Freedom Dreams

Over the past few years, Web 2.0 has become all the rage. Closed web apps and social networking services, however have a serious problem – the user’s lack of control over their data, and their inability to interact well with other services. However, it is good to see that the “free software community” (for want of a better term), are increasingly starting to compete offering open Web Apps. Laconica/identi.ca, for micro blogging, libre.fm for music “scrobbling”, and most recently daisychain, which should soon be a facebook competitor.

However, the one thing I have not yet managed to find a good replacement for, is Google Mail (Gmail). To this end I have resurrected my long dormant libreapps project. I’ve got the site back up and running, and my two “Apps” functional – mail and rss.  Anyone interested in testing/evaluating these as they are should ask me for an alpha account (this is only to make sure no-one expects stuff to Just Work, and so I can keep track of resources), or if you’re adventurous, check out the source code (bit of a mess atm). The site is still in a very alpha, or even pre-alpha type state, but any feedback would be appreciated.

The RSS code on libreapps is TT-RSS (GPLv2) but the Mail code I have written myself, and had previously released as AGPLMail. Now, however, I have released it under the MIT license (the most permissive commonly used license there is). Why? Well, firstly, I’m no longer happy with using the governmental force of copyright to affect what people do with my code (see this blog post). Yes, I disagree with people not sharing the source to code they write, but I am not willing to threaten/hurt them to make them change their mind. This is a very contentious and political issue, but, there are other reasons why I think the AGPL is not as great as some claim.

Firstly, compatibility – this is the killer with any copyleft license. Because I am using TT-RSS, my core libreapps code needs to be at least as permissive as GPLv2. Since I plan to add other apps, most likely under other licenses, my core code needs to be permissive so it is compatible with all.

Next, how much “protection” of a Web App does the AGPL actually provide? It is supposed to force the release of the code of a hosted modified version. But, what defines modification? Or, rather, where. Obviously, changing one of the files of the application is modifying, but the (A)GPL is supposed to also cover linked works. But, with webapps, it is possible to make a site that behaves differently with out technically linking (eg. php include). One example I can see is an ajax script added to the main app (and source released)  could pull data from closed app, and the user experience would be the same. Also closed software could read/write to the db of the AGPLed software without technically being linked.

So, whatever the license of a web app, there are ways to change it and not return source. And, it is hard to prove anything, all that is returned to the user is html and js files – they can not be sure how they are generated. Returning source for AGPL apps relies partly on good will, something that also benefits an MIT app.

However, there is a more important point here. I would argue that it is not really the software that is the biggest issue in webapps – it is the data. Writing a twitter, facebook or other webapp clone is perfectly possible, and compared to some tasks, not that difficult. However, what really sets open web apps apart is primarily the availability of source, its the fact you can run your own copy and, crucially, communicate with the original site. The AGPL can do nothing to stop someone creating a large laconica instance with the federation turned off. A federatable twitter is many times better than one with source code released. (Interestingly, facebook actually releases some of their source code, but, for the reasons above, it is useless).

Finally, one of my other personal reasons for choosing MIT it means I get more users of my software I write (people can reuse snippets/functions in whatever they are writing, for example). True, someone could create a non-free fork, but, they would be silly to do so. For those who “hate freedom” there is Goole Mail/Apps. The main thing that makes libreapps mail valuable, is not the code itself, but the fact it is open/free.

So, that’s why I use MIT, even for Web Apps. However, it does really mostly boil down to my dislike for the governmental copyright system – the above are just reasons why I don’t feel like I’m missing much. I know many people don’t come from that angle, so AGPL makes sense to them. That’s fine. I’m happy to support any web app that federates and gives me access to source. I’m an identi.ca user, and am looking forward to trying daisychain. Hopefully though, people will now understand why I personally use MIT, and respect that.

It’s a bit since my blog post. In that time I’ve been on holiday, upgraded this blog to Wordpress 2.8.2 and myself to 18 (ie. years old ).

