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Open Access, FOSS... and cross-pollination

Posted: November 27th, 2006, 1:57am GMT

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On the weekend, one just ran into an old friend Subbiah "Arun" Arunachalam. The reason? An assignment by this useful site called SciDev.net to write a brief report on the recent Workshop on Electronic Publishing and Open Access held in Bangalore.

Needless to say, sharing information and knowledge cuts across many diverse domains -- whether it is software, research journals, or CreativeCommons-style works.

What Arun commented was interesting: "You may also visit http://planet.foss.in/. Now we should get all these peoople to work for the promotion of OA [Open Access to academic journals] in general and OA self-archiving in particular. They are a very creative and committed bunch of people, most of them young and very talented." Needless to say, cross-pollination is something we all need very badly!

Arun also e-introduced me to IISc professors who attended the workshop like Prof. Raghavendra Gadagkar, Prof. N Balakrishnan ("the man behind the Million Books Digital Library project and the IISc's EPrints archive"), Prof. M R N Murthy and Prof. Giridhar. A real pleasure to know more about the work going on in a parallel... but very related... field.
Geeks and coders get support from government, corporations

Posted: November 26th, 2006, 2:57pm GMT

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[By Frederick Noronha, Indo Asian News Service] Bangalore, Nov 26 (IANS) It was started as a movement of long-haired geeks and coders, but today the Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) network is now seeing some big corporate names and government institutions backing it with funding and support in various ways.

FOSS.in, the premier national event of the Free and Open Source Software community, held here over the weekend, drew support from web giant Google and software giant Sun Microsystems, with India's ministry of communications and information technology as its principal sponsor.

Bangalore-based Geodesic, which is working on hand-held solutions to computing including the Simputer, was another of the sponsors. IT giant from Bangalore Wipro also supported the event, which claims to be the largest tech FOSS event in India and possibly in Asia.
FOSS.in... in LinuxWorld.com

Posted: November 24th, 2006, 12:31am GMT

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Editor Don Marti's brief comment on FOSS.in in LinuxWorld.com is here. If you want the not-so-brief comment, go here.
fdmbx ... a box offering freedom?

Posted: November 24th, 2006, 11:41pm GMT

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Check these photos of Warren Noronha's (no relation of mine!) work-in-progress Freedom Box. Put briefly: "The Freedom Box is a wireless community device. It is an entertainment, communication and community tool..." Sounds interesting. An earlier comment about Warren is here too
FOSS.in... what's that?

Posted: November 23rd, 2006, 9:42am GMT

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It's a Free [Libre] and Open Source Software held in Bangalore, held for six years in the past (earlier known as Linux-Bangalore). Some reports on it come from The Hindu, Monsters And Critics, Indiaenews.com, the Telugu Portal, IndianMuslims.info, Mangalorean,

It's difficult to fit such a story into the "news" format, but here's The Hindu:

Spotlight to be on free software: FOSS.In is eer 1,500 software professionals: Bangalore: Information Technology users have been into a revolution for some years now. With proprietary software packages costing a lot (most come from international giants in the field), home PC users and even small businesses cannot easily afford them. Or keep upgrading their software as new versions are released.

An answer to them comes in the form of an IT event, FOSS.IN, to be held here from November 23 to 25. The abbreviation stands for Free and Open Source Software, licensed freely for users to study, change, and modify its design for their individual requirements because the source code is easily available unlike most other software.

Since late 1990s, open source code has been widely used to build software. India with its huge "coder base" is considered an important player in the rivalry between FOSS and the traditional closed or proprietary software.

This year, about 1,500 professionals will converge here as part of the country's Open Source community. The event is aimed at those with necessary skills in coding, testing and documenting or contributing to FOSS projects and want to share ideas and expertise with likeminded colleagues.

Prominent speakers: In Bangalore, FOSS.In is expected to bring prominent speakers and experts such as Aaron Seigo and Andrew Cowie from Canada, Christoph Hellwig from Germany and Sulamita Garcia from Brazil.

Rahul Sundaram will speak on the "One laptop for each child" plan, with an ideal to create laptops costing under $ 100 for children in developing countries and the difficulties it has faced in India.
The Wealth of Networks... towards free-er intellectual sharing

Posted: November 22nd, 2006, 4:39am GMT

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Earlier this year, I ran into Ronaldo Lemos from Rio de Janeiro's Fundacao Getulio Vargas school of law referred to a book called 'The Wealth of the Networks'. We've come quite a way, then, from Adam Smith and 'The Weath of Nations'.

Interesting that somebody could even think of giving importance to the networks, invisible though many might be. Ronaldo explained: "Should open business be considered as the primary excample of this wealth, produced not by nations, but by networks that surround a particular type of business?"

"Open business involves, to some extent, generosity. In order to make it work," he said.

Then, in a sharp, insightful intervention of a few words, the Brazilian-who-doesn't-play-football (apologies for the stereotype!) cited the Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales, who said there were 12 things that would become free in the immediate to not-to-distant future.

