Announcements

EFF: Unintended Consequences - Twelve Years Under the DMCA

The Electronic Frontier Foundation "celebrates" twelve years of the DMCA with a report listing of the problems which have resulted from that law, and from its anti-circumvention rules in particular. "EFF's report details the numerous harms stemming from the DMCA's ban on circumventing DRM, including Apple's attempts to lock down the iPhone and force users into its App Store. Also new in this year's report is the account of hobbyists threatened by Texas Instruments for blogging about potential modifications to the company's programmable graphing calculators as well as the story behind the legal attacks on Real DVD and other products that create innovative new ways for consumers to enjoy DVD content they have legitimately purchased."

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IIPA aims to put Indonesia on watch list over FOSS

The International Intellectual Property Alliance has issued a special report which puts Indonesia on a priority watch list for, among other things, mandating the use of open-source software in its government. Page 3 of this document [PDF] explains: "While IIPA has no issue with one of the stated goals of the circular, namely, “reducing software copyright violation,” the Indonesian government’s policy as indicated in the circular letter instead simply weakens the software industry and undermines its long-term competitiveness by creating an artificial preference for companies offering open source software and related services, even as it denies many legitimate companies access to the government market. Rather than fostering a system that will allow users to benefit from the best solution available in the market, irrespective of the development model, it encourages a mindset that does not give due consideration to the value to intellectual creations..." (Thanks to Priyadi Iman Nurcahyo).

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FOSS law journal is open to receive submissions

The International Free and Open Source Software Law Review (IFOSS L. Rev. or IFOSSLR) is open for submissions. IFOSSLR is a collaborative legal publication aimed at increasing knowledge and understanding among lawyers about free and open source software. "The topics covered by the publication include copyright, licence implementation, licence interpretation, patents applicable to software and business methods, standards applicable to software, case law, statutory changes, license enforcement, competition law applicable to software, economics analysis, business models and due diligence."

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Novell: Linux finally breaks even (Channel Register)

Channel Register takes a look at Novell's financial results. "As part of its discussion of its financial results for the first quarter of fiscal 2010 ended in January, Dana Russell, chief financial officer at operating system and systems software maker Novell, said that the SUSE Linux business was at break-even, what he called "a significant milestone.""

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Elliott Associates Offers to Buy Novell

The New York Times reports that hedge fund Elliott Associates has made an offer to buy Novell. "Elliott said it would pay $5.75 a share in cash for Novell, a price that is 21 percent higher than Novell's closing stock price on Tuesday. Wall Street's initial response to the bid, announced after the stock market closed, was to anticipate the possibility of a higher offer. Novell's shares jumped $1.32, or nearly 28 percent, to $6.07 in after-hours trading." (Thanks to Jeff Schroeder)

See also: Elliott's press release about the offer. "Over the past several years, the Company has attempted to diversify away from its legacy division with a series of acquisitions and changes in strategic focus that have largely been unsuccessful. As a result, we believe the Company's stock has meaningfully underperformed all relevant indices and peers. With over 33 years of experience in investing in public and private companies and an extensive track record of successfully structuring and executing acquisitions in the technology space, we believe that Elliott is uniquely situated to deliver maximum value to the Company's stockholders on an expedited basis." That suggests some rather significant changes should this deal be accepted.

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LiMo Foundation Seeks Alliance With WAC (InformationWeek)

InformationWeek reports that the LiMo Foundation is seeking a partnership with the Wholesale Applications Community. "In an open letter sent Tuesday, LiMo Foundation executive director Morgan Gillis said the mobile Linux platform group offers its "full support, our committed participation, and our immediate practical assistance" to WAC. Formed last month by 24 operators at the World Mobile Congress, WAC is an effort to build an open platform to deliver mobile phone apps. WAC's members, now numbering 27 mobile industry firms, serve some 3 billion mobile phone users."

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Archos 5 Internet Tablet with Android Review (Anything but ipod)

Not all Android devices are phones: here's an extensive review of the Archos 5 tablet (part 1), (part 2) on the Anything but ipod site. "The Archos 5 Internet Tablet with Android is a very touchy subject for some people as it’s part awesome, part scrap. On one hand, you have excellent hardware (with the exception of the resistive touch screen, which should have been capacitive) and awesome support for video and a giant market of apps to put on it, but on the other hand you have a device that’s so unstable I legiimately wish it had a big giant red reset button on the back instead of a tiny reset hole."