So, intellectual property. A good recent example to use to discuss this would be the recent Orwellian Kindle case. The irony in this case that it was actually 1984 animal Farm that Amazon chose to delete from users machine. (Yes, really. I almost didn’t believe it myself). The obvious question is, this this action right, or not.

I don’t think it is particularly productive to attack Amazon for actions in this case. Amazon was acting on behalf of the copyright holder, in order to comply with copyright laws. It could be argued that they should not have implemented the DRM in the first place, but many of the book publishers pressured them to do so. And, more importantly, DRM would not have the (partial/percieved) effectiveness it has, if it were not for copyright and laws against cracking DRM (eg. the DMCA).

So, instead lets look at the laws, and whether they are right or not. The laws here, covering copyrights and patents (trademarks are not such an issue), are often referred to as “intellectual property”. This leads to much confusion when trying to discuss whether these laws are moral. Some people claim that creative works are effectively property, and unauthorised copying is akin to stealing, so should be stopped. (This stealing analogy is even used by publishers organisations, that should really know better that the law does not link copyright and theft at all). Others don’t go quite this far, but say simply that the authors of creative works have a right to be able to benefit from their work. (There are example after example in the free software and free culture movements as to why “IP” laws aren’t necessary to make money).

As a voluntaryist believing in the basic natural rights to life, liberty and property. Its a black and white choice, and has nothing to do with existing laws. Either “intellectual property” is real property, subject to the same type of ownership, or it should not be controlled at all. The issue of whether “IP” is moral, for me, hinges on whether it is property. And, I do not think it is.

First of all, lets look at the concept of property in the first place. Why does the idea exist, and why is it better than alternatives. As far as I know, property exists as a way to manage resources. The exact same meal can not be eaten by both me and and the person next to me. So, property is about exclusivity. Something is mine because I am the only one who uses it (or more accurately, the one who decides how it is used).

Does this kind of exclusivity exhibit itself in the information  world? Yes and no. Digital content can be copied very easily which blurs the line of what belongs to who. If I create an image, and send a copy to someone, who owns that copy? If we’re talking about property, if someone creates an object similar to mine, with their own materials, it obviously belongs to them. So, similarly, if someone recreates on their own machine, a file like I have on mine, their copy belongs to them. This means, if you want property like protections, that kind of exclusivity, there is a way – just keep your file to yourself!
(Of course, this issue of server side, or “cloud” software comes up here, but thats an issue I’ll look into in depth in another blog post.)

Of course, my way of thinking about property isn’t the only one. Objectivists maintain that property is created as a result of man’s mind. Raw materials are useless without the cleverness to transform them. Since property comes from the mind, then thoughts, ideas can also be property – intellectual property. The problem I see with this is, where do you draw the line?

Owning property means being able to morally use force to protect it. If someone copies my idea or creative work without permission, Objectivists presumably would argue the same is the case. But what if my idea is simple, or obvious. How do you manage fair decisions on what belongs to who, who has been influenced, and who has been “stolen” from. How do you be sure who the original creator is? And, ultimately, to whom do you want to give the power to make these decisions. Trust not to make decisions that limit creativity, that are in there own interests?
(The current patent system is a woefull example of this. The running of the system is influenced by lawyers who want as much paperwork and as many lawsuits as possible, in order to benefit themselves.)

Another argument is that intellectual property can be seen as an extension of contracts. I could contractually lend or give an object to someone (for example, to pay in installments). That object is used by them, but I still retain ownership. In the same way, I could also contractually lend a digital work to someone, on the condition that the don’t copy it. Breaking such a contract would, in my eyes, be immoral. But, if you are given the digital work by someone else, without my permission, you are not breaking any contract! Only the person who originally got the work from me is.
(In this way EULAs would also be pointless without copyright. It only takes one person to break it, and people can choose not to be bound by them.)

In conclusion, I think the idea of “Intellectual Property” is frankly silly. We would be a lot better off without copyright or patent law (despite what even stallman might say). As for DRM, without copyright laws, and DMCA-like laws, these measures would make no business sense. Even if a company were to try it, a mass boycott would be much easier without this government-perpetuated myth that copying is theft.

