The Icelandic government has released a policy on free and open source software. In short, the policy states that when buying software free and open source software should be considered on an equal footing with proprietary software, that software based on open standards shall be chosen, that lock-ins to specific vendors should be avoided (choosing free software is one means to achieve this), that bespoke or customized software shall be reusable (and free and open source software achieves this), and finally that students of Icelandic educational institutes shall have the opportunity to learn about and use free and open source software on a par with proprietary software.

This policy applies to all state institutions and organizations operated with public funds.

The San Francisco Committee on Information Technology has published a new software evaluation policy that requires departments of the city government to consider open source software solutions alongside proprietary commercial offerings.

We free software advocates surely know that, no matter what we say or how we say it, some people have to or (if you prefer) simply want to use proprietary software for one reason or another - and that's even when they've heard and understood everything we have to say on the matter.

"...Free Software is really something to get excited about. Through the community created by GNU Generation, hopefully that excitement will persevere through the years to come. Unfortunately, it will take more than just a small little campaign to make this happen. It will take the cooperation of all Free Software users, developers, and advocates to really get the message across.

What worries free software advocates is that their software can be enhanced without sharing the source, if the software is hidden behind a web interface. I claimed that this is not really a threat to the free software movement...

The free software community understands that free software gives the user more freedom than proprietary software. Proprietary software confines its users, prohibits them from making changes that would allow everyone to benefit, etc. Free software advocates (myself included) have a habit of claiming that using free (libre) software means the same thing as having freedom.

"Despite the considerable advances that the free software has made in the last years in its «market share» in different fields in informatics, only in a few of this fields free software has the supremacy. One of these is the field of web servers.

The Free Software Foundation will host a mini-summit on Women in Free Software to discuss how the free software community can cultivate and increase participation by women in free software's development and activism communities.

Free software is definitely going strong in some areas, especially in the server market. However, there are other areas where free software and free protocols have failed. Internet based voice and video communication is one of those areas.