RMS gave his speech "Logiciels Libres & Éducation" at the Université de Bretagne Occidentale's Guilcher amphitheatre in Brest, France, on May 12th, 2015, twenty years after his first visit to the city, to an audience of over five hundred people.

(Photos under CC BY-SA 3.0 and courtesy of Romain Heller.)

He was also in Greece later in May, to speak:

…at CommonsFest in Athens on May 16th,

(Photos under CC BY-SA 3.0 and courtesy of dkoukoul.)

…at the Lecture Hall of Natural History Museum of Crete, in Heraklion, on May 22nd,

(Photos under CC BY-SA 3.0 and courtesy of dkoukoul.)

…and at the Technical University of Crete (speech available in Ogg Vorbis and WebM formats), in Chania, on May 27th.

(Photos under CC BY-SA 3.0 and courtesy of the Technical University of Crete.)

Please fill out our contact form, so that we can inform you about future events in and around Brest, Athens, and Heraklion and Chania. Please see www.fsf.org/events for a full list of all of RMS's confirmed engagements and contact rms-assist@gnu.org if you'd like him to come speak.

Thank you to everyone who helped make this tour a success!

We've been warning against the threat presented by the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations, particularly over the past few months, given that time is running out to stop it. For the uninitiated, TPP is a secret treaty that would trap participating countries into laws that lock users down with DRM, software patents, and perpetual copyright restrictions. TPP will also give corporations the power to interfere with local policy decisions by suing governments if they try to pass any laws or regulations that protect users. The danger is particularly imminent in the U.S., where Congress is readying to grant the Obama administration Trade Promotion Authority (TPA), meaning that they would be giving up their right and duty to review and amend the worst parts of the eventual treaty before the terms of the deal have even been publicly released. The final vote in the Senate is set for tomorrow, June 24th, so today may be the last chance to stop TPA. That is why we've been pushing users here in the States so hard to fight back now. But the harm caused by granting TPA unfortunately isn't limited to what is hidden within the pages of TPP. Once granted, TPA lasts for years and would enable the same abrogation of duty when it comes to two other secret, international negotiations: the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) and Trade In Services Agreement (TISA).

TTIP is in many respects similar to TPP, and covers much of the same ground. But, whereas TPP covers agreements between the U.S. and many Asian countries, TTIP address similar issues between the U.S. and the European Union. Some documents have been made public for these negotiations, though the actual negotiation texts for the copyright and patents chapter is notably still secret. Despite that, we can still draw some disturbing conclusions. Like TPP, TTIP would grant proprietary developers supra-national power to interfere with local laws and policies in the form of investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS). TTIP also has provisions about software patents that could lock the U.S. and EU into their current terrible situation. Trying to end software patents locally is difficult enough already, but if TTIP passes, for signatory countries there may not be any way out. Ever fond of secrecy, the negotiators for TTIP are pushing a possible expansion of penalties relating to trade secrets.

TISA has the potential for the most widespread impact, with Europe, the U.S., and many more countries negotiating in secret. A recent leak included a particularly nefarious term: a prohibition on governmental mandates for free software. Article 6 states that "No Party may require the transfer of, or access to, source code of software owned by a person of another Party, as a condition of providing services related to such software in its territory." Governments around the world have come to understand the importance of free software to ensuring a free society. Many governments have chosen to mandate the use of free software in their offices and in their software service contracts. Ensuring that government-used and -purchased software is free for anyone to review, share, and modify promotes the safety and security of the people. TISA would stop governments all around the world from putting into action their dedication to the principles of free software.

Even if Article 6 were modified or interpreted more narrowly to allow free software mandates, it would still be extremely problematic. Even if the section is simply meant to prevent governments from demanding source from proprietary developers as part of their contracts, it would still leave the same holes in security that only access to source can provide. Even if a government isn't able to use free software in a particular instance, it should still be able to demand that source code be given to the government to ensure that the code has no back doors or vulnerabilities. Furthermore, the government should still be able to review source to handle bug fixes or make the software compatible with other systems; governments shouldn't be beholden to a single company for support and customization of the software they pay for with tax dollars.

TPP, TTIP, and TISA all include the U.S. as a bargaining nation, meaning that the deal on Trade Promotion Authority being negotiated in the Senate right now could fast track all of them this week. But there are other agreements that are as nefarious and must be stopped with the same urgency. Case in point: the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) between Canada and the EU. Like the other agreements, CETA has terrible provisions, including a copyright extension and anti-circumvention provisions for Canada. While the text is now public, that publication came only after negotiations were complete.