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Microsoft Takes Down Whistleblower Site (Wired)

Wired reports that Microsoft has pulled Cryptome off the net. "Microsoft dropped a DMCA notice alleging copyright infringement on Cryptome’s proprietor John Young on Tuesday after he posted a Microsoft surveillance compliance document that the company gives to law enforcement agents seeking information on Microsoft users. Young filed a counterclaim on Wednesday — arguing he had a fair use to publishing the document, a full day before the Thursday deadline set by his hosting provider, Network Solutions." Wired is also hosting the document in question at the moment.

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Novell flirts with Citrix (Channel Register)

Channel Register discusses a potential partnership between Novell and Citrix. "There has been some chatter about Citrix Systems - the corporate entity behind the open source Xen hypervisor and the commercialized XenServer product - hooking up with commercial Linux distributor Novell to work out some sort of deal to collaborate on Xen in a more meaningful way than they currently do. While the two parties are dancing a little bit closer, Novell is not going to adopt XenServer as its main hypervisor, as some have expected and others, like El Reg, have encouraged."

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Hands-on: Ubuntu goes social, gains Me Menu in 10.04 alpha 3 (ars technica)

Ryan Paul looks at the Me Menu in Ubuntu's Lucid Lynx. "The Me Menu, which Canonical unveiled in December, provides a unified interface for managing your presence on instant messaging and social networking services. A text box that is embedded in the menu allows users to publish status messages to all of their accounts. The menu also provides easy access to the standard account and identity configuration tools."

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How Sun's need to control the code cost them the company (ZDNet)

Jeremy Allison looks back at the demise of Sun Microsystems on ZDNet. "The Solaris operating system, the Java language and virtual machine, the OpenOffice office suite - all of the really large software projects that Sun released - had strings attached that stopped any real external community from forming around the code. Usually it was the demand that any code contributions be contributed directly to Sun for their own use in proprietary products that was the major failing of all the Sun 'community' projects. Poor licensing choices, demands for ownership of all contributors work, ignoring contributors outside of Sun, all of these can be blamed for Sun’s inability to maintain active coding communities around their Open Source code, but in the end it comes down to the desire to maintain control and ownership of the code at all costs. People are smart enough to understand when they’re being taken advantage of, especially programmers."

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Apple files a patent suit against HTC

Apple has announced the filing of a lawsuit against HTC alleging the infringement of 20 of Apple's patents. "'We can sit by and watch competitors steal our patented inventions, or we can do something about it. We've decided to do something about it,' said Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. 'We think competition is healthy, but competitors should create their own original technology, not steal ours.'" The press release does not say whether HTC's Android phones are the ones being targeted here.

Comments (24 posted)

CE Linux Forum Newsletter: February 2010

This issue of the CE Linux Forum Newsletter covers ELC 2010 sessions announced and Registration is Open, 32nd Japan Technical Jamboree, CELF Hardware Donations, and CELF sponsors LWN.net.

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PyCon 2011 - Call for Tutorial Volunteers

Plans for PyCon 2011 in Atlanta have already begun. "The main conference will once again be proceeded by two days of tutorials. There was quite a bit of feedback from students and teachers this year that we want to incorporate in next years classes. In order to do this, more people need to get involved; why not you?"

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Ubuntu 10.10 Developer Summit Announced

Ubuntu community manager Jono Bacon has announced that the Ubuntu Developer Summit for Ubuntu 10.10 is taking place May 10 - 14, 2010 at Dolce La Hulpe Hotel and Resort in Brussels, Belgium. "The Ubuntu Developer Summit one of the most important events in the Ubuntu calendar and at it we discuss, debate and design the next version of Ubuntu. We bring together the entire Canonical development team and sponsor a large number of community members across the wide range of areas in which people contribute to Ubuntu. This includes packaging, translations, documentation, testing, LoCo teams and more. UDS is an incredible experience, filled with smart and enthusiastic people, fast paced and exhausting, but incredibly gratifying to be part of the process that builds the next Ubuntu."

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FSFE proclaims Document Freedom Day 2010

The Free Software Foundation Europe has announced Document Freedom Day 2010 will be held on March 31. "On Document Freedom Day, we will raise awareness for Open Document Formats and Open Standards by organizing activities all over the world together with partner organizations and volunteers. During the whole month of March, we will spread the word on open document formats and Open Standards."

