Brad Kuhn, VP of the Free Software Foundation

Paul Tjapkes ptjapkes at email.com
Fri Apr 19 12:37:44 CDT 2002


The Calvin College computer science club is hosting a presentation by bkuhn (thanks Poling).  Some of us are already going, and this is open to everyone.  Details below:

----

Abstraction is pleased to have Brad Kuhn, VP of the Free Software
Foundation, come and speak at Calvin College. All are invited to this
event on Wednesday, April 24 at 3:30 in the Calvin Commons Lecture Hall.

The topic for his speech will be "Software Freedom and the GNU
Generation." It will last approximately two hours. An abstract for the
topic is attached to the bottom of this message.

For those of you that aren't familiar with the FSF and GNU:

"The GNU Project was launched in 1984 to develop a complete Unix-like
operating system which is free software: the GNU system. Variants of the
GNU operating system, which use the kernel Linux, are now widely used;
though these systems are often referred to as ``Linux'', they are more
accurately called GNU/Linux systems."

http://www.gnu.org/
http://www.gnu.org/gnu/thegnuproject.html

Please forward this along to anyone that may be interested.



Abstract:

Software Freedom, the GNU Generation, and the GNU General Public License

------------------------------------------------------------------------

In this talk, I introduce the issues of software freedom, copyleft, and
the history and future of the Free Software Movement to an audience that
is generally familiar with computer software.  (The talk is geared
towards computer users, but developers will not be bored.) I discuss in
detail the most popular copyleft license, the GNU General Public License
(GPL), and introduce its advantages for users, programmers, and
businesses.

In contrast to the talks given by the free software supporters who
founded the community (such as Richard Stallman), this talk comes from
the perspective of someone who came of age in the Free Software Movement
after the early work was complete.  Thus, this talk addresses the "GNU
generation"---those of us who learned of free software only after
GNU/Linux systems were beginning to become popular.

In particular, I address the stark contrast of two existing worlds in
the software industry: the developers of proprietary software and the
developers of free software.  As someone who has lived in both of these
worlds, I speak with some authority about the terrible challenges and
drawbacks faced in the proprietary software realm, and how the free
software community has overcome them by giving the same freedom to all
users, whether they program often, occasionally, or not at all.  I
explain how one specific copyleft software license, the GNU GPL, has
worked to ensure freedom while creating a thriving user, developer and
business community.

Finally, I discuss the great challenges that we, the Free Software
Movement, face in the years ahead.  Too often, people assume that since
the job of writing a core operating system is done (namely, GNU/Linux
and emerging GNU/HURD systems) that there is nothing left for the Free
Software Movement to do.  I dispell this misconception by giving
real-world examples where we face challenges today.  I also identify
dangerous trends that indicate challenges that we may face in the
future.

This talk takes approximately two hours, which leaves some time for a
question and answer session.
-- 

_______________________________________________
Sign-up for your own FREE Personalized E-mail at Email.com
http://www.email.com/?sr=signup




More information about the grand-rapids-pm-announce mailing list