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Links 2/6/2015: Black Lab Linux Releases, Krita Fundraiser





GNOME bluefish

Contents





GNU/Linux



Free Software/Open Source



  • How to Make Money from Open Source Platforms, Part 3: Creating a Product
    What is the value of an open source platform? Would someone ever pay for it outright? Indeed, how does someone use an open source platform? Let’s start with the oldest and most significant of open source platforms, Linux. For the longest time, Linux was dismissed as a non-viable data center technology for “enterprise-grade” or “business critical” operations because it had no support model, no applications that ran on it and no obvious way to make money from it. How, then, did Linux become the engine that fueled the growth of the world’s open source ecosystem, an ecosystem that could be valued in the trillions of dollars, when calculating the percentage of the world’s economy that relies on open source systems? Was it just a bunch of hippies sharing the software and singing about it, or were there clear business reasons paving the way to its eventual victory?


  • Why enterprises embrace open source
    The state of affairs of enterprise IT is changing quickly. Open source will become a much higher percentage of every IT organization’s environment, given its advantages in terms of cost, control, and innovation. Likewise, open source skills will soon become a critical requirement, both for using open source wisely, but also in attracting the kind of talent necessary to compete in a Third Platform world.


  • SourceForge locked in projects of fleeing users, cashed in on malvertising [Updated]
    The takeover of the SourceForge account for the Windows version of the open-source GIMP image editing tool reported by Ars last week is hardly the first case of the once-pioneering software repository attempting to cash in on open-source projects that have gone inactive or have actually attempted to shut down their SourceForge accounts. Over the past few years, SourceForge (launched by VA Linux Systems in 1999 and now owned by the tech job site company previously known as Dice) has made it a business practice to turn abandoned or inactive projects into platforms for distribution of "bundle-ware" installers.

    Despite promises to avoid deceptive advertisements that trick site visitors into downloading unwanted software and malware onto their computers, these malicious ads are legion on projects that have been taken over by SourceForge's anonymous editorial staff. SourceForge's search engine ranking for these projects often makes the site the first link provided to people seeking downloads for code on Google and Bing search results.

    And because of SourceForge's policies, it's nearly impossible for open-source projects to get their code removed from the site. SourceForge is, in essence, the Hotel California of code repositories: you can check your project out any time you want, but you can never leave.


  • Make your very own emojis with Open-Source emojidex


  • Emojis go open-source with emojidex


  • Measuring the performance of a community manager
    In an open organization, measuring performance for particular roles like community managers may not be straightforward, especially when comparing those roles to others with more defined success metrics, goals, and outcomes. In my experience over the past six years, I've worked closely with my manager to make sure that we are in sync with my objectives and what I need to do in order to maximize my impact in my role as a community manager.


  • Web Browsers



  • SaaS/Big Data



    • Security, creating a federated cloud, and more OpenStack news
      Interested in keeping track of what's happening in the open source cloud? Opensource.com is your source for news in OpenStack, the open source cloud infrastructure project.


    • DNSSEC, DANE and the failure of X.509
      As a few people have noticed, I’m a bit of an internet control freak: In an age of central “cloud based” services, I run pretty much my own everything (blog, mail server, DNS, OpenID, web page etc.). That doesn’t make me anti-cloud; I just believe in federation instead of centralisation. In particular, I believe in owning my own content and obeying my own rules rather than those of $BIGCLOUDPROVIDER.




  • Databases



  • Funding/GSoC



  • Public Services/Government



    • Mr Paulwell, we cannot afford to be left behind
      As a technology user and enthusiast, I believe in the critical role of open-source software to create the applications and infrastructure necessary to support government-funded technology projects. There is an accelerating interest in and use of open-source software worldwide. Local governments are changing. Forward-thinking municipalities are embracing technology to make countries and cities better for everyone. Innovative government staff are sharing resources, best practices, and collaborating on common problems. Jamaica needs to provide a broad range of resources, programmes and services to support and advance civic innovation.

      As open-source software becomes the leading information technology day by day, and there are open-source alternatives to most of the commercial software, Jamaica must join this technological revolution, as the national pledge does state, "...so that Jamaica may play her part in the advancement of the whole human race".

      Open-source software is computer software with its source code made available with a licence in which the copyright holder supplies the rights to study, change, and distribute the software to anyone and for any reason or function. Open-source software is oftentimes developed in a public, collaborative manner. It is the most striking example of open-source development and often compared to (technically defined) user-generated content or (legally defined) open-content movements.