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Day Against DRM: May 4

The Free Software Foundation has announced that May 4, 2010 will be this year's International Day Against Digital Restrictions Management (DRM). "The Day Against DRM will unite a wide range of projects, public interest organizations, web sites and individuals in an effort to raise public awareness to the danger of technology that restricts users' access to movies, music, literature and software; indeed, all forms of digital data. Many DRM schemes monitor a user's activities and report what they see to the corporations that impose the DRM."

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Events: March 11, 2010 to May 10, 2010

The following event listing is taken from the LWN.net Calendar.

Date(s)	Event	Location
March 13 March 19	DebCamp in Thailand	Khon Kaen, Thailand
March 15 March 18	Cloud Connect 2010	Santa Clara, CA, USA
March 16 March 18	Salon Linux 2010	Paris, France
March 17 March 18	Commons, Users, Service Providers	Hannover, Germany
March 19 March 21	Panama MiniDebConf 2010	Panama City, Panama
March 19 March 21	Libre Planet 2010	Cambridge, MA, USA
March 19 March 20	Flourish 2010 Open Source Conference	Chicago, IL, USA
March 22 March 26	CanSecWest Vancouver 2010	Vancouver, BC, Canada
March 22	OpenClinica Global Conference 2010	Bethesda, MD, USA
March 23 March 25	UKUUG Spring 2010 Conference	Manchester, UK
March 25 March 28	PostgreSQL Conference East 2010	Philadelphia, PA, USA
March 26 March 28	Ubuntu Global Jam	Online, World
March 30 April 1	Where 2.0 Conference	San Jose, CA, USA
April 9 April 11	Spanish DebConf	Coruña, Spain
April 10	Texas Linux Fest	Austin, TX, USA
April 12 April 15	MySQL Conference & Expo 2010	Santa Clara, CA, USA
April 12 April 14	Embedded Linux Conference	San Francisco, CA, USA
April 14 April 16	Linux Foundation Collaboration Summit	San Francisco, USA
April 14 April 16	Lustre User Group 2010	Aptos, California, USA
April 16 April 17	R/Finance 2010 Conference - 2nd Annual	Chicago, IL, US
April 16	Drizzle Developer Day	Santa Clara, CA, United States
April 23 April 25	FOSS Nigeria 2010	Kano, Nigeria
April 23 April 25	QuahogCon 2010	Providence, RI, USA
April 24 April 25	OSDC.TW 2010	Taipei, Taiwan
April 24 April 25	BarCamb 3	Cambridge, UK
April 24	Festival Latinoamericano de Instalación de Software Libre	Many, Many
April 24 April 25	Fosscomm 2010	Thessaloniki, Greece
April 24 April 25	LinuxFest Northwest	Bellingham WA, USA
April 24	Open Knowledge Conference 2010	London, UK
April 24 April 26	First International Workshop on Free/Open Source Software Technologies	Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
April 25 April 29	Interop Las Vegas	Las Vegas, NV, USA
April 28 April 29	Xen Summit North America at AMD	Sunnyvale, CA, USA
April 29	Patents and Free and Open Source Software	Boulder, CO, USA
May 1 May 2	OggCamp	Liverpool, England
May 1 May 4	Linux Audio Conference	Utrecht, NL
May 1 May 2	Devops Down Under	Sydney, Australia
May 3 May 7	SambaXP 2010	Göttingen, Germany
May 3 May 6	Web 2.0 Expo San Francisco	San Francisco, CA, USA
May 6	NLUUG spring conference: System Administration	Ede, The Netherlands
May 7 May 9	Pycon Italy	Firenze, Italy
May 7 May 8	Professional IT Community Conference	New Brunswick, NJ, USA

If your event does not appear here, please tell us about it.

LearnUbuntu.com.au

A new website, LearnUbuntu.com.au, is available. The site offers an introduction to Ubuntu and various training options. "If you are considering Ubuntu for your home or office computing requirements, please consider our training and installation packages. Face to face, classroom-style or email based, Jon [Jermey] can provide training to get you up and running faster and much more smoothly."

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FOSDEM 10 videos now available

Video recordings from the Distribution Developer Rooms at FOSDEM 10 are available. "All but two talks were recorded and are available in Ogg Theora+Vorbis format, in low-bandwidth (~300 kbit/s) and high-bandwidth (~1.5 Mbit/s) versions. These recordings should also be available later on the FOSDEM YouTube channel."

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