There’s an oft reappearing topic of debate in Free Software circles, about whether Free Software is really about freedom. I want to give a different take on this issue, using some ideas from classical liberal philosophy.

The debate that I see most often starts when a strong free software supporter suggests that we should use exclusively free software on our machines. To this, someone else may respond that, surely such a policy is restricting a users freedom to run whatever software they want, including proprietary software.

I want to address this issue in a different way, by asking, what is freedom? According to the FSF, freedom in software is composed of the freedom to #0 run the program in any way, #1 study the program, #2 distribute  the program and #3 modify the program.

Fair enough, but what is freedom in a more general sense? Dictionary definition time – “The condition of being free of restraints.”. Yes, there are many different ways of defining freedom, but this is the one that I, as a voluntaryist would most agree with. It its the simplest and most consistent way of thinking about freedom – you are free if you are not being restrained – that is you are not having force initiated against you.¹

So, how does this conception of freedom tally with the FSF’s. Looked at one way, not too badly. Being free from restraints (if you don’t hurt anyone or their property), in the area of software, would mean no copyright law. This being the case, you would be able to use and copy software as you saw fit (”freedoms” #0 and #2).

However, there’s a problem with this. In order to exercise the supposed freedoms #1 and #3, there is, as the FSF says, a prerequisite, the source code. Of course, in the sense of real freedom, without copyright law, you would not necessarily be given the source code, a programmer might choose to withold it. However, you could choose to use only software that is “open” (has source code), and the majority of software would probably be this way, since there isn’t the incentive of a copyright monopoly over the work, and open code makes it much easier for benevolent people to participate.

In this way, real freedom – that is, no restraining copyright law – fits very nicely with principles of free software. However, the same does not work so well the other way round. It may seem outrageous to suggest free software advocates, such as the FSF are working against real freedom and initiating force – after all, for all their heckling, they don’t actually force people to use software – but, in other ways they do.

As I said, to be actually free, you must not have the implied force of copyright threatening you. With this in mind, take a look at the GPL – what is it? A copyright license, and a fairly restrictive one at that.Yes, it is a free software license, because it doesn’t restrict any of the four specific software freedoms. But it restricts plenty of other things, you being able to distribute only parts of it (ie. binaries), or, combine it with non-compatible code and distribute (potentially very useful). These things are restricted with the threat of force. A threat, that through the legal system (SFLC lawsuits) has been carried out in some cases. Such restriction by force, is, in my eyes at least, anti-freedom and immoral.

However, in case it was obvious, these are not reasons for me to be making a big move away from free software, as I said, free software fits well with my sense of freedom – I strongly support the idea of being free to do what you want and having source code. Proprietary software is a much worse use of immoral copyright force. But, I disagree with the use of copyright, to advance the specific software freedoms, as it leads to other freedoms being lost – this is especially so with copyleft.

So, instead of fighting copyright with copyright, and amassing users to free software systems, we should try to abolish copyright, to try to make all software free. After all, do we really think we will manage to switch a majority of users away from the dominating OSes any time soon? Abolishing copyright might seem the harder thing to do, but it is much easier for ordinary people to get behind, without needing to switch much software etc. (of course, it would be good if they did). Now is as good a time as ever due to the outrage over ridiculous bittorent fines.

One final note, the emphasis on anti-copyright rather than 100% free software is why I now conceed to convenience in certain matters – namely, I now use adobe flash plugin on an ubuntu system.

#1 – Defensive force is of course another matter. You still have freedom, I would say, if you would have reasonable defensive force used against you if you hurt someone else.

So, I decided to learn the Dvorak keyboard layout. I’m writing this post in it….. vvveeeerrrryyyy slowly. I’ve just about got to the point where I can use Dvorak to chat on IRC, but I still have a deep sypathy for those who can’t touch type.

I am trying Dvorak just for the fun of it – its supposed to be better than qwerty, anh although I think that its probably true, I don’t see any benefits yet due to the steep learning curve… I guess thats how many people feel about Linux or free software in general. Fear of change is not completely irrational… effort is required to make that change. All we can try to do is reduce the work involved as much as possible; but more importantly, wemust make it evident to people that their effort will be worthwhile.

