The adoption of free software by governments, especially in Brazil, is starting to show us the trajectory of a migration that is not only about changing from one software to another or just saving money, but a wide-reaching cultural shift.
Read more »Expresso Livre: an example of community/government free software collaboration in Latin America
Software libre conquista América Latina!
If you can read Spanish, the Madrid-based newspaper Público has come out with a nice article which surveys the Latin American open source movement: Linux conquista América Latina.
Read more »Open Sustainability Network Event in San Francisco, this weekend
North by South will be participating in the Open Sustainability Network camp in San Francisco this weekend. OSNCamp is “a BarCamp style conference about free content and knowledge sharing in sustainability, international development, appropriate technology and solutions to poverty.”
It will be happening this weekend, October 18-19, at San Francisco State University.
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Venezuela adopts ODF as a national standard
"Speaking at the Second ODF Workshop in Pretoria, South Africa, yesterday, Carlos Gonzalez of the National Center of Information Technologies, announced that the Venezuelan government had formally adopted ODF as a standard for the ‘processing, exchange and storage of documents’.” Venezuela joins a number of other countries who have adopted this open standard, along with Brazil, Uruguay, Sout
Read more »SERPRO chooses Debian GNU/Linux
Brazilian state IT company SERPRO (US$ 1 billion annual revenue) has selected Debian GNU/Linux as their preferred distribution for its thousands of GNU/Linux development and production servers. The announcement occurred during Debian Day in Porto Alegre.
Read more »Improving the democratic process with free software e-voting
As countries around the world modernize their public elections process, the big problem with electronic voting machines is that the market is moving slow to provide equipment which fulfills all of the requirements for a fully democratic election. In many cases, printed proof of a citizen’s vote is still needed, in case the machine has buggy software or if there is suspicion of fraud.
Read more »Brazil begins using the Open Document Format
The Brasília Protocol (now translated to English) started the process of implementation of the Open Document Format (ODF) within the Brazilian Government.
Read more »Interview with Daniel Oliveira from the UTUTO project in Argentina
The UTUTO Project is a non-profit volunteer organization that incubates other free software/knowledge projects from Argentina. They maintain a GNU/Linux distribution all translated to Spanish, they keep their own packages repository and you can search for packages on their site. The UTUTO community also maintains various documentation projects as well as a multimedia server.
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BrOffice, the Brazilian OpenOffice, with a life of its own
Continuing our series of bringing information about the free software movement in Latin America to English readers, North by South interviewed Cláudio Filho (original in Portuguese), one of the people responsible for starting the OpenOffice.org project in Brazil (pt-BR), known in the country as BrOffice.org.
Read more »Microsoft corrupts the ISO
RMS: « Microsoft consummated its corruption of the International Standards Organization, which dismissed an appeal by several countries against the approval of OOXML.
Read more »Free Software movement fights to keep internet freedom in Brazil
"A proposed new law that restricts the freedom internet use in Brazil has already passed the Senate and is dangerously close to going on the books [...] The Free Software movement from Brazil is striking up against this project and they have a petition online against it.
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The ISO Document: Brazil's Appeal and ISO/IEC's Attachments 1 and 2 - as text
Thanks to Groklaw's Steve Martin, we have Brazil's appeal against the approval of OOXML as an ISO standard, as text. It begins on page 11 of the ISO document [PDF] Groklaw published Wednesday, the recommendation memo to the TMB to toss the four appeals in the garbage. The memo lists Alan Bryden, Secretary-General and CEO, ISO, and Aharon Amit, General Secretary and CEO, IEC, as the authors.
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A Reminder: ISO's Code of Ethics and What Happens Next
Now that there have been at least three official appeals filed against OOXML, by South Africa, Brazil and India, as well as a letter of protest from a participant entity at the BRM over the way matters were handled in Denmark, I thought this might be an excellent time to take a moment and remind ISO of its published Code of Ethics [PDF].
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India Appeals Against OOXML, Joining Brazil, South Africa, Maybe More
3 nations (at least) are already confirmed to have appealed against ISO's decision
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Slashdot: World’s Third-Largest Population Appeals ISO’s Decision
Slashdot seems to suggest that Brazil filed an appeal against OOXML (ISO's decision on it) after all.
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