"We're are in the process to form a team in Hanoi, Vietnam. We have our first meeting tonight, so far we have 20 persons interested," commented David Tremblay of Oxfam in the Vietnamese capital.

As the word went round, small teams sprung up globally in diverse locations.

In short, this coordinated-splash hopes to help make more in the world aware about the virtues of Free/Libre and Open Source Software (FLOSS, or FOSS). Volunteers plan to set up stations in public places, to give away information fliers and CDs with select software -- including TheOpenCD and
an all-free version of widely-admired Knoppix.

Organisers call this part of a global grassroots marketing campaign "in which we are inviting volunteers from around the world to participate". Local teams can choose how to organise their "PR efforts".

Commented Henrik Nilsen Omma, an Oxford (UK)-based Norwegian completing a PhD in theoretical astrophysics, and one of the team-leaders behind the event: "We would be happy if we could simply establish the tradition this year, with a few good events around the globe. And that does seem to be happening, with several solid teams popping up on different continents."

He is better known as the founder of The Open CD project -- a compilation of tools that packs useful Free software (free-as-in-freedom, not merely zero-price) that works on the Windows platform.

Behind TheOpenCD project is the view that the 'first step' of changing their OS is simply too great for most people. Otherwise, how else does one explain the reluctance to change over to a technically superior operating
system, which also happens to be free (of charge)?

"Why should they throw out something which meets most of their needs and came pre-installed with their computer for 'free' only to risk that after the switch things such as printing, email, whatever, don't work," contends Omma Nilsen. "There seemed to be a clear need for a tool that FLOSS enthusiasts could use to help others make the transition. That's how TheOpenCD project got started, and the rest just followed on from that."

Says Nilsen Omma, in an interview with this correspondent: "Matt (Oquist) came up with the idea of selecting a specific day to set up a stand in a public place to inform people about FOSS. He then approached us at TheOpenCD
project about using our disc as material. We debated the event at some length in the forum at TheOpenCD and decided to try to make it a global event. That's also where the name was born."

New Jersey-based Matt Oquist describes himself as a "software engineer by day who has never contributed significantly to an Open Source or Free Software project, even though I've been running Linux and OpenBSD exclusively on my own machines for years".

Come August-end, and they hope to make their dream come true.

They've had smooth sailing so far. "We've had positive correspondence with both RMS (Richard M Stallman) and ESR (Eric S Raymond) of the FSF and OSI respectively. KDE is throwing a big party on softwarefreedomday in conjunction with their world conference in August and we will be a central feature at a FLOSS conference in Johannesburg," says Nilsen Omma.

There are already some 20 teams already signed up, such as a group in New York (see www.nylxs.com) that is planning multiple SFD events. KDE has added a SFD celebration to their 2004 KDE Community World Summit (see
http://events.kde.org/info/conference2004/freedomfest.php).

Omma Nilsen -- whose work mainly involves numerical simulations on large parallel machines, like the local Beowulf cluster visible at clusterheating.org -- says the style of SFD has been to "just bounce ideas around and pitch in where needed, and that seems to work pretty well".

Doesn't he then agree with the view, of some FLOSS enthusiasts and techies,that the alternative software world doesn't need promotion anymore?

He argues back: "I think that is either naive or arrogant. Some people have all the FLOSS they'll ever need right now, and see no reason to appeal to the public at large. Emacs and the Linux kernel will always be free, and for some people that does everything they need. However, this group represents only a tiny fraction of the population; what about those who use proprietary software exclusively today, not from choice but by default?"

In this young astro-physicist's view, computer users are threatened with getting more and more locked in to a closed information system where they are gradually loosing control over their own data and being locked into expensive upgrade cycles.

"This is not just a cause for programers to retain the freedom to share code, but also to give people back control over their data and computers. (Free Software Foundation lawyer and campaigner) Eben Moglen often says that
it's all about free speech, and in an increasingly electronic world, that often means electronic speech, which must be protected," says Omma Nilsen.

Organisers of this event see it as a symbiotic need.