I would write a bit more, but it is painstakingly slow…..

In ether news, the third episode of Freedom Socks, my free software podcast, has been released. Have a listen and please tell me what you think.

So, yesterday I finally installed gnewsense on my two machines. It was doing some weird stuff, and I didn’t know why, so I was going to write an irate blog post. However, I now know what was going on, but it brings me to the same conclusion – Gnewsense is not a viable alternative for most people.

So, I install it on both of these machines. Well, on one machine ethernet didn’t work, but I had tested it with the livecd and expected this.  The wireless card on my other machine also required firmware, but it worked out of the box with gnewsense. Before we all give gnewsense a pat on the back for having hardware support, let my explain what happened when I installed updates – both the wireless and the sound stopped working. A package had been removed, since it contained firmware – now this makes sense, and is the way gnewsense works in order to fuffill its goal, but it means two things:

1. The gnewsense deltah-h cd I was using contained the non-free software required by my graphics card. Yes, let me say that again the gnewsense cd contains propreitary software.
2. Regreesions are happening, quite major ones where sound or 3D stops working for many or all people, which is just not something most people will accept, without caring an awful lot about the ethical issues. Not only this, but if someone asks why some of these regreesions happened, you must tell them: sorry, we lied to you – gnewsense wasn’t actually all free software, so we had to remove the bits that weren’t.
   Now, I think most of the people who are ready to use gnewsense will understand the technical difficulty in separating out all propreitary software – but for new GNU/Linux users it will just sound highly hypocrytical, and make gnewsense seem even more pointless than they already though it was.

Now, there was something that rms said in his talk at manchester about people being cowards if they don’t use 100% free software. These are words that I’ve thought about a few times – he is calling 99.99% of the population cowards. But, then again, it is in Stallman’s nature to say such things. His point is partially valid, IMHO, but it is more laziness than cowardice.

We should be trying to introduce people to free software by starting off with gnewsense, as someone on irc said – it is a journey. Think about it – fair trade and free range groups concentrate on getting people to buy increasing ammounts of ethical food, rather than saying that people should switch 100% straight away.  We need to first show people firefox, then openoffice, then ubuntu, then gnewsense.

So, yes, the message of this blog is that giving out gnewsense cds to windows users will just give them a perception of a technically inadequate and hypocritical system. Far better to give them ubutnu cds, explain its weaknesses to them, and let them realise the need for gnewsense themselves.

As anyone who has read other posts on this blog will know I feel quite strongly about software freedom. I try to use exclusively free software as far as I possibly can. However, unfortunately I do still use some propreitary software, for various reasons.

Nonetheless, I wish to strive to become better in this respect. Recently, I took a look at the 100% free software distribution gnewsense. Thing is, I’m still rather undecided about whether non-free firmware is a problem (topic for a future blogpost maybe) and gnewsense breaks the network cards on both my pcs, rendering it useless for me, until I buy new network cards of course (It also means that I have no compiz, due to graphics card firmware, and the fact that glx has been stripped out (this annoys me, no truly free 3D acceleration yet :S), but I can live without this. The internet, I basically can not).

And, there is also the fact that my belief in the importance of free software has been wavering a bit (I know it is important, I’ve just been wondering how important – I’ll elaborate more in athoer blog post). But, I decided I was at a point where I wanted to try to remove all the tradiotional non-free software. By this I mean software that is regared by everyone by non-free, is not GPL’d etc. In fact most distributions have this content in a separate repository.

On Ubuntu (which I use on my main PC), this software is put into the multiverse. I decided today that I would cut myself off from this repository completely. It should be no harm for me, as I do not use any of these apps, flash and java were installed, but only for other people (gnash and icedtea ftw). However, the thing that is really annoying me is that by disabling multiverse, it is not only non-free software that I can not download, it is also perfectly free software with some sort of legal problem (patents, DMCA). The two groups of software are not the same thing for me (being a freedom lover and patent and DMCA hater), so it is a great inconvenience if the two are just lumped together!!!!!!

