90ies, the GNU system still lacked a central component, the kernel. Like other Unix operating systems, the GNU system is modular, so Linus Torvalds was able to write the Linux kernel to work within the GNU system and release it under the GPL. The GNU system with a Linux kernel - the GNU/Linux system - is particularly widely-used today and provides the basis for every so-called Linux distribution. The web page of the GNU Project can be found at http://www.gnu.org/ --- What is the GNU General Public License/GPL? The GNU General Public License (GPL) and its sister license, the GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL; formerly known as GNU Library General Public License) were published by the Free Software Foundation for the GNU Project. The GPL does not only grant the four freedoms of Free Software, it also protects them: Derivatives of GPL software have to be licensed under the GPL again if they are being published. There is no requirement to publish modifications, but if they are being released to others, they must adhere to the GPL. This vaccinating effect against proprietarisation by third parties is often referred to as Copyleft. Like all Free Software, software under the GPL comes at no licensing cost. It can, however, be sold. Also it is possible to provide warranties as part of a commercial service. GPL/LGPL are the most widely used licences for Free Software today. The GNU General Public License alone has been chosen by more than 50% of all Free Software, including such important contributions as the GNU system and the Linux kernel. --- What is the Free Software Foundation? The Free Software Foundation was originally founded in 1985 by Richard M. Stallman as the legal entity representing the GNU Project. In response to the need to perform tasks such as spreading awareness of Free Software, and performing legal and political work related to this,FSF soon grew beyond this initial idea. Based in Boston, MA, USA, the FSF has been working on all aspects of Free Software for over 16 years, which makes it the oldest organisation of its kind. Facing the needs of a growing Free Software community, the FSF always needed to adapt to new situations. With the foundings of the Free Software Foundation Europe and the Free Software Foundation India in 2001, the FSF has taken a large step forward. Nowadays, the Free Software Foundation consists of the original FSF (the FSF North America), and FSF Europe and FSF India, with more regional FSFs to come. --- What is the organisational layout of the FSF Europe? The FSF Europe is a European Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO) founded in 2001 by members from several European countries with the intention of one day having members from all European countries. Believing in the European vision, but facing lack of a European association law, the FSF Europe is registered as a charitable association in Germany (gemeinnütziger eingetragener Verein). To provide means for tax-deductable donations in other countries, as well, the FSF Europe seeks to set up charitable per-country-specific - usually referred to as Chapters - whenever possible. Similar to its sister organisation, the FSF North America, the FSF Europe follows a minimal membership policy to protect its integrity. For the FSF Europe, new members are only appointed if 3/4 of the existing members believe in the serious commitment and dedication as well as the long-standing Free Software competence of the new member. Therefore participation in the activities of the FSF Europe usually begins through associate organisations, which are self-organizing, independent associations often centred on a certain region or area of interest. These associate organisations are included in much of the internal communication, are the first reference points when questions arise and always have a direct line into the FSF Europe. Every organization related to Free Software and agreeing with the general positions and values of the FSF can apply for associate status. As of 1st June 2002, the associate organisations of the FSF Europe are: AFFS (UK), ANSOL (Portugal), APRIL (France), AsSoLi (Italy), FFII (Germany), FFS (Austria), Ofset (France). For information on how to get involved in these associations, please follow the links on the FSF Europe home page http://fsfeurope.org/. --- What does the Free Software Foundation Europe do? The FSF Europe is working on all aspects of Free Software in Europe, which means that it is engaging itself in multiple areas. Technical Tasks The FSF Europe engages itself directly or indirectly in multiple technical activities. Usually, the FSF Europe tries to avoid maintaining dozens of Free Software development projects, though. In most cases, the FSF Europe tries to identify and solve bottleneck-problems that have not been addresses sufficiently before. Through input, communication, coordination and sometimes even funding, the FSF Europe will seek to push these projects past the threshold. Example: The FSF Europe is participating in K.A.IV 3.3 of the 5th European Commission framework programme as a partner of the "AGNULA Project" (IST-2001-34879). The aim of the project is to create "A GNU/Linux Audio Distribution" for professional audio users that will be easy to install, use and maintain. The page of the project is http://www.agnula.org Competence Center The FSF Europe provides a competence center for Free Software. It offers advice for politicians on the EU-, country and regional levels and tries to make sure Free Software gets adequate coverage and recognition in the political and legislative systems. Example: For the 6th European commission framework programme, the FSF Europe has issued a recommendation explaining how the European Union could greatly profit by adopting Free Software as the preferred model. This recommendation was backed by over 50 companies, research institutes, associations and consortiums throughout Europe; it is available online at http://fsfeurope.org/documents/fp6/ Legal Work Being the fiduciary for most of the GNU system and also other Free Software, the Free Software Foundations worldwide make sure the freedoms granted by the Free Software licenses are being