Explains Omma Nilsen: "But just as much as the public need our help to protect these freedoms, we also need their help to maintain a society and a legal framework in which FLOSS can thrive."

Free Software and Open Source enthusiasts increasing fear that while rival proprietary software makers are loosing ground on technical merits, they are increasingly using legal and other means to stop the spread of FLOSS, and
preserve their proprietary business model.

Software patents is a major risk. Some governments have been mandating the use of proprietorial software, after being lobbied.

"Proprietary producers will keep moving the targets, will invent hardware-based lock-ins, push patent laws, use propaganda, and still-not-invented methods to stop FLOSS. The only way to guarantee the survival and prosperity of FLOSS is for the voting public to learn to cherish the principles of freedom associated with it, and insist on it in the same way they insist on free speech," argues Omma Nilsen.

This calls for a whole lot of educating. That's where the
softwarefreedomday.org comes in.

Adopting a 'gradualist' approach, the idea is to get people to slowly use some select FLOSS programmes, and at the same time introducing ideas of freedom in parallel.

In their own time, the average user would hopefully absorb it.

Oquist argues: "We want the barrier of entry to be as small as possible, so we are handing out software that will run on more than 90% of the desktops out there, on a CD with a wonderfully intuitive interface that explains and installs FLOSS packages with minimal button-clicking. Accompanying
literature will make the SFD packs even more clear and usable."

Explains Oquist of his own experience: "I converted while I was a computer science student. FLOSS was superior in so many ways that mattered to me (stability, remote accessibility, configurability, openness, freedom), and
it was free. There have been no significant drawbacks for me, and I've got my family and my in-laws now running Linux to dial up to the Internet.Other people get viruses, but my families don't."

But the road ahead is long. Most FLOSS campaigners themselves haven't even heard of the idea. "But we have to start somewhere. I suspect there will be a surge of interest in the week before the event and just after (which will help for next year)," adds Omma Nilsen.

The idea is to hand out free CDs. Wouldn't these simply get wasted?

"Sure. But the risk that you might fail is never a good reason not to try something. As far as the material costs; CDs are really cheap now.Certainly cheaper than a nice colour booklet. In marketing you only ever reach one to two percent if you are lucky, so we should not be to depressed
about a few discarded CDs," argues Omma Nilsen.

Oquist has been thinking along parallel lines, and, infact, originated the idea.

Says he: "I had the desire to raise public awareness about Open Source and Free Software, because so many people who could be using it are instead paying large amounts of money for software that is marginally superior, or else pirating proprietary software. I knew I had a solution for them that
was better than either of those alternatives, and I just needed a way to
publicize it."

This is more true in schools and other non-profit organizations. Yet, look
around and you'll see schools with lab computers lacking word processing
software because the school cannot afford a Microsoft Word license for every
machine. Says Oquist: "This is a symptom of the awareness problem that I
want to help fix."

Says he: "If we can get just 10 SFD teams to hand out 5000 SFD packs, I hope
that 1000 of those packs will be effective in converting people to use
projects like OpenOffice.org, Mozilla, and the GIMP. And once people have
made that switch, maybe they'll be a little more willing to stick in the SFD
Linux LiveCD (be it a modified KNOPPIX, Mepis, or otherwise) and see what
Linux is about.

Oquist said in an interview with LINUX JOURNAL: "And after we establish
ourselves this August 28, even as a ragged band of driven people, then we'll
have one SFD under our belts, and we'll be ready to organize in greater
numbers and to greater effectiveness in successive years."

After a many-year wait for the year of 'Linux on the desktop', its
enthusiasts are not losing hope. Argues Oquist: "I don't know when that will
be, but I think the world is at a tipping point in the adoption of Open
Source and Free Software. SFD will be yet another soldier helping to raise
the flag."

"We're hitting the whole world simultaneously and with coordination. We're
banking on the idea that the whole of SFD will become greater than the sum
of its parts," says Oquist.

ENDS
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* frederick noronha * freelance journalist * http://fn.swiki.net *
784 near convent * sonarbhat * saligao * bardez * goa 403511 india
phone 0091.832.2409490 or 09822 122436 * fred <at> bytesforall.org
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