I want to be able to have all free software enabled (including that with patent issues etc.) but no non-free software. With ubuntu, I can’t do this – all I can do is pick debs out of multiverse by hand! For this reason, I’m thinking of switching to a distro that does not lump non-free and possibly troublesome together, the obvious choice, I think would be Debian (Sid, I think). Already, I had realised I would be comfortable with debian (I use it on another machine), but given that ubuntu is considered more user friendly and will do anything Debian will do, I had no incentive to switch. Now I do!

I wonder if I can update my current hardy installation to Sid. Its probably not advisable, but given that I have a fallback Kubuntu partion, I might just give it a go, for the hell of it.

Another thing I was wondering, is that I do decide to go freedom crazy (and hate non-free firmware). Then what distro would I choose? Not gnewsense I don’t think, because that doesn’t ship the free software that ubuntu lumps in multiverse. Annoyingly, there doesn’t seem to be a freefree distro based on pure debian. Maybe gnewsense could be tweaked to be based on debian (project for the summer holdiays maybe).

Okay, I just spoke to the gnewsense guys, and it would probably be easier to create a “free multiverse repo”. So, I might not switch to Debian afterall. Then again I might. And everything could change if I manage to buy a new ethernet card. Watch this space

Self referencial note: This blog is almost like a conversation with myself. I either leave too long before writing or am still making up my mind whilst I’m writing. The latter is definitely better though.

Yesterday, me and a couple of friends went to see a talk in Manchester by Richard Stallman (rms), the founder of the free software movement. I’m not sure quite how much the other two got from the experience, but I certainly found it very interesting – although I knew many of the things he said, it was the way he explained them, and it also provoked me to think about certain things.

One of the biggest things was Richards unfaltering commitment to the four freedoms as moral imperatives. One thing he explained particularly well, that I’d known for a while, but found difficult to explain was the problem with free software not allowing people to do certain tasks (e.g. use a printer, due to the technical incompleteness) and yet still claim to be liberating them. His explanation, which I will use from now on, is that something like this is not about freedom, it is about convenience. The two are completely separate, even though people are sometimes try to lump them together.

Of course, that then raises the question for me personally: How committed am I? What inconveniences am I prepared to face? This was really brought home to me by part of his talk specifically about schooling. Not only did one of his apologies compare roughly to my own experience (free software is great for learning for children who want to know how stuff works, unfortunately, I was still part of the proprietary software world during most of my childhood, so I missed out). But, also he was talking about how exclusively Free Software is an absolute must in schools, for four reasons:

• Its much cheaper, and schools have tight budgets as it is
• To prevent proprietary software companies from locking in, or “addicting” children
• Given that the four freedoms are important, the most important people to teach these ethics to are our children. Rms gave his example that children should be willing to and able to share anything they bring to class, whether that be sweets or software
• Free software provides a much better way for eager students to learn how software works (as explained above)

However, what struck me most, was again, how he talked about achieving it. That those who care about Free Software, such as myself, should refuse to use the proprietary software in schools. I’m currently wary of doing this, especially for diplomacy, but it is certainly something I should consider doing. Then, there’s the point of whether I can avoid proprietary software entirely – really, it is something I should aim for, and am working towards, but when am I going to take the plunge entirely.

Something I found interesting, especially as it will be one of ADFA’s campaigns, is his stance on webapps. Using computers in the way he does, he sees no need for them, and points out that you are giving up a certain amount of control to your data (whether the server runs free software or not), something that I had pointed out on the ADFA project. However, the thing that I had not thought about, was the fact that these apps run software on the users machine, in the form of languages such as javascript. It is these scripts that must be under a free software license for webapps to be 4-freedoms-compatible. I’m still not sure whether this is a terribly big issue, but it is definitely something to campaign for – particularly since freeing these scripts would not cause much loss to the companies, escpecially as the source code is already availible anyway.

