20 September 2008

This is a blog item that needs to be converted to the new Bliki format

Celebrating Freedom

This Saturday, September 20th, there will be worldwide events to celebrate free software. As you can see from the map of events, there are hundreds of happenings at locations across all continents, including the humble Devonport, NZ - a reported stronghold of Organic Design supporters! Teams that registered early could request numerous give-aways, which were donated by the sponsors (nice to see some sizable "corporates" amongst them!) and distributed by the Software Freedom Day (SFD) organisers. A wiki is being used to coordinate the event, it has a very comprehensive instruction manual for running an event and a blog section for frequent updates in various languages.

The organisation and structure of the event itself can be seen as an expression of free software ideals; it is an example of people coming together around the world to celebrate one of our most basic and treasured ideals - that of freedom. The resources supplied on the wiki include marketing material in open formats and some loose guidelines, such as agreeing to keep things positive, rather than bashing certain corporations which shall remain unnamed:-) The event has been held for several years and is growing in size every time. At SFD 2007, there were over 330 teams registered, this year there are over 500! Kudos to the organisers and the army of enthusiasts and of course the sponsors, for doing the right thing.

Some of us will be doing a stall at Wharf IT, a local affiliated business, to show what can be done with free software. There will be public software demonstrations and people will be able to take home various Linux distributions on DVD or memory stick; we will also cater to Mac and Windows users.

So help us make this a big day, it is not too late to register a team and of course you can always support your local team by showing up at the event!

• Here is the official website of SFD
• The team page for Devonport