*Please consider adding <[email protected]> to your address book, which
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*Read and share online: <[link removed]>*

Welcome to the *Free Software Supporter*, the Free Software
Foundation's (FSF) monthly news digest and action update -- being read
by you and 230,313 other activists. That's 462 more than last month!

### LibrePlanet 2023: Let's chart the course together! Submit your session by November 2

*From September 14*

We are proud to announce the fifteenth edition of the Free Software
Foundation's conference on ethical technology and user freedom, which
will be held in spring 2023, both online and in the Boston area (exact
venue to be determined). In these fifteen years, LibrePlanet has
always been a community that brings together concerned users of all
varieties to carve out the direction of software freedom for today as
well as for years to come. The call for sessions is now open and will
close on November 2, 2022. Potential talks should examine free
software through the lens of the theme "Charting the Course."

* <[link removed]>
* <[link removed]>

## TABLE OF CONTENTS

* Free Software Awards: Nominate those who have charted a course to freedom by November 30
* Interview with Martin Dougiamas of Moodle
* Wrapping up ten years of GNU Guix in Paris
* Study of electronic monitoring smartphone apps confirms advocates' concerns of privacy harms
* The ungodly surveillance of anti-porn 'shameware' apps
* Draft EU *AI Act* regulations could have a chilling effect on free software
* *Ada & Zangemann* ready to pre-order in English
* Nextcloud works with governments to create MS Office replacement for the EU
* September GNU Emacs news
* Join the FSF and friends in updating the Free Software Directory
* LibrePlanet featured resource: Lightning talks for LibrePlanet 2023
* September GNU Spotlight with Amin Bandali: Seventeen new GNU releases!
* FSF and other free software events
* Thank GNUs!
* GNU copyright contributions
* Translations of the *Free Software Supporter*
* Take action with the FSF!

View this issue online here: <[link removed]>

Encourage your friends to subscribe and help us build an audience by
adding our subscriber widget to your Web site.

* Subscribe: <[link removed]>
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Miss an issue? You can catch up on back issues at
<[link removed]>.

Want to read this newsletter translated into another language? Scroll
to the end to read the *Supporter* in French or Spanish.

***

### Free Software Awards: Nominate those who have charted a course to freedom by November 30

*From September 21*

The dedication and determination of its contributors has helped the
free software movement chart a course to a freer digital
tomorrow. Whether you realize it or not, simply *using* free software
makes you a part of our collective journey to freedom. On the way to
our destination, there are those inspiring individuals and projects
who go above and beyond in their dedication to the movement and its
principles. Now is your time to show these community members and
projects that you appreciate their vital work. The three award
categories, which will be presented at LibrePlanet 2023, are
"Advancement of Free Software," "Projects of Social Benefit," and
"Outstanding New Free Software Contributor." Deadline for nominations
is November 30.

* <[link removed]>
* <[link removed]>
* <[link removed]>
* <[link removed]>

### Interview with Martin Dougiamas of Moodle

*From September 22*

After a bit of a hiatus, we are rebooting the interview series the FSF
started ten years ago that highlights work by developers who choose
GNU licenses. We are happy to have Martin Dougiamas, CEO of Moodle,
join us for the first interview after this long break. In this
interview, Martin tells us about his experience with remote education
growing up in Western Australia and how it has helped inform the
direction of Moodle Learning Management System (LMS). Moodle LMS,
written in the PHP programming language, is a learning platform
designed to provide educators, administrators, and learners with a
single robust, secure, and integrated system to create personalized
learning environments. He also shares how the
[GPLv3]([link removed]) has helped Moodle and its community of
educators, developers, and organizations worldwide.

* <[link removed]>

### Wrapping up ten years of GNU Guix in Paris

*From September 28 by Ludovic Courtès, Tanguy Le Carrour, and Simon Tournier*

It has been ten years since the very first commit of what is now
called "GNU Guix," which is the name coming from its blending of Guile
and Nix. On its tenth year anniversary, everyone involved in the GNU
Guix project has a lot to celebrate. Gathering together in Paris,
France over three days in September, hackers, users, and enthusiasts
conducted dozens of talks, socialized, and even enjoyed a beautiful
cake. Videos, photos, SVG artwork, and more are now available online.

* <[link removed]>

### Study of electronic monitoring smartphone apps confirms advocates' concerns of privacy harms

*From September 23 by Saira Hussain and Will Greenberg*

"Electronic monitoring" software is being used more and more often in
lieu of ankle monitors, which track a person's location at any given
moment. These monitoring measures, used in a probation, parole, or a
immigrant, juvenile, and/or pre-trial context, are installed onto a
person's phone and often send various personal information to the
authorities as well as to the company developing the software itself
and proprietors of third party libraries upon which such data
collection is being utilized. Researchers, presenting the findings at
the 31st USENIX (Unix Users Group) Security Symposium, go into depth
about the privacy implications and how users described "a general
sense of injustice." One individual who has been forced to install the
software says "your money is not worth my freedom!"

