Sustainers help us do our work in a strategic, long-term way. We could not do this without the support and financial contributions of individuals like you. We list our Sustainers here.
Please watch this video to learn about what we do and why we need your support as a Sustainer:
The wide range of work we engage in is supported by people like you.
We are so proud that we're funded by individuals and stay unbeholden to corporate interests and pressures. We stand up for developers, consumers and those who have been historically excluded. We work to make technology truly fair for all.
Thank you for helping making this work possible:
- Standing up for consumer rights in copyleft compliance
- Supporting Outreachy with its increasing number of interns
- Bringing legal action against prolific license violators
- Hiring team members to get projects like Reproducible Builds to continue pushing the forefront of software reproducibility
Our Year in Review
This has been a big year for Software Freedom Conservancy in our tireless efforts to promote ethical technology, increase diversity and inclusion in FOSS, continuing to fight for your rights with copyleft compliance, and support our incredible member projects. Our staff engaged in many invited speaking opportunities, we grew our staff, and we continue to build community around important issues like the software Right to Repair movement. We hosted our first large conference, FOSSY, and while we finalize details for next year, we hope to see you there to join us in community!
SFC lawyers after recent Vizio case- CC BY-SA 4.0
Our lawsuit against Vizio— the first lawsuit of its kind to seek third party beneficiary rights to the complete, corresponding source code under the GPL is progressing! World-changing, public policy litigation requires resources and time, but it's worth every penny so we can build a future where every consumer has access to the source code they need to modify and repair their devices. At a recent hearing in the case, we presented our opposition to Vizio's Summary Judgement Motion, our lawyers presented the eloquent case that recipients of software under the GPL Agreements can enforce their rights to the corresponding source code themselves, and that right should not be preempted by copyright law. We are the only organization currently taking legal action to protect the GPL Agreements in the USA; your support is critical for us to continue these kinds of efforts.
We have also once again filed key DMCA exemptions for the following categories:
- Computer programs for purposes of good-faith security research
- "jailbreaking" smart TVs
- "jailbreaking" routers
- Literary works consisting of compilations of data generated by medical devices or their personal corresponding monitoring systems, to access personal data
These allow people access (that should be granted in the first place!) to investigate their own devices for issues of license compliance, security, and replacing the firmware on their TVs and routers. It's a key ability to vet and replace software on devices we own and operate, so renewing this exemption each time it comes up is very important for us all. The medical device exemption was submitted by our Executive Director Karen Sandler in partnership with others who are personally affected by proprietary medical technology.
As software based technology becomes more pervasive in our lives, it's vital that we communicate the importance of software freedom to the wider population. In that vein we've created a video (narrated by our Executive Director Karen Sandler) that introduces the ideas of software freedom, and specifically what Software Freedom Conservancy does. We also did a lot of public writings about some of the important issues this year. From our perspective on the Neo4j suit to highlighting problematic behavior from proprietary software companies and calling for folks to Exit Zoom. We'd also like to remind you that as a Sustainer, we will provide you with your own BigBlueButton account so that you can host your own video calls on a FOSS platform. Once you have donated to us, you can fill our the new account signup and your account will be approved.
New staff!
SFC hired two additional employees this year! General Counsel Rick Sanders joins the team to help with our continued legal needs. Rick has over 20 years experience as a intellectual-property litigator. His expertise has been critical in helping our license compliance efforts and helping our organization take on the increasing needs from projects and new initiatives. SFC's new systems administrator is Paul Visscher. With over 20 years experience with Linux and free software, Paul's belief in the power of free software to help people engage with technology in non-exploitative ways fits in perfectly to support our growing organizational needs and mission. Helping make sure we can provide solid FOSS replacements to proprietary technologies for all of us.
Writing and Speaking
Our staff has been presenting and speaking about software freedom all year. Our Executive Director Karen Sandler received an honorary doctorate from Katholieke Universiteit Leuven for her incredible work in FOSS leadership, and her advocacy and pursuit of software freedom and rights for all. In November she spoke at SFSCON about "The History of, and Path forward for, Copyleft and the GPL".
