links for 2007-07-18

Software Freedom Day Press Release

I’ve just released a press release on SFD 2007. If people could follow the link and repost this as far and wide as they can (and translations very welcome!) that would be awesome! Below is a taste 🙂

September 15th marks Software Freedom Day, the world’s largest celebration and outreach effort about why transparent and sustainable technologies like Free & Open Source Software are so important. Community groups in more than 80 countries organise local activities and programs on Software Freedom Day to educate the wider public about free software: what it is, how it works and its relationship to human rights and sustainability. We already have over 140 teams around the world registered: join them in spreading the word! Registrations for Software Freedom Day teams that want to receive a free SFD team pack close in two weeks, so register now!

Full press release available here! Only two months away, time for everyone to get their skates on!

Maureen is in town!

A good friend of mine and very cool chick Maureen O’Sullivan is giving a talk at UNSW hosted by the Unlocking IP crew next Wednesday. Details are all here so come along if you can 🙂 She is a great speaker and has some pretty interesting ideas about copyright, IP & FOSS. Thanks to the housemates at the Unlocking IP house of commons for putting it on 🙂

Buddhist conference this weekend in Sydney

So this is one of those blog posts where everyone finds out something new about a person 🙂 I have been studying Chan Buddhism casually since I was 15 and with a more serious focus in the past 2 years. Chan Buddhism is an big part of Shaolin Kung Fu which is what I started at aged 15 (after 3 years of Karate training). I really love my Kung Fu and Chan studies. They promote a sense of purpose, clarity and self-responsibility that I try to reflect in my life.

Anyway, the reason I’m bringing this up is because in Sydney this weekend is a large Buddhist conference called Change you mind, change the world with loads of different Buddhist schools coming together to learn and share. If there are people out there who read my blog interested in Buddhism, it would be a great experience for you! Several of my teachers are participating including the head of my school who is a major inspiration, Abbot Shi Yuan Zhi on the second day.

Anyone interested in studying either Chan Buddhism or Shaolin martial arts can check out my school here. I have looked around at loads of schools and always came back to this one. There are schools in Sydney, Canberra, Wollongong and the Blue Mountains.

Software Freedom Day online shop is up!

I’ve been working on putting up the online Software Freedom Day shop, which at this point includes tshirts for the event and CD packs of The Open CD. Teams running SFD events (that register prior to the 31st July) get a 50% discount so spread the word! 🙂

We also have more and better free schwag for teams than ever before including balloons, CDs, shirts, stickers and more. We also have more sponsors than ever before but more on than soon 🙂

We already have 125 teams registered from all around the world and it is only July! This year is looking to be huge!

More information soon to come 🙂 Comments on the shirt design are welcome.

SFD07 tshirt design - front
SFD07 tshirt design - back