One less important, but interesting thing I took away from the talk was a fresh look on the whole Linux naming controversy. What I am trying to campaign for is free software as a right, not just Linux as a system or open source being good technically. Since what I am striving for is most similar to GNU/FSF than any other project, using the name GNU should really be a good thing. My main issue with GNU/Linux was that it sounded technical and off-putting. However, I hope to use the term “GNULinux” from now on (to avoid the “slash”). Really this is not so off-putting, especially since a gnu is also an animal, so those who won’t appreciate “funny” acronyms don’t need to know about them. And, if you are trying to market simply as a software product, then just use the distro name like Ubuntu – however, I don’t just want to market a product, so from now on, I hope to make an effort to mention GNU. Linux might be shorter to say, but surely we can at least use GNULinux as the “full name” for the system.

Another minor, but useful thing was how he answered the question about the loss of jobs if the whole world moved towards free software (aka. free software is communist, developers can’t make money etc.). He pointed out something I’d not quite grasped. Within the computing market, jobs actually developing software are only a small section, and only a small section in that is creating proprietary software (the rest is building custom software, which as long as the one user of the software has the four freedoms is completely ethical – giving people software and restricting there use of it is immoral, but not sharing at all is just a bit mean). The worse that could possibly happen is that this small section within a section would disappear. Not a problem at all, considering that it is entirely possible to get jobs developing free software! Someone raised the issue of one person propreitary software developers no longer being able to make money, and rms pointed out the argument we too often overlook – that nobody has a right to make money if they are exploiting people (in fact, he told the person that he hoped their business failed!). Free software is about encouraging a completely different mindset and ethos.

Finally, after watching Richard auction  I’ve re-realised it would be good to read some of the free software movements literature. So now, I want to get my hand on Free as in Freedom and Free Software Free Society, as well as the ancap books Wikiacc mentioned in response to my previous posts.

PS: I left this a day before writing this. I reawlly ought to improve my blogging style and use a notebook or something.

PSS: Point in case, I’ve already found myself adding a major paragraph to this, I’ll probably find myself adding more to this as it comes to my head. I need a small pocket sized notebook!

Not only do I believe that free software, or freedomware as I like to call it, is the moral way of doing software, making me more or less a subscriber to the FSFs views.

However, I have only been aware of freedomware for a couple of years now. I really do appreciate the freedom it gives me, to be in control over my own computer; to use my computer how I want.

Also, I’m increasingly of the belief that growing up with propeitary software was actually bad for me. I am, and always been inquisitive. From when I first had a computer, I wanted to find out how stuff worked, and how I could do the same thing. For example, not soon after I started regularly using the internet, I was right clicking and selecting view source to copy and tweak parts for my own HTML documents. As a result of that and the following learning process I am not quiet proficient in XML and can also code my own PHP scripts.

However, the big thing that Windows, and proprietary software in general prevents you from doing is looking at the source code. This restricted me greatly I’m sure of it. I still remember my futile attempts to run code in the same way other applications were run. I thought that the “proper” ways of doing it cost money, lots of money (most development tools are hundreds of pounds). Therefore, I was limited to batch scripting and yabasic etc.

Its so painful in hindsight to realise that wonderful things that were out there. Open code that I could look at and modif, just like I did web pages. Free (in both senses) compilers so that I could make my own applications that ran in the same way as professionals.  However, I could not see these things – I only knew the proprietary world I had entered in. I could not create, innovate or learn to my full potential because of these restrictions, at a time, as a child were I could have developed greatly.

Yes, I truly believe proprietary software hindered my personal development, and I will forever loathe it for that.

Note: This post is from the point of view of someone trying to avoid proprietary software because I believe proprietary software is immoral (many of the things here help explain this). If you don’t share this view, this post probably shouldn’t concern you.
Also, if you are trying to avoid it, like me, then you might want to consider switching to Gnash and IcedTea for Flash and Java. (These are what I use)

On Saturday I recorded a podcast with two of the other people from Teenlug: Zach (zoglesby) and Rob (x_rob). Due to the distances we live apart, VOIP was the only option and we ended up using the propeitary Skype.