upheld. Especially the GNU General Public License (GPL), the most common license of Free Software, is of paramount interest to the FSF. The FSF Europe helps upholding the GPL in court and keeping it up-to-date with legislation and technical developments. Example: In January 2002, Germany approved a revision of the copyright law that aimed to give musicians and artists better protection from unfair contracts. Unfortunately, this revision might have jeopardized Free Software developers and companies in Germany. Together with the ifrOSS, the FSF Europe was able to make sure this law - which has been enacted by now - does contain an exception for Free Software. Building Awareness A main task of the FSF Europe is to create awareness for the issues of the information age. Free Software is the best answer to the questions of the information age that we know of. But since most people do not ask themselves these questions yet, we have to make people raise these questions so they will be able to appreciate the answer. Example: In May 2002, the FSF Europe filed a request to the French authorities to have the GNU Privacy Guard (GnuPG) and OpenSSL approved for strong cryptography on public networks and for official use. After GnuPG has become the only supported major OpenPGP standard implementation in early 2002, this will help protecting privacy and maintain secure communication in the future. --- What are the advantages of Free Software? Free Software offers many advantages in different areas. Their relevance is often determined by personal preferences, so here are some reasons why you should consider Free Software: Reliability Access to the source code is necessary for two of the four freedoms of Free Software. Since many people can take a look at the source code and have the chance to find and fix problems faster and more efficiently, Free Software tends to be more stable. Security Although it strikes some people as odd that security might be enhanced by allowing the world to look at the source code, this is actually the case. The best analogy for this is that between key and lock. With Free Software the best people can work together on creating the best lock - which does not mean we give everybody our key. Economy For most companies, software is not their main area of interest, but it largely determines their ability to fulfil their contracts. Contrary to the situation most companies find themselves in today,with Free Software a company can never lose the right to use their IT solution because a vendor goes out of business or decides to not renew the license. Companies gain independence from release-cycles forced onto them. Also a company employing Free Software retains the right to change the vendor should this become advisable or necessary. If a company wishes to train or hire somebody to maintain their own IT structure, they have the freedom to do so. This makes Free Software the most secure way of investing in IT. Politics Like companies, governments very much depend on software. Whenever a government depends on the proprietary product of some software vendor, this vendor can effectively shut down parts of the government for several months, giving it significant clout over its decisions. Democracy Proprietary software has the tendency to only interact properly with itself, forcing citizens into the same proprietary solution used by the government in order to be able to communicate with it. Citizens unwilling to be forced in such a way lose the ability to communicate with their government. Macro-Economy Communication has always been a necessity for social and economic success. Just like citizens are being forced into a proprietary solution, companies wishing to interact with each other are forced to use the same proprietary software solution. Proprietary software has a strong, inherent tendency to create mono- or oligopolies. Free Software breaks that cycle and brings freedom from dependencies along with better protection against monopolies. Society Access to software determines who may participate in a digital society. It decides what can be learned, what can be said, what can be done and who can be communicated with. Software ceases being an entirely economic property, it becomes a cultural property, a cultural technique. Therefore, it becomes fundamental for the information age that all people have equal access to software. --- Support the Free Software Foundation It sounds like this is very important and you could clearly need help. How can I support the FSF Europe? You can support the work of the FSF Europe in many ways. First of all, in order to be able to understand the answers provided by Free Software, people have to start asking the proper questions. By spreading the word you can make them raise these questions for themselves. To help you with this, you might order this flyer from the FSF Europe and spread it to colleagues, friends, family or anyone else who might be interested. The flyer can be ordered in several languages at the FSF Europe office by email to address@hidden If you wish to participate in the information flow, you should consider subscribing to the FSF Europe mailing lists you are interested in and possibly joining one of our associate organizations. You can find information about both on the FSF Europe home page. The best way of getting involved in the work is to start helping out as a volunteer with the web site, translations, booths or other activities that you feel you can help us with. General information on this can be found at http://fsfeurope.org/help/help.html. And if you have the necessary resources, you might also support us financially with a donation to the FSF Europe. You will find details about this at http://fsfeurope.org/help/donate.html. Joining one of our associate organizations and helping us work for Free Software through them or as a volunteer, donor or other contributor is also the best way of getting involved in the FSF Europe activities and getting to know us and our work in detail. ------ -- Georg C. F. Greve <address@hidden> Free Software Foundation Europe (http://fsfeurope.org) Brave GNU World (http://brave-gnu-world.org)
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