Software Freedom Day
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Software Freedom Day (SFD) is an annual worldwide celebration of free/open-source software. SFD is a public education effort, not only to celebrate the virtues of free/open-source software, but also to encourage its use, to the benefit of the public.
Software Freedom Day was established in 2004 and was first observed on 28 August 2004 when over 70 teams participated. Since that time it has grown in popularity as more than 300 teams from over 60 countries celebrated on the second SFD, held on 10 September 2005. In 2008, over 500 teams in over 90 countries all around the world celebrated the SFD. The primary sponsor for 2005-2006 was Canonical Ltd., the company behind Ubuntu, a Linux distribution.
From 2006 onwards, it has been decided the Software Freedom Day to be held on the third Saturday of each September: 15 September 2007, 20 September 2008, 19 September 2009, etc. Because of this, Software Freedom Day occasionally coincides with International Talk Like a Pirate Day.
[edit] Software Freedom International
"Software Freedom International" is a non-profit organisation that acts as the official organiser of the event, and allows organisers to take donations and enter into sponsorship contracts and to order and ship materials using official accounts. It has announced plans to seek tax-exempt status, to make donations deductible. To distinguish it from the event itself, the parent organisation has been called 'Software Freedom International' (SFI).
Major decisions concerning SFD are made by the SFI board of directors:[1]
- Pia Waugh (President), of Linux Australia
- Henrik Nilsen Omma of TheOpenCD project
- Matt Oquist (Treasurer), a Tufts University graduate student and employee of the Exeter, NH School District
- Phil Harper, of TheOpenCD project
- Benjamin Mako Hill, of Debian and Ubuntu
- Sidsel Jensen, DKUUG
- Frederick Noronha, Goa SFD Team
- Joe Olutuase, of Knowledge House Africa
- Robert Schumann, of TheOpenCD project
Volunteer efforts are sought in many other sectors too, including local (national or regional) coordinators, sponsorship coordinator, wiki/website maintainers, media campaign people, etc.
