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Read and share online: https://www.fsf.org/blogs/community/will-you-support-user-freedom-by-helping-reach-our-membership-goal-before-december-31

Dear Free Software Supporter,

This year end, we are focusing on growing the community further, with a goal of gaining 500 new associate members before December 31st. The deadline is only one day away—or, depending on where you are located, today!—and we are not there yet. We need your support to reach—and hopefully exceed—this goal. The more members we can count, the better equipped we are to defend #UserFreedom, and educate people about its importance. Below is a message from our president, Geoffrey Knauth, reflecting on the FSF's mission to protect software users everywhere.

We're so grateful for your commitment to free software. If you can afford to, we hope you'll consider helping us even more, by turning this commitment into an associate membership for just as little as $10 per month ($5 for students), or $120 per year. You can also help bring us one step closer to software freedom by sharing your commitment, along with this article, with people in your community and on your social media using the #UserFreedom hashtag. By inspiring others to join, we can continue to help computer users find freedom everywhere.


Since its founding, the Free Software Foundation (FSF) and thousands of volunteers have worked hard to make computing safe for users, liberating them to learn the best of the arts of computer science from each other and to share freely their creations, while protecting users from exploitative licenses and intrusions of governments and corporations that put their interests ahead of your computing freedom.

In 2021, it became very clear that people in the free software community care deeply about the values enshrined in the FSF mission and the four freedoms. And this level of engagement requires improved governance from the Board of Directors in the form of visibility in our decision-making, and mechanisms that encourage members to discuss and advance candidates for selection to the board. The structure up to now has been too opaque. Consequently, the board has worked very hard this year with outside experts to bring FSF associate members more transparency and give them a voice in governance going forward. Besides what we've already announced, more details will be coming soon.

In anticipation of the release of a formal process for proposing board candidates, you can already start to think about people in the free software community whom you admire and why. Ask them if they would like to be part of the future governance of the FSF. If those people are interested, FSF associate members will be able to nominate them. We must do this now, so that the Foundation can continue to protect computer users' freedom far into the future.

Imagine a world in which only governments and corporations have a say in how you, the individual, use your own computer. I don't think you want that particularly limited future for yourself or your children. The FSF helps give voice to the individual who wants protection in the form of rights, status, and freedom in computing. We rely on your participation and support.

In the spirit of holiday cheer, doing something for software freedom can be as small as voicing your support for someone, or a group of people, who have made your life better through a software package they developed. Consider starting the new year by sending them some cheer via a thank you note for the work they do.

As 2021 comes to a close, please also consider supporting the FSF, so that our hard-working and dedicated staff may continue the work they do behind the scenes to secure freedom-preserving infrastructure, develop and promote advocacy, and deliver services to you. Along with the developers of free software, our staff are often the unsung heroes. They are dedicated, smart, wise and considerate. I wish them a free and Happy New Year just as much as I do you.

Be well and be free,

Geoff Knauth
President