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Read and share online: https://www.fsf.org/blogs/community/everything-you-need-to-know-about-libreplanet-2020-now-fully-online
Dear LibrePlanet visitor,
It's been a bumpy road, but in just three days, LibrePlanet 2020
will continue -- now online-only for the first time, and via a
fully free streaming setup. We are excited to hear from our fantastic
speakers and connect with the global free software community. Read on
to see how you can participate!
As a reminder, we have canceled all in-person events associated with
LibrePlanet 2020. This includes the "extracurricular" events like the
Free Software Foundation (FSF) office open house, as well as the women
and nonbinary dinner.
In the interest of everyone's health, even if you are in Boston, we
ask that you do not visit the FSF office unless you make specific
advance arrangements with us (such as for streaming your talk). We
normally pride ourselves on welcoming visitors year-round, so this is
hard for us, too, but we appreciate your understanding.
How to watch online
Our tech team will be working tirelessly during the entire conference
to make the online experience of the event as smooth as
possible. Bookmark the libreplanet.org/2020/live page as your
starting point.
The schedule for the online conference will be sticking as
closely to the original schedule as possible, with some variation due
to speaker availability and technical requirements -- only this time,
instead of speaking from Boston, talks will be delivered from all over
the "libre" planet! Thankfully, barring any last-minute complications,
we still anticipate our three exciting keynote speeches, with
presentations by Internet Archive founder Brewster Kahle, Public
Lab co-founder Shannon Dosemagen, and a panel of young
hackers talking about their interpretations of the conference's
"Free the Future" theme. You also won't want to miss the announcement
of this year's Free Software Award winners on Saturday evening.
Please note that the United States has just transitioned into Daylight
Saving Time (DST), which may have put us an hour further away from
your region. All times listed in the schedule are given in terms of
the UTC−04:00 timezone.
Audience participation
As in past years, remote participation will be facilitated via the
timeless IRC communication platform, but our plans are expanding this
year, as we expect increased virtual participation from both viewers
and speakers. IRC will enable you to mingle with other LibrePlanet
participants, and will allow even more attendees to participate in
each session's Q&A section, since an FSF staff member or volunteer
will be present for every session to collect questions from the chat,
and relay them to our speakers (assuming the speaker provides time for
questions). FSF staff and volunteers will also be present to ensure
that the online conference adheres to the Safe Space Policy.
As people have already become familiar with them and to prevent any
confusion, we are keeping the planned channel names, which were named
for the rooms in the venue we had intended to use. After all, everyone
can appreciate "freedom!"
You can participate in the LibrePlanet IRC chat by joining one of the
following channels, all on the Freenode network.
- General: #libreplanet
- Back Bay Grand Ballroom: #libreplanet_room_grand
- Patriot Room: #libreplanet_room_patriot
- Freedom Room: #libreplanet_room_freedom
Lightning talks
One good thing about moving the conference to cyberspace is the
increased opportunity it gives us for lightning talks! We'll be able
to accept prerecorded lightning talks this year, giving you an
opportunity to give the world a (brief!) introduction to your favorite
free software project, or your free software-related ideas and
obsessions.
Lightning talks can be submitted following the instructions we
posted. In order to ensure that our schedule stays on track, you must
keep your talk below five minutes in length. To keep LibrePlanet
memorable and engaging, we also ask that any prerecorded talks be
videos that were recorded for the purpose of LibrePlanet streaming,
and not be videos of talks you have given at other conferences or
events.
Social media
Are you on GNU social, Mastodon, Diaspora, or another microblogging
platform? Please post I'm watching #LibrePlanet online! at
https://u.fsf.org/live, and share your experience.
We will be posting continual updates throughout both days of the
conference. Follow the Free Software Foundation on these microblog
services:
You can also find us on Twitter at twitter.com/fsf -- to read about
why we use Twitter, but only with caveats, see fsf.org/twitter.
Support the FSF by buying LibrePlanet T-shirts and other gear
We're going to have to forego the famous GNU Press merchandise table
this year, but you'll still be able to order as many shirts, scarves,
books, and sundry items as you like from the FSF's online
shop. From there, you can get your souvenir shirt commemorating
the first ever fully online LibrePlanet. If you have
pre-purchased a LibrePlanet 2020 T-shirt, expect to hear from us
soon. Your purchases are key to funding LibrePlanet and the rest of
the FSF's work.
In previous years, conference attendees have also been able to buy
raffle tickets at the GNU Press table to win great freedom-respecting
prizes. This year we were generously donated prizes by our in-kind
sponsors. While we won't be able to hold a raffle online this
year, we will be announcing a chance for you to win prizes next
week. Stay tuned!
Requesting a registration fee refund
If you're not an FSF associate member, it's likely that you paid
for a conference registration. Before requesting a refund, we ask that
you keep in mind that the FSF is a nonprofit with a social mission,
and canceling an event the size of LibrePlanet places a large
financial and administrative burden on us. Please consider using the
price of your admission as a donation to the FSF to show your support.
At the same time, we understand that the conference you paid to attend
is no longer happening in the same way. If you would like to request a
refund, please email your request to [email protected]
We look forward to seeing you online this year's LibrePlanet!
Zoë Kooyman
Program Manager
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