  • Licensing



    • Conservancy Seeks Your Questions on GPL Enforcement
      Historically, Conservancy has published extensive materials about enforcement of the GPL, including blog posts, announcements regarding compliance actions, many sections appearing in the definitive Copyleft Guide (a joint initiative with the Free Software Foundation). After Conservancy's recent announcement of its funding of Christoph Hellwig's lawsuit against VMware, Conservancy has sought to answer as many questions as possible about GPL enforcement.


    • The Licensing and Compliance Lab interviews François Marier, creator of Libravatar


      In this edition, we conducted an email-based interview with François Marier, a free software developer from New Zealand. He is the creator and lead developer of Libravatar. In addition to his passion for decentralization, he contributes to the Debian project and volunteers on the FSF licensing team.

      Libravatar is a free network service providing profile photos for a number of Web sites, including bugs.debian.org and git.kernel.org. Its flexible architecture allows end users to host their own images and allows Web sites to use Gravatar as a fallback when necessary. It is licensed under the GNU Affero General Public License version 3, or end user can opt for any later version (GNU AGPLv3+).




  • Openness/Sharing



    • 5 reasons wikis rock for documentation
      You may not have noticed, but people often become attached to their favorite technology. This could be a mobile phone, a programming language, or a text editor. When you work on someone else's project, you generally have to go with whatever the prevailing tools and languages are, but when it's your own project, you get to choose the toys. Documentation requires technology, too, but most people have less of a pre-set opinion about documentation tooling than they do about web frameworks and version control systems. So how is a project to choose?


    • Open Data



      • UW students use open source mapping to aid relief efforts in Nepal
        Half a world away, University of Washington civil and envi€­ron€­men€­tal engi€­neer€­ing stu€­dents trace the out€­lines of roads, paths and build€­ings in Nepal from their lap€­tops.

        Using open data soft€­ware Open€­StreetMap, the students in assistant professor Jes€­sica Kamin€­sky’s Civil Engi€­neer€­ing in Devel€­op€­ing Com€­mu€­ni€­ties class joined an online com€­mu€­nity effort to turn satel€­lite imagery of Nepal into maps and aid the earth€­quake relief effort. These dig€­i€­tized maps provide emer€­gency respon€­ders and relief coordinators responding to the 7.8 magnitude earthquake and powerful aftershocks in Nepal with crit€­i€­cal data to guide teams deployed on the ground.


      • Bulgarian government publishes first open datasets
        Bulgaria has just published the first datasets on its open data portal. Currently, about 36 datasets from 26 public agencies have been made available online. The organisations involved were summoned to do so by the Council of Ministers. The Council even has a dedicated team to overcome resistance at the agencies and help them to extract and cleanse the data from the databases. The ambition is to publish another 100 datasets before the end of this year.






  • Standards/Consortia



    • UK overhauls its Digital Service Standard
      The United Kingdom has revised its Digital Service Standard, which describes the components for building eGovernment services. The update came into effect on 1 June, and is to be used for new and redesigned external-facing services.






Leftovers



Recent Techrights' Posts

Confirmed in the Mainstream Media: A Lot of Microsoft "Workloads" Were Just LLM Slop (Helping to Fake Growth for Years, as Microsoft Had Paid "Open" "AI" to Become a "Client") and Demand is Rapidly Waning, Datacentres Canceled and/or Shut Down
Anything to facilitate further accounting fraud
Taiwan's Media Covers Closure of Microsoft's "AI" Lab, It's Time to Talk About the Gradual Death of Windows and Implosion of the "AI" Bubble
Earlier this week we showed that mostly Asian media had the 'nerve' to mention Microsoft silently shutting down its 'AI' lab
More Gains for GNU/Linux, Based on Web Surveys
the Steam site shows rapid growth for "Linux" this month
 