* <[link removed]>
* <[link removed]>
* <[link removed]>

### The ungodly surveillance of anti-porn 'shameware' apps

*From September 22 by Dhruv Mehrotra*

It seems that proprietary software companies are continuously finding
yet new ways to exploit their users. So-called "shameware" is software
designed to be installed onto a user's device and report all online
activity directly to another person, whether that be someone's parent,
spouse, teacher, or faith leader. This software is *designed to spy*
on its users around-the-clock, and it does so by capturing
screenshots, logging software applications used to browse the
Internet, and logging URLs of Web pages visited. The software is also
part of a broader ecosystem of shaming individuals by those in
positions of power, which makes people feel bad about themselves and
which scientific experts find lacking in any proof of a "lasting
positive effect." WIRED's article provides interviews with users who
installed the software under direction of their church leaders as well
as various tests that revealed such things as the software's reliance
on accessibility APIs, designed specifically to assist users with
disabilities, and Facebook's Pixel, which sends sensitive data
directly to Facebook, in order to capture ever-more invasive data on
the person whose device the non-free shameware is installed.

* <[link removed]>

### Draft EU *AI Act* regulations could have a chilling effect on free software

*From September 11 by Katyanna Quach*

New rules drafted by the European Union (EU) aimed at regulating
artificial intelligence (AI) could prevent developers from releasing
free software models, according to The Brookings Institution. The
proposed EU *AI Act*, yet to be signed into law, places burdensome and
unnecessary regulations on free software (and [source
available]([link removed])) developers. Alex Engler of the
Brookings Institution aptly notes that such regulation for free
software is "broadly unnecessary because, like any other models, they
would already be regulated by the *AI Act* if they are used for any
covered applications, such as in hiring or in dangerous products." He
also goes on to say that free software general-purpose AI (GPAI)
projects "play two key roles in the future of GPAI: first, they
disseminate power over the direction of AI away from well-resourced
technology companies to a more diverse group of stakeholders. Second,
they enable critical research, and thus public knowledge, on the
function and limitations of GPAI models."

* <[link removed]>
* <[link removed]>

### *Ada & Zangemann* ready to pre-order in English

*From September 8 by Matthias Kirschner*

Free Software Foundation Europe's executive director Matthias
Kirschner recently published a book to help introduce children to free
software concepts and what software freedom can mean in their
lives. Through a delightly narrative, protagonist Ada loves to tinker
and repair. And much to the delight of her friends and family, she
even discovers some very useful hacks to modify the technology around
her to work in new fun and useful ways. Meanwhile, Zangemann, a very
wealthy software developer and inventor, tries to control all of the
devices that the citizens of his town are using. Now available for
digital restrictions management -free (DRM-free) download in English,
you may also pre-order physical copies from No Starch Press, which
will be shipped from the US starting in December.

* <[link removed]>
* <[link removed]>
* <[link removed]>

### Nextcloud works with governments to create MS Office replacement for the EU

In a promising new development, a number of European governments are
working with [Nextcloud]([link removed]),
which is licensed under the GNU Affero General Public License version
3 (AGPLv3), to create a platform to help governments regain their
independence from a small number of powerful proprietary software
companies by creating a free Microsoft Office 365 replacement intended
for use by municipal, state, and federal government organizations
within the EU. In addition to achieving overall digital sovereignty,
other expected benefits include having a suite of office software that
is compliant with privacy standards, easy to use, and decentralized.

* <[link removed]>
* <[link removed]>

### September GNU Emacs news

*From September 26 by Sacha Chua*

In these issues: Diff-mode, Japanese input that "requires minimal
dependencies but is still usable," new GNU ELPA and MELPA packages and
more!

* [2022-09-26]([link removed])
* [2022-09-19]([link removed])
* [2022-09-12]([link removed])
* [2022-09-05]([link removed])

### Join the FSF and friends in updating the Free Software Directory

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 version
control, Instant Relay Chat (IRC) channels, documentation, and
licensing. The Free Software Directory has been a great resource to
software users over the past decade, but it needs your help staying
up-to-date with new and exciting free software projects.

To help, join our weekly IRC meetings on Fridays. Meetings take place
in the #fsf channel on Libera.Chat, and usually include a handful of
regulars as well as newcomers. Libera.Chat is accessible from any IRC
client -- Everyone's welcome!

The next meeting is Friday, October 7 from 12:00 to 3:00 EDT (16:00 to
19:00 UTC). Details of the meeting, including how to connect via IRC,
are published on its event page:

* <[link removed]>

### LibrePlanet featured resource: Lightning talks for LibrePlanet 2023

Every month on [the LibrePlanet
wiki]([link removed]), we highlight one
resource that is interesting and useful -- often one that could use
your help.

For this month, we are highlighting Lightning talks for LibrePlanet
2023, which provides information about how to submit a lightning talk
to next year's LibrePlanet. Check it out, submit a talk if you like,
and consider helping us spread the word.

