Software Freedom Conservancy has had a lot of major successes this year:
<ul>
<li>We brought three new projects under the protection of Conservancy: <ahref="https://forums.librehealth.io/">LibreHealth</a>, a critical initiative for health in free and open source software; <ahref="https://www.spec-ops.io/">Spec-Ops</a>, a project dedicated to creating of open standards in critical areas, including payments and identity;
and <ahref="http://brew.sh/">Homebrew</a>, a software package manager for Apple's OS X. </li>
the lawsuit</a> Christoph Hellwig brought against VMware in Germany, the
first case on derivative works and the GPL. Christoph's case <ahref="/news/2016/aug/09/vmware-appeal/">continues on appeal</a>.</li>
<li>We helped Conservancy projects Bro, Buildbot, and Godot receive Mozilla MOSS grants. Another Conservancy project, phpMyAdmin, successfully completed a thorough security audit as part of Mozilla's Secure Open Source Fund (no serious issues were found!).</li>
<li>We <ahref="/news/2016/may/10/yorba-assigns-copyrights/">received an assignment of copyrights from the Yorba Foundation</a>, including Shotwell and Geary, in order to safeguard those copyrights for the future.</li>
<li>We conducted friendly discussions with companies out of compliance with
the GPL, seeking non-litigious resolutions in accordance with our <ahref="/copyleft-compliance/principles.html">Principles</a>. We <ahref="/news/2016/nov/03/linux-compliance-agreements/">published our template agreements</a> and held two feedback sessions, at <ahref="/blog/2016/oct/27/feedback-gpl/">Embedded Linux Conference EU</a> and <ahref="/blog/2016/nov/16/2016-lpc-gpl-compliance-bof/">Linux Plumbers' Conference</a>, to evaluate and improve our compliance efforts. We also worked with other community members to <ahref="/blog/2016/jul/19/patrick-mchardy-gpl-enforcement/">bring clarity to international activities around GPL compliance</a> and help make the ecosystem safer for free software adoption. We stayed committed to providing <ahref="/blog/2016/feb/25/zfs-and-linux/">straightforward analysis about the GPL</a>.</li>
<li>Our Executive Director, Karen Sandler, <ahref="/news/2016/feb/23/FOSSA-testimony/">testified to the New York City Council Committee on Contracts in favor of the Free and Open Source Software Act and the Civic Commons Act</a> which would increase the use of free and open source software by New York City departments and agencies. Karen later in the year also <ahref="/news/2016/oct/26/karen-sandler-oscon-eu-2016/">taught kids in London about free software</a>.</li>
<li>We <ahref="/blog/?tag=ContractPatch">launched a new initiative called ContractPatch</a> to help provide information and understanding about employment agreements.</li>
<li>We <ahref="/blog/2016/jun/06/openchain-spec/">commented on the OpenChain specification</a> to help make sure that the initiative by companies to collaboratively come up with standards and shared materials around compliance also meets community expectations about how compliance obligations are satisfied.</li>
<li>We supported, helped coordinate, and financially backed volunteers from
our member projects to organize seven conferences in three continents, where thousands of
attendees learned about free and open source software.</li>
<li>We processed and paid reimbursementrequests to individuals doing work
around the globe advocating for their free and open source software
projects at conferences and other venues. We also paid contractors to
of diversity for the community via Outreachy and other programs, and are the
legal home to 40 member projects that are essential to developing free
software.</p>
<p>We undertake these critical programs because they are essential to the
future of technology. We do them because they are right. <strong>But we cannot do
them without you.</strong> Last year you helped us to fundraising goals that didn't merely keep us running, but even let us <ahref="/news/2016/aug/22/brett-joins/">hire a new employee</a>. Yet even this staffing level isn't enough to handle our existing workload.</p>
<p>Our fiscal sponsorship model is not financially self-sustaining by itself:
we cannot afford even one staff member and basic overhead with the revenue we
take in from our projects. With over 1,000 Supporters, we can now sustain the basic
work and we will survive. But to thrive, and handle the really complex tasks like
copyright and licensing advice, and license compliance, we need even more
resources. That's why our final target is 2,500 Supporters. If you use
or care about our <ahref="/members/current/">member projects</a>, which
include some of the most widely used free software, you can help them all
by <ahref="#donate-box"class="donate-now">signing up as a Supporter
<p>Many consider our GPL compliance and enforcement controversial. We don't
think it is: we stand up for the GPL at the request of our member projects,
the Debian community, and members of the Linux kernel community.
Most recently, that has resulted in our funding
of the <ahref="/news/2015/mar/05/vmware-lawsuit/">suit
against VMware</a>, which is the first lawsuit on derivative works and the
GPL (Christoph's case <ahref="/news/2016/aug/09/vmware-appeal/">continues on appeal</a>). While this work is extremely important to the continued long-term
success of software freedom and copyleft, not to mention in the long-term
interest of the industry as a whole, it makes fundraising from companies
very difficult. Some companies
have stopped funding us and some have even successfully pressured
conferences to cancel or prevent talks on our compliance work. We do
this work because we think that it is good for everyone in the long run,
because we know it is the right thing to do, and because we know that we are
in the best position to do it. But that's not enough — you have to think it's
right too and <ahref="#donate-box"class="donate-now">show us by
becoming a Supporter now</a>.</p>
<imgalt="Photo of Conservancy t-shirt that Supporters receive"class="appeal-left"src="/img/conservancy-t-shirt.jpg"/>
<h4>It's up to you</h4>
<p>Conservancy is deeply committed to supporting, promoting, developing, and
defending free and open source software. We pursue our mission on various
fronts, and we're proud of what we've been able to accomplish in 2016. To
do even more in 2017 and in the years to come, we need your help.</p>
<p>We believe 2017 will be a critical year for Conservancy, our member
projects, and our work. We look forward to making huge strides in providing
software tools for public charities as well as services for developer
communities. We will continue to champion the rights of the public and the
interests of copyright holders who have licensed their contributions to the
commons for the public's benefit. We will continue to host and speak at
conferences, create and maintain educational resources, and raise awareness
about how free and open source software is essential to a free and open
source society. </p>
<p>While we appreciate our corporate donors, we simply cannot depend
solely on grants from companies who may not find our mission to be
compatible with shifting corporate strategies. We need you, the public as
well. Simply put, we need 2,500 Supporters in order to maintain our staff,
continue to provide a full range of administrative, bookkeeping, and legal
services to our member projects, educate the public, <strong>and</strong>
undertake compliance efforts. We hope you will <ahref="#donate-box"class="donate-now">sign up as a Supporter</a> to help us achieve this. If we don't reach our goal, we will
have no choice but to hibernate some of our activities — likely
our compliance efforts — until we have the resources to resume them