Microsoft's Trouble in Africa and Asia
A new all-time high for GNU/Linux
Brett Wilson LLP Reported to the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA)
The saddest thing in all this is that law firms can maintain high standards shall they wish to
Links 03/04/2025: Tariff Pains and C.D.C. Cuts
Links for the day
StatCounter: Microsoft is Masking a Disaster, It's Way Behind DeepSeek Already and Interest in LLMs Has Waned
it turns out the money "raised" for "Open" "AI" may not even exist at all
Links 03/04/2025: SoftBank Money for Microsoft "Open" "AI" Probably Doesn't Even Exist, Wikimedia Foundation Blasts LLM Nuisance While Microsoft Admits Demand Has Shrunk
Links for the day
Gemini Links 03/04/2025: Patch Panel and Pictures
Links for the day
Islamic Republic of Iran: GNU/Linux at All-time High This Month, Windows Falls to 12%
Vista 10 is up this month despite being "end of life" (EoL) soon
Indonesia: All-Time Highs for GNU/Linux
What's noteworthy right now is the growth of GNU/Linux
statCounter Says GNU/Linux Usage is Up Again (Internationally)
some preliminary April data
Only on April 1st Can the Free Software Foundation Associate With Microsoft's Open Source Initiative (OSI)
We saw some pranks that day linking the FSF to Microsoft (e.g. "endorsing" Windows)
IBM Gets Rid of Kelly Chambliss as Mass Layoffs Reported in IBM Consulting, IBM Loses Key Contracts/Graft
IBM Consulting has been in disarray lately
Slopwatch: Anti-Linux Articles, Not Even Written by Humans
Why aren't Web sites more vocal about this problem?
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, April 02, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, April 02, 2025
Links 03/04/2025: Apple Fined Over Secret Surveillance, "Elegant Writer For A More Civilized Age"
Links for the day
Gemini Links 02/04/2025: Books and Cold Tea
Links for the day
Links 02/04/2025: More Layoffs, Nokia Again Takes Advantage of Illegal and Unconstitutional Patent Court With Nokia Staff as 'Judges'
Links for the day
Links 02/04/2025: Seizures and Returns to Windows of 24 Years Ago
Links for the day
LLM Slop Helps Obscure and Distort News About Layoffs (IBM, GAFAM)
It's hard to find accurate information
Links 02/04/2025: Microsoft Developers Are Threatening to Go on Strike, World Backup Day Noted
Links for the day
Gemini Protocol Has Growing Appeal (the Web Got Too Bloated and Full of LLM Slop)
For any "data plan" with bandwidth limits or "tiers" it would be cheaper to use/browse Geminispace
The Web Can Survive LLM Slop, But Only If We Collectively Shun and Discourage Serial Sloppers
Doing nothing ought not be a possibility
Amid Secret Shut-downs and Mass Layoffs at Microsoft (4 Waves of Layoffs in 3 Months of 2025) Some Microsoft Staff Expected to Go On Strike
workers going on strike
Gemini Links 02/04/2025: No more on Mastodon and Gemini Mention Script in Go
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, April 01, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, April 01, 2025
My Motion Disbarring or “Striking Off” Brett Wilson LLP for Enabling Violent Americans Who Try to Crush Microsoft Critics in the United Kingdom by Multiple SLAPPs
"Guns for hire" (for Microsoft people who received Microsoft salaries)
The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Hijacked Again by Patent Litigation Industry, as President Cheeto Prioritises Aggressors
The "mafia" has taken over the "industry" and the Federal system (justice and constitutions trampled upon)
Ubuntu Slop and FUD Manufactured With LLMs and Funded (by Oneself) 'Studies'
Slop and FUD are ruining the Web
Gemini Links 01/04/2025: Games and More
Links for the day
Links 01/04/2025: Apple Fined $162M for Privacy Abuses, Disinformation Online a Growing Concern
Links for the day
Why We're Reporting Brett Wilson LLP for Apparently Misusing Their Licence to Protect American Microsofters Who Attack Women
For those who have not been keeping abreast
Newer Press Reports Confirm That Microsoft Shuts Down 'Hey Hi' (AI) Labs Despite All the Hype
The "hey hi" (AI) bubble is not sustainable
Links 01/04/2025: Mass Layoffs at Eidos and "Microsoft Pulls Back on Data Centers" (Demand Lacking); "Racist and Sexist" Slop From Microsoft
Links for the day
Stefano Maffulli and His Microsoft-Funded OSI Staff Are Killing the OSI and Killing "Open Source" (All for Money!)
This is far from over
Gemini Links 01/04/2025: XKCDpunk and worldclock.py
Links for the day
50 Years of Sabotage and a Gut Punch to Computer Science (and Science in General)
Will we get back to science-based computing rather than cult-like following?
Techrights Headlines as Semaphore
"If you are hearing this, thank you"
3 Months in 2025, 4 Waves of Mass Layoffs at Microsoft, Now Offices Shut Down Permanently
"A recent visit by the South China Morning Post confirmed that the office was dark, unoccupied, and had its logo removed."
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, March 31, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, March 31, 2025