The coordinators of Software Freedom Day are meeting in Oxford on 3
March this year - and supporters of FOSS are invited to come chat with
us about software freedom in general and SFD in particular.
* DATE: Saturday 3 March 2007
* TIME: 1330 UTC onwards (till late afternoon)
* VENUE: Freud's Bar, Walton Street, Oxford (walking distance from bus
and train stations)
* Maps and information about venue at the end of this email.[1], [2]
Please drop an email to info(a)sf-day.org if you're planning to come - so
that we can work out (approximate) numbers.
== Background ==
Software Freedom Day is getting a professional makeover this year as
Software Freedom International (SFI), the organisation behind this
annual event, holds their first ever face-to-face board meeting.
The coordination of SFD in previous years has been undertaken by the
board [3], consisting of members in Australia, Pakistan, Nigeria, UK,
Denmark and USA, using IRC and email as their primary means of
communication. Their coordination has supported teams all over the world
in staging their own local events, which vary from giving away FOSS CDs
to staging seminars to demonstrating FOSS to their communities.
After the overwhelming positive response for SFD 2006 (with close to 200
teams from all over the world registered) and the late delivery of
support to some teams, the board has decided to shake things up and
sharpen their strategy for bringing software freedom to the streets.
Part of this has involved restructuring the board to enhance contact
with teams, but we've also decided to sit down together and make some
serious plans to grow SFD and further promote the spread of free software.
The SFI board will be meeting in Oxford from 1 to 3 March, and on our
last day of meetings we wanted to invite members of the local FOSS
communities - or even those just curious about SFD - to come for a few
drinks, some food, and to share your thoughts with us. Please do come
along if you're anywhere near Oxford, and find out about our new ideas
for Software Freedom Day!
Our face-to-face meeting could not take place without the assistance of
OSS Watch [5], the open source advisory service based at the University
of Oxford. Many thanks to them, to our other sponsors, and to the teams
that make SFD worthwhile.
Make sure you have Saturday 15 September in your diaries for Software
Freedom Day 2007, and we hope to see you in person, in Oxford!
Robert.
[1] Freud's website:
http://www.freudliving.co.uk/cgi-bin/shop/page.cgi?user_id=526&file=bars.ht…
[2] Google map to Freud's: http://tinyurl.com/2cenps
[3] SFI board: http://softwarefreedomday.org/sfi
[4] IBM: http://www.ibm.com/
[5] OSS Watch: http://www.oss-watch.ac.uk/
