Seminar calls for the protection of internet freedom

The IT (Intermediaries Guidelines) Rules, drafted to protect intermediaries, now appear to be a tool that can be used to harass them.

-T. K. RAJALAKSHMI

On May 3, a cross-section of politicians and representatives of some of the intermediary groups met to discuss the rules and the annulment motion. It was surprising that barring Rajeev and a few others, those who met had little knowledge of and little interest in the clauses in the rules and were rather wary of the powers of the cyber world. There was admittedly confusion among political parties, not because they do not support ideas of freedom of expression but because, it was apparent, they had not studied the matter enough.

While the representatives of the ruling party and the Bharatiya Janata Party clearly had not studied the aspect thoroughly and sought more clarity on the problems with the guidelines, Rajeev got support from his Rajya Sabha colleague Rajeev Chandrasekhar, an independent member, who endorsed his views on the matter. He appeared to have studied the issue in detail. He was emphatic that the background of these rules was in the context of the Jan Lokpal and anti-corruption movement. He made it clear that he was not against rules and regulations though, in his opinion, these particular rules were not workable.

Death Of Freedom in the Virtual World

    On 11th April 2011, the Government notified the new Information Technology (Intermediaries Guidelines) Rules, 2011 prescribing various guiding principles to be observed by all Internet related companies.

    The Government has exceeded the mandate given to it by the Parliament in formulating these rules. These rules give the Government a free pass to censor Facebook posts, listen to every Skype conversation, monitor tweets or blogs or access private photographs and documents stored online, track location using mobile phones or track any online activity. This will lead to a clamp down on the freedom of speech and expression, adversely affect the right to privacy of citizens and hamper the growth of Internet and the related industries in India.

   Mr. P. Rajeeve, Member of Parliament has moved an annulment motion to get these rules abolished. This motion has been admitted and will be coming up for discussion before the Rajya Sabha soon.

   Free Software Movement of India along with Knowledge Commons, and Software Freedom Law Center, India invite you to a meeting to be held on May 3, 2012 from 6PM to 8 PM at the Dy. Chairman Hall, Constitution Club on this issue. We request your presence at the event and also your support for the annulment motion when it comes up for discussion in the parliament.

Govt of TN should stop moving in retrograde direction!

Submitted by admin on Mon, 03/12/2012 - 16:12

The recent understanding between Microsoft Inc and the Tamil Nadu government following a meeting between Mr. Jean Philippe Courtois, President, Microsoft Inc and Chief Minister J.Jayalalithaa as reported in the media is a cause for concern to all the democratic minded people of the country. The understanding which as stated “envisions” further investments by Microsoft in the fields of education, e-governance and cloud computing comes even as other States in India and many other countries in this world are moving away from the proprietary models of software in these fields propogated by Microsoft and adopting free software. This move entails in the colonisation of the indian minds and the technology subservient to the proprietary systems.

Richard Stallman's visit to Chennai

RMS in Chennai

Dr. Richard. M. Stallman, founder of the Free Software Foundation, addressed a mammoth gathering at IIT-Madras on Monday, February 6, 2012. Speaking on the topic 'Free Software, Freedom and Education' in front of an audience of at least 3,000 students, teachers and activists, Dr. Stallman elaborated on a variety of topics including the history of the free software movement, the difference between free software and open source software and the dangers of proprietary software. Dr. Stallman was also very firm on the negative impact of social networking and the retrogressive role of mega corporations in stalling open access to knowledge. The previous night, during an interaction with FSFTN volunteers, he was very critical of the Tamil Nadu government 's scheme to distribute Windows Starter Edition to college students, an issue on which FSFTN has conducted a campaign with students and teachers. Students from nearly 25 colleges attended the function, in many cases coming from considerable distances in buses. About 30 students from different colleges formed part of the volunteer committee that worked closely to facilitate the smooth arrival and departure of the participants. There was also a considerable interest from participants in Community Computing Centre project.

Future of internet looks bleak with..SOPA/PIPA-RMS

RMS at the Seminar

Swecha, has organised a talk on Internet Freedom in the context of SOPA/PIPA by Dr.Richard Stallman, founder of FSF. He is also the initiator of GNU project and he is the man behind the emacs editor and GNU Compiler Collection, GCC. The talk that was well attended by around 1500 people from the industry and academia from all across the state. RMS spoke on the importance of free software and evolution of the free software movement.

Industry, academics and research have achieved rapid progress in the past two decades largely owing to the availability of knowledge on internet. However, the introduction of bills such as SOPA/PIPA makes the future of internet bleak.This was the essence of Dr.Stallman's lecture who also spoke about the necessity of knowledge being free from any shackles. Software being a knowledge in itself should also be free.

