Man, what a week! Some rather interesting organisations have taken a huge and rather recent interest in Open Source. I’ve managed to get involved in a small group of people doing Open Source policy work, and have helped structure it so that there is reference to Open Source community and industry groups for information. This means that the community will have real input to the legislation of Open Source in this country for the first time. All of this to be explained further very soon in the circles I’m in but needless to say I’ve been flatstrap trying to sort out how it can work, calling people from different groups, testing the viability and need for this idea, and then starting to get the buy-in necessary for its success. Hopefully will be able to get some sort of consolidation from the many different Open Source stakeholders in Australia, in order to make a direct and strategic impact where we need to. To long has the direction of OSS in Australia been dictated by those who don’t understand its value. If the least we can do is have a single supported statement on what OSS is, and what it means to the average person, workplace or government, we are well on the way to a fair playground. More on that as it comes 🙂
Want to get together this wonderful Linux Australia Press group, and we finally have the go ahead from the committee. I will remain as Press Officer (making sure I get some training to aid in this role), Michael Davies will also act as a liason officer to the group, then we get some fiery skilled media people from the community who are interested in strategic media moves, rather than just shot in the dark reactive moves. Hopefully this year we can be more out there, and active publicly.
Also the issues surrounding the recent and controversial FTA with the US have come up. Now that some of the details on this ‘mutually beneficial agreement’ are known, it has become apparent that there is scope for serious damage to innovation in ICT, let alone Open Source development in this country. Something needs to be done to at least let people know the dangers in such a deal, notably patents and anti-circumvention legislation.
On a more personal note, Kung Fu is rocking. I study Shaolin Gung Fu with an amazing group of people. My teachers’ teacher (Da Shi) is still the most impressive human being I’ve encountered. Intellectually, physically, spiritually and emotionally he is centred, giving and the best teacher one could ask for. I can only hope that one day I can see with even one percent of his clarity.
Getting things happening with the Australia Chinese Friendship Society (http://acfs.com.au/). Organising some hardware for them, trying to sort out their policies and practices (many of which are outdated). It is quite interesting to deal with one organisation which is 100% online, and another that is 100% offline. Certainly a learning experience. Last November I was actually supposed to meet the President of China, Hu Jintao, through this group, however that was when I got sick, and also had to cancel the Brazil trip to their International Free Software Forum. I will be there this year in June with bells on 🙂