These things are: the encyclopedia, the dictionary, academic curricular, music, art in general, file formats, maps, product identifiers, search engines, production made by communities, TV listings, academic publishing.

Ronaldo rightly felt that things lacking in this list included news and software.
Shifting over... to FLOSS

Posted: November 21st, 2006, 6:12am GMT

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NGOs, or non-government organisation, should be FLOSS's natural allies. They talk about alternatives; the alternative works here. They hold high values like freedom and autonomy; for FLOSS those are surely more than just buzz-words.

But, for many reasons, that doesn't always happen. In the last few years, however, there has been a noticeable push towards convincing non-profits about FLOSS (Free/Libre and Open Source Software)

Teresa Crawford's post to the InterRider list drew my attention... Actually, it's a forward from Chris Bailey's post to the UKRiders list.

Teresa wrote: "Chris Bailey (of the East of England FOSS in the VCS project) posted this on the UKRiders list but I thought it was too good to be kept a secret. What a great blog with personality and a lot of interesting entries on the move to an [Free/Libre and] Open Source office. Susie's Blog - Winning hearts and minds over to FOSS [www.afl.org.uk]

A quote: "I'm starting this blog because our organisation is trying to move over entirely to open source oftware, and it's been such a feast of internecine struggle and moral outrage so far I thought it would be useful to other people to show the real non-techy issues of Moving Over To The Dark Side."

And, Susie is Resources Director at AFL (ex-CIAC). AFL is Advice For Life, a not-for-profit organisation based in Cambridge, focused on advice and ICT projects. Interesting!
Promoting FLOSS, South African-style

Posted: November 18th, 2006, 12:42am GMT

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When we met earlier this year, Hilton Theunissen was programme manager of the Shuttleworth Foundation. South African entrepreneur Mark Shuttleworth established the Shuttleworth Foundation in 2001, with the aim of driving social innovation in the field of education.

This Foundation, as we're reminded by the Wikipedia, is built with the belief that education is the key to unlocking the creative and intellectual potential of the youth, inspiring them to believe that "anything is possible". (FULL ARTICLE FOLLOWS)
Asia Source II, coming up soon... (Jan 2007, Indonesia)

Posted: November 17th, 2006, 5:20am GMT

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Sunil Abraham and team are working hard to get the right people on board for AsiaSource II, which happens from January 22-30, 2007 at Sukabumi, Indonesia.

Sunil, my long-term friend from Mahiti.org (how we got to know each other is a story in itself) wrote: "I am looking for contacts in Timor Leste, Indonesia, Cambodia, Vietnam and the Philippines. I am also looking for at least 30% if not 50% participation from women."

As a participant of two earlier Source events, here's wishing them well. If you can make it, try to apply! Before Nov 25, 2006. My days at Bangalore and the Sesse Islands (Uganda) will, I guess, be fresh for long. Technology, commitment and a great group ... all rolled into one.
Free Software, Open Source ... in Pakistan

Posted: November 17th, 2006, 5:02am GMT

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Writing it the first time round, the text came out all in a hurry. Actually, it was pretty bad. The fact that I'm Indian probably didn't make the task any easier! (We are supposed to be mutually unfriendly, right?) And here was I, trying to describe the Free/Libre and Open Source Software scene in Pakistan!

Naturally, my initial efforts got trashed. With some rather critical comments. And I couldn't but agree with what was said about it....

Last weekend, I sat down on the job again. This time, trying harder. So, to find a copy of my draft on the topic, please go to this post on the BytesForAll list.

Of all the country-profiles done for the IOSN.net, this was one I felt fairly satisfied with. (Caution: it's still a draft... feedback waiting to be incorporated.) My best reward came from a young Indian kernel hacker, who commented, "How are they doing so many things in Pakistan?" Another colleague from Pakistan, with whom I share space on this SouthAsiaICT4d blog appreciated pleasantly surprised by what all was happening in her country on the FLOSS front.

Thanks are due to the many friends built up at the Pakistan General mailing list. And to networks like AsiaSource and APC.org that helped build interaction, and also APDIP.net that put us in touch with one another early on.

Well, we need not be unfriendly, after all. FLOSS isn't a zero-sum game; it can build bridges.... And give you the freedom to make friends across not-so-friendly borders :-)

(If you want a plaintext copy of this draft, just mail me).

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foss4us blogs (10 unread)

Posted: November 27th, 2006, 1:57am GMT

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Posted: November 26th, 2006, 2:57pm GMT

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Posted: November 24th, 2006, 12:31am GMT

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Posted: November 24th, 2006, 11:41pm GMT

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Posted: November 23rd, 2006, 9:42am GMT

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Posted: November 22nd, 2006, 4:39am GMT

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Posted: November 21st, 2006, 6:12am GMT

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Posted: November 18th, 2006, 12:42am GMT

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Posted: November 17th, 2006, 5:20am GMT

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Posted: November 17th, 2006, 5:02am GMT

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