Document Actions
FOSSAPII Blog, reporting from Siem Reap, Cambodia
An update about issues and people at the Free/Open Source Software for Asia-Pacific Consultation (FOSSAP II) held in Cambodia from September 1-4, 2005.
From software to content
After the trip to Siem Reap, I thought of sharing some photos (and a little text) to the page devoted to Siem Reap on the ever-helpful Wikipedia. Please help to update and improve the content (is this a suitable word?) there.
Who was there?
Links to organisations of participants who reached Siem Reap. Check out the Asian diversity that met and spoke... not always in the global lingua franca -- English.
Marrying wikis and blogs
What happens when a wiki marries a blog, and runs into a mailing-list and a website? This is a wonderful world of new communication opportunities, and it's probably a good idea to check out what works. Look out for FOSSAP on Wikipedia. Take a look at this Wikipedia entry for FOSSAPII and this one for the International Open Source Network.
FOSS focus near the Angkor Wat
In a historic region home to 12th century temple structures at a town called Siem Reap, FOSS campaigners, supporters, funders and officials from across Asia are prioritising their issues. The focus is on capacity building, localisation, development paradigms of FOSS, open content, e-governance and more.
Geneva to Tunis, will history repeat itself on FOSS?
Is Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) under threat of getting run over at the World Summit on the Information Society meet coming up in mid-November 2005 in Tunis? Voices from civil society fear this is likely to happen.
A link to China: Gong Min
Beijing-based Gong Min, D.Sc., is a council member of the Co-Create Software League of China. CoSoft describes itself thus, "Initiated, legally registered and established in Feb. of 2000 by institutions and individuals that are determined to revive Chinese software industry, it is a nonprofit software technology league. It is made up of members, the Council and executing bodies." Here's a link to some of the work that CoSoft has been doing.
A Frenchman, and maps
Franck Martin is a Frenchman based in the South Pacific. (You might have noticed his sense of humour on the trip to Angkor Wat.) As a Wikipedia contributor, he's described as someone "checking mainly the pages of the Pacific Islands and updating when neccessary. Promotion of wikipedia in Pacific Islands." But what's more interesting is his Tikimaps work.
Copyrights, going insane?
Lawrence Liang believes that copyright as a system, is going insane. Why so? It's showing all the clinical signs of doing so, argues this articulate young lawyer from Bangalore, India.
From books to fonts and local computing
Fifty percent of Nepal's population is still grappling with illiteracy. "Even if we translate everything (on the computer desktop) into Nepali, the people wouldn't understand. They can't read," says Amar Gurung. But that doesn't stop initiatives on the Free and Open Source Software front to localise computing in Nepal.
The doc who talks geek
Dr Molly Cheah Bee Li is a medico by profession. So what's she doing at FOSSAP II? Talking about [GNU]Linux, Apache, Postgres, Php and content management solutions. Take a look at how medicos are deploying IT in Malaysia.
Making cybercafes free and open
What does Indonesia have with cybercafes being run on Free and Open Source Software? The link is strong, and these guys are doing some great work there. Maybe the loss is ours for not being able to understand the language they speak! Here's what happened when we encountered a pack of three CDs... and ran again back into an old story.
Link from the Philippines... and many ideas
Keep in touch with what's happening in the Philippines, a country which has had a user group going for a decade and more. Surely Asia has a lot to learn from here. Marvin Pascual, who heads the Philippine Linux Users' Group, Inc. tells us about the activities of user groups in the Philippines that gives a nice picture of the way ahead.
An education e-primer, and more
Talking about education, if you've not yet come across the IOSN.net education e-primer, then it's probably worth a download. At Siem Reap, Cambodia, participants at FOSSAP-II got freshly-printed copies of this e-primer, together with others on government policy and localisation.
In class, fighting the proprietorial tide
GNU/Linux in education? If you thought you had heard enough on that front, here's some more. And rightly so. This is indeed an important field that needs to be worked on. Reports from Mongolia, Nepal and Pakistant throw up some interesting links.
Questions coming in from Danese Cooper
What's the progress being made by countries like India and Vietnam in convicing their citizens and officials about the many benefits of FOSS? Queries from an Open Source diva.
Brief link... from Jamil
When I searched Technorati.com for FOSSAP-II, this is a link from Jamil in Bangladesh Browsing some links on Jamil's page took me to the Bangaldesh LUG page (is there some problem with this URL... a google search takes me to this page), screenshots of BanglaOffice and a screenshot of a hack on Mozilla Thunderbird for Bangla localization Baaz Paakhi.
Two years, two persons... and some impact
What do you achieve with a fledging organisation, and a rather limited amount of manpower? Quite a bit, it seems, if you follow the Free Software/Open Source mode of functioning. Or so says the IOSN.
Poverty ... and 'piracy'
Poverty and 'piracy'... that's the vicious circle which the poorer countries of the planet are caught up. Can Free and Open Source Software (FOSS, or FLOSS) provide a way out? The United Nations is taking a closer look at a global movement which was spawned by geeks, decades ago, and for entirely different motivations.
Blogging live... or almost
Nice to be at FOSSAP2, meet a whole lot of friends (and, more importantly, persons who one knew earlire largely as email addresses or interesting projects). Most of us reached the venue, in Northern Cambodia, on August 31. By the morning of September 1, the programme got going. Typing in some inputs, while Min Gong of the Chinese Co-Create Association is explaing the history of how FOSS got going, and the challenges it faces in the most populous country of the planet.
In Cambodia, the issue is language
Free software makes sense to Cambodia because it allows a small country of a little over 13 million to work towards language solutions that are relevant to it.
It's announced...
FOSSAP 2 is in early September 2005... in Cambodia.