While each of these agreements varies the trouble they would implement slightly, they are all being negotiated in secret, and for good reason: if people knew what was in them, they would fight back. And that's exactly what we must do. These agreements are being put together with tons of input from corporations and trade groups who seek to benefit from the restrictions these treaties will implement. The people they will control are not welcome at the table, but we still have a voice. Now is the time to speak up and let the leaders in every country subject to these negotiations know that these bargains made in the shadows must be brought into the light to die.

The time to fight back is now. Here is how you can help:

• If you only have a moment to help, please spread the word by sharing this article with your friends, or microblogging the following:

I oppose secret international trade agreements in all forms. Protect free software by stopping #TTP #TTIP and #TISA (shortened link to article)

Note that if you use Twitter for microblogging, you can do so in a way that avoids using proprietary software.

• If you are in the US, join EFF's action and write to your representatives telling them not to grant Trade Promotion Authority, and that you oppose these secret negotiations. EFF's action uses the free software tool Phantom of the Capitol. Today may be your last chance to stop TPA.

• If you live in Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, or Vietnam, contact your local representative and let them know you oppose TPP.

• If you live in the European Union, contact your local representative and let them know you oppose TTIP, TISA, and CETA.

• If you live in Australia, Canada, Chile, Hong Kong, Iceland, Israel, Japan, South Korea, Liechtenstein, New Zealand, Norway, Switzerland, Taiwan, Uruguay, Colombia, Costa Rica, Mexico, Panama, Peru, Turkey, Pakistan, or Paraguay contact your local representative and let them know you oppose TISA.

• Canadian users should likewise contact their representatives to demand an out from CETA.

• Support our work representing you in this area by becoming an FSF member or making a donation.

Last summer, I worked for ThinkPenguin, where I gained a much greater appreciation for the history of free software. I'm currently studying Free and Secure Computing at Hampshire College, where I also lead LibreHamp (the free software student group) and write for a free speech publication called The Omen.

Every day it seems, I find a new place where digital technology exists that it didn't before. As this influx of the digital realm into our physical world continues, I find it increasingly worrisome that many people don't know – or even care to know – who actually controls the technology they regularly interact with. The FSF informs users about the importance of free software better than any other organization I am aware of, and for that reason, I feel very honored to have been chosen as a summer intern. I'm particularly excited to working on the Email Self-Defense project, which will give me the opportunity to promote free software and computer security awareness together.

If you would like to contact me, you can find me on freenode IRC as jupelluri. Of course, my preferred method of communication is encrypted email. The aforementioned guide is a great place to start if you're new to GnuPG. If you would like to send me some encrypted love mail, my email is adaml@fsf.org, and my fingerprint is 9D7E D11A F670 9719 F854 A307 198C 9A1E 9309 EF0C.

Join the FSF and friends on Friday, June 19th, from 2pm to 5pm EDT (19:00 to 22:00 UTC) to help improve the Free Software Directory by adding new entries and updating existing ones. We will be on IRC in the #fsf channel on freenode.

Tens of thousands of people visit directory.fsf.org each month to discover free software. Each entry in the Directory contains a wealth of useful information, from basic category and descriptions, to providing detailed info about version control, IRC channels, documentation, and licensing info that has been carefully checked by FSF staff and trained volunteers.

While the Free Software Directory has been and continues to be a great resource to the world over the past decade, it has the potential of being a resource of even greater value. But it needs your help!

If you are eager to help and you can't wait or are simply unable to make it onto IRC on Friday, our participation guide will provide you with all the information you need to get started on helping the Directory today!

We recently updated our list of various licenses and comments about them to include the Historical Permission Notice and Disclaimer(HPND). The HPND is a simple permissive license, compatible with all versions of the GPL. The HPND is actually more of a template, allowing developers to select a few options, such as whether to include a disclaimer. Variations on this license had actually been approved previously (such as the old license of Python), but it never had its own entry in the list. While at this point HPND is largely deprecated in favor of more modern lax licenses, you can still find it on some current projects, and kicking around inside some long-running projects that include code created back when it was more prevalent. As such, we wanted to include it on the list explicitly, to help clear up any confusion regarding whether this simple license was free software.