Dr.Stallman said censorship of any kind as tyranny and all those who are  for the freedom of internet should fight any attempts aimed at stiffling free speech and access to knowledge.

Report Of Panel Discussion On IT Rules

A panel discussion on Information Technology Act rules was held at Sundarayya Vignana Kendram on March 31st , 2012. Prof. Madabushi Sreedhar, NALSAR, speaking in the discussion criticized the Information Technology Act rules (IT rules) which make even the “intermediaries” responsible for the user generated content. Mishi Choudhary, Executive Director, Software Freedom Law Center, has thrown light on the technicalities IT rules. Intermediaries which help the internet reach the common people cannot be made responsible for the user generated content, she said. Mishi, commenting on the pre-censorship of user generated content has taken an example where a site like www.youtube.com, around 72 hours of video is uploaded per minute and urged the government to consider its feasibility. And if such practices are taken forward, internet would cease to exist in the current form, she added.

Membership campaign of DAKF inaugurated.

The membership campaign of the Democratic Alliance for Knowledge Freedom (DAKF) was inaugurated by Dr B. Ekbal, by giving the first membership to Dr Achyuth Sankar on 14th Feb 2010 at Press Club Auditorium, Thiruvananthapuaram. Speaking in the seminar that followed, on the subject “The control of Social Networking Media – Realities and Reactions” Dr B. Ekbal elicited the significance of DAKF in the context of commercialisation of knowledge and technology. Speaking on the occasion, Dr Achuth Sankar (*Director of State Inter University Centre of Excellence for Bioinformatics*) stated the importance of free media and freedom of speech. If the controlling aspect of the social networking media is largely meant to evade criticism against the government, then the whole process is objectionable. The contribution of social networking media in solving and interpreting the social and ethnic issues in and around the world is enormous. Architect Padmasree G Sankar, Pu Ka Sa General Secretary Prof V. N. Murali, Kerala University Syndicate Member Dr. P. S. Sreekala also participated in the Seminar. DAKF State Secretary Dr M. R. Baiju delivered the welcome address and DAKF Thiruvananthapuram Dist Secretary T. Gopakumar delivered the vote of thanks.

FSMI on Open Standards in eGovernance

Free Software Movement of India congratulates the FOSS community of India on its victory in acheiving an Open Standards Policy by the Government of India. The continuous debate on the draft policy and vigilant persuasion by the community has finally paid off.

The community should now focus on sensitizing the various government departments and organisations towards compliance to these standards and implementing alternative solutions. We should extend support upto the local government bodies in identifying non-compliant solutions and deploying solutions as per the Open Standards Policy.

We should look forward to foster an environment where the country's technology graduates can be employed for engineering free alternatives in the light of the great demand for solutions that this change in policy will bring forward.

This policy should be showcased as not only a success story of a vibrant Free Software community but also as a benchmark for other government departments in our country and for other countries as well.

FSMI was quoted by The Hindu in this article as:

Speech By Dr.A.P.J.Abdul Kalam at NCAR 2010

Former President Dr. A.P.J Abdul Kalam

I am delighted to inaugurate the National Convention for Academics and Research – 2010 on “Computing Freedom for Technology, Education and Research” being organized by the Free Software Movement of India (FSMI) at IIIT, Hyderabad. I am happy to know that this First NCAR 2010 is being organized for spreading awareness of Free/Libre and Open Source Software (FOSS/FLOSS), and provide a platform for sharing of experiences and views in its use in Academia/Research Communities and to Foster a collaborate approach to education in developing and improving educational aids including software tools.

I am happy that the convention is focusing on wide range of topics through dedicated track sessions on academic and research areas like scientific computing and visualization, embedded technologies, Networking and Security, Cloud computing, to Indian Language technologies and application specific domains of Mobile, GIS...

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Workshop for Academicians at BVSR Engg College

Venue: 

BVSR Engineering College, Chimakurthy, Prakasam Dist.

Event Date: 

18th Nov 2010

BVSR Engineering College, Chimakurthy (Prakasam Dist.), will be organzing a one day workshop on "Computing Freedom in Engineering Education – A Free Software Perspective" in association with Swecha. The workshop aims at sensitizing academicians and Post Graduate students about Free Software and the research opportunities in the domain of Free Software. It will show a path for the researchers to think innovatively and to collaborate for the demand for indigenious research in FOSS (Free/Open Source Software).

Topics Covered by the Workshop:

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