* <[link removed]>

Do you have a suggestion for next month's featured resource? Let us
know at <[email protected]>.

### September GNU Spotlight with Amin Bandali: Seventeen new GNU releases!

Seventeen new GNU releases in the last month (as of October 3, 2022):

* [autoconf-archive-2022.09.03]([link removed])
* [bash-5.2]([link removed])
* [emacs-28.2]([link removed])
* [gama-2.23]([link removed])
* [gawk-5.2.0]([link removed])
* [gnunet-0.17.6]([link removed])
* [gnutls-3.7.8]([link removed])
* [grep-3.8]([link removed])
* [gsasl-2.2.0]([link removed])
* [guile-ncurses-3.1]([link removed])
* [linux-libre-6.0-gnu]([link removed])
* [mtools-4.0.41]([link removed])
* [parallel-20220922]([link removed])
* [readline-8.2]([link removed])
* [shepherd-0.9.2]([link removed])
* [unifont-15.0.01]([link removed])
* [units-2.22]([link removed])

*For a full list with descriptions, please see:
<[link removed]>*

For announcements of most new GNU releases, subscribe to the info-gnu
mailing list: <[link removed]>.

To download: nearly all GNU software is available most reliably from
<[link removed]>. Optionally, you may find faster download
speeds at a mirror located geographically closer to you by choosing
from the list of mirrors published at
<[link removed]>, or using
<[link removed]> to be automatically redirected to a
(hopefully) nearby and up-to-date mirror.

A number of GNU packages, as well as the GNU operating system as a
whole, are looking for maintainers and other assistance: please see
<[link removed]> if you'd like to
help. The general page on how to help GNU is at
<[link removed]>.

If you have a working or partly working program that you'd like to
offer to the GNU project as a GNU package, see
<[link removed]>.

As always, please feel free to write to me, <[email protected]>, with
any GNUish questions or suggestions for future installments.

### FSF and other free software events

* October 7, 2022, Barcelona, Spain, [KDE Academy]([link removed])
* October 10-16, 2022, Namur, Belgium, [Plone conference]([link removed])
* October 13, 2022, Online, [LibrePlanet 2022 CFS office hours]([link removed])
* October 20, 2022, Online, [LibrePlanet 2022 CFS office hours]([link removed])
* October 27, 2022, Online, [LibrePlanet 2022 CFS office hours]([link removed])
* November 4-5, 2022, Online, [SeaGL]([link removed])
* December 3-4, 2022, Online, [EmacsConf]([link removed])

### Thank GNUs!

We appreciate everyone who donates to the Free Software Foundation,
and we'd like to give special recognition to the folks who have
donated $500 or more in the last month.

* <[link removed]>

This month, a big Thank GNU to:

* Dylan Zenner
* James Reade

You can add your name to this list by donating at
<[link removed]>.

### GNU copyright contributions

Assigning your copyright to the Free Software Foundation helps us
defend the GNU GPL and keep software free. The following individuals
have assigned their copyright to the FSF (and allowed public
appreciation) in the past month:

* Arsen Arsenović (GCC)
* Bruno Claude Pierre Barbier (GNU Emacs)
* Mikhail Skorzhinskii (GNU Emacs)
* Santiago Thomas Calandrino (GNU Emacs)

Want to see your name on this list? Contribute to GNU and assign your
copyright to the FSF.

* <[link removed]>

### Translations of the *Free Software Supporter*

El *Free Software Supporter* está disponible en español. Para ver la
versión en español haz click aqui:
<[link removed]>

**Para cambiar las preferencias de usuario y recibir los próximos
números del *Supporter* en español, haz click aquí:**
<[link removed]>

Le *Free Software Supporter* est disponible en français. Pour voir la
version française cliquez ici:
<[link removed]>

**Pour modifier vos préférences et recevoir les prochaines
publications du *Supporter* en français, cliquez ici:**
<[link removed]>

### Take action with the FSF!

Contributions from thousands of individual associate members enable
the FSF's work. You can contribute by joining at
<[link removed]>. If you're already a member, you can help
refer new members (and earn some rewards) by adding a line with your
member number to your email signature like:

I'm an FSF member -- Help us support software freedom!
<[link removed]>

The FSF is always looking for volunteers
(<[link removed]>). From rabble-rousing to hacking,
from issue coordination to envelope stuffing -- there's something here
for everybody to do. Also, head over to our campaigns section
(<[link removed]>) and [take action on software
patents]([link removed]), [Digital Restrictions
Management]([link removed]), [free
software]([link removed]) adoption,
[OpenDocument]([link removed]),
and more.

**Do you read and write Portuguese and English?** The FSF is looking
for translators for *Free Software Supporter*. Please send an email to
<[email protected]> with your interest and a list of your experience
and qualifications.

***

Copyright © 2022 Free Software Foundation, Inc.

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0
Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit
<[link removed]>.

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