Policy Fellow Bradley M. Kuhn gave many conference talks and also represented SFC at many government hearings and inquiries. Beginning the year at FOSDEM, Bradley (and Karen) led the Legal and Policy DevRoom. He then spoke at SCaLE 20x giving a talk titled Learning From the Big Failures To Improve FOSS Advocacy and Adoption. As the host of a keynote discussion at FOSSY, Bradley facilitated a community discussion about the RHEL policy change. As a panel member, he was the only representative for the FOSS community on the FTC's discussion “Creative Economy and Generative AI“
Our Director of Compliance, Denver Gingerich, spoke at SFSCON talking about what it's really like to enforce the GPL. His talk at FOSSY titled You don't carry a phone?! Improving societal acceptance of abnormal people was one of the most talked about from our own conference. Pono represented SFC at SCaLE 19x and SeaGL, which was great to be back at community centered conferences. SFC staffers also participate in key meetings to represent community interests in a variety of FOSS related discussions concerning security, governmental use of FOSS and in critical infrastructure discussions and also presented in classroom to educate students about software freedom.
Highlights from some of our projects
We've raised, administered and/or facilitated $1.8 million to improve software freedom directly! This includes contractors, interns and students, administrators, and grants for creation, distribution and maintenance of free software projects. Part of the unique position of our organization is the expertise necessary to do this kind of work.
Group Picture: Outreachy interns, mentors, and community coordinators gathered to celebrate the 1,000 interns milestone in Lagos, Nigeria.
You can view a video of the celebration here.
Outreachy accepted 63 interns in the December 2022 cohort, and 64 interns in the May 2023 cohort with over 30 Free and Open Source software communities. Bringing in new communities in the Open Science and Humanitarian spheres, Outreachy continues to lead the way in providing opportunities to people subject to systemic bias and impacted by underrepresentation in technology. Celebrating our 1000th intern (!!!), there were celebrations featuring alumni and current interns all over the world.
OpenWrt released version 23.05.0 which continued adding hardware support for myriad devices, now supporting over 1790 devices, over 200 of which were added since last year! There is also now support for various Rust packages, and major improvements to the core components. OpenWrt remains one of the most important alternative firmware projects, ensuring user rights in the ability to install (free) software on your own devices.
The Institute for Computing in Research completed it's fifth year, supporting 32 students in 3 cities this summer. Now providing training, education and real world software experience to high school students in 3 cities and exploring additional cities that may join next summer. These research internships are a great way for high school students to get involved in real academic research while also being exposed to the ideas and principles of software freedom.
Inkscape just celebrated their 20th anniversary! Coinciding with their new 1.3.1 release, Inkscape is as active as ever and proving itself one of the most vital free software projects, full of longevity and an ever growing community. This year has been a big year of development, marking some very exciting developments for the project. Creation of a new bug accelerator program, a migration to GTK4, another year of GSOC participation and new support for Adobe Illustrator import!
Our member projects had a range of in person and online events this year. Inkscape hosted an in-person meeting in Bensberg, Germany. A great meeting for the PLC and contributors to get together to plan and work on technical challenges. The first back in-person Selenium conference was in Chicago this past may. Attendance from over 10 countries, it was an incredible reunion for the project contributors and users to get together. The Git contributor summit was held online this year in September. Topics ranged from ideas of new library support to how to better support for scaling with large code forges and what the new contributor experience is like. A great mix of code related and process related talks. The Reproducible Builds annual summit was hosted in Hamburg featuring incredible technical talks, project planning and continues to build the momentum and reach for reproducibility.
Help us Continue this Work
Sustainers pose with Karen!
From left: Stefano “Zack” Zacchiroli, Karen M. Sandler, John Sullivan, and Jim Wright
We are beyond thankful for the ability to continue our work — which only continues due to your financial contributions. We recognize that not everyone has the same financial leeway to donate as they have in the past. But please consider giving what you can so that our organization can continue to advocate and support the rights of all software users. We work hard and efficiently, and accomplish so much with our small staff. We hope — through our hard work, creativity, and passionate dedication — that we've demonstrated over the years how Software Freedom Conservancy continues to be the beacon of change for software freedom that the world needs. Please consider donating now!