Its true that an alternative exists, the open protocol SIP and its many open source clients. But the truth is, these aren’t really that good. There is no consistent text chat, no presence notification and much of the time, the sound quality is abysmal (which can be seen in the other podcast I was in, TuxTeens). Also, because these are normally small projects, Phone to PC calls are either not available or not competitively priced.

So, there you have one of the reasons why I use propeitary software, despite not wanting to, even at home. The others are compatibility testing (one of the main things I code is webpages, so I use IEs4linux) and programs I need for school – luckily this is only one program (containing information about Physics) which runs perfectly under wine.

For the second thing, I would recommend free website snapshoting tools, but these only do so much. Whenever I code something ajaxy I need to test it in a live browser. However, I think I am probably prepared to live with this in the mean time. It is a symptom of other peoples dependency on non-free software, not so much mine.

The VOIP problem is, of course, the tricky one. I am in danger of becoming locked into Skype, because everyone else having the conversation needs to use the same protocol. However, I don’t find this such a major issue as most of the people I want to talk to are in favor of open source, and would be happy to use a good open source alternative. The thing is, most of the alternatives are nowhere near the quality (interface or sound) of skype. If people are to be convinced to use freedom respectful, this is something we need to improve.

Of course, it would make sense to build upon the existing technologies. One way to do it would be to build upon the XMPP protocol (used by Jabber), which provides text messaging and presence notification, and add audio and video. This is what google did with Google Talk, and although this is a proprietary program, Google are working towards an open source library. However, FOSS support for this protocol is experimental.

Or you could take SIP and attach text messaging and presence notification. This is what a project called openwengo are doing. This is the project I am most interested in, because it should be compatible with other skype clients (although the added bits would not work) and it doesn’t involve using experimental versions of kopete etc.

Edit: Although Wengo has precense notification, it does not have text chat.

However, to properly test these technologies, I need someone (maybe even several people) to call.
Any volunteers?

I believe that in an ideal world, we should all have freedom over our computing environment. And, I want to work to help achieve this dream.

However, I don’t feel like I’ve done much recently to further the causes of Free Software, despite that being something I want to do. Therefore, I am trying to think of ways I can do this. These fall into two basic categories

1. Helping improve software in the Free Software Community
2. Helping with existing efforts to raise awareness of Free Software generally
3. Helping raise awareness of Freedomware in my local community

Although the first is something I’d like to do, perhaps starting off by alpha/beta testing Ubuntu Hardy (watch this space), I believe that for me, at this time, raising awareness is more important. This is because its not specifically Linux/Ubuntu I want to improve – Linux is not that important – instead, I want people to realise that software liberty is important (and possibly choose Linux because of that).

The second should be fairly easy to do, I just need to hang around the GGL specific Nuxified forum a bit more. In fact, one of the GNU/Linux Matters ideas particularly interests me – UndeclaredRight.Info – but it doesn’t seem to have got anywhere yet. Perhaps I could be the person to get it started.

Libervis also seems like something I want to become more part of, but its more a group for discussing these issue rather than advocating them. And, I’m already a regular participant in #libervis anyway.

However, the thing is, I’m not really sure how to go about doing the third.”Local community” probably translates to my school. Thing is though, from talking to people about Software Liberty so far, I have had a rather negative response. At best, people are interested, in agreement with some of the things, but not bothered enough to take it further themselves; at worst, I give people a bad impression of Freedomware – my “advocacy” has a negative effect if any at all.

I’m not sure how I can overcome this. Perhaps over time I’ll get better at explaining it and making it relevant? Or perhaps I need a new approach. We have a “lesson” called enrichment, where speakers come in to do talks, and our teacher has suggested that students could talk about something important to them. An ideal opportunity? Maybe, if I managed to pull it off. If I don’t, I’ll just give freedomware a bad name in the minds of a lot of young people :S

Perhaps I should start a Freedomware group? I know there’s at least one person that would join. But similar to the enrichment idea we could get a lot ridicule and our efforts might fail miserably.

In addition I’d like to get more Freedomware into schools in the UK generally, but I have no idea at all where I can start working towards that.

:S :S :S