Bonum Certa Men Certa

Corruption in Organisations Like the Linux Foundation and the FSFE

Reprinted with permission from the Free Software Fellowship

The UN Working Group on human rights and transnational corporations has recently started a consultation on corruption.



While a lot of attention is on practices in the developing world and the corporations that operate there, there is increasing attention on the practices of large corporations like Google in the free, open source software space.



For example, why have so many organizations like Linux Foundation and the FSFE simultaneously eliminated their elections, shifting the balance of power towards certain corporations like Google? Why are messages about corporate influence routinely censored from the mailing lists of open source groups who claim to be both transparent and independent of the corporations funding them? Voting and censorship are both human rights issues. If we can't get these things right in an organization of professionals, how can there be any hope for the developing world?



People who wish to collaborate on a submission to the UN working group can respond to the call by joining the Fellowship mailing list and responding to the call there.



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