The LogiLogi Foundation

Yesterday we were at the Software Freedom Day kickoff in Baarn, the Netherlands. We gave a presentation there on Freedom on the Brave New Web, and on LogiLogi.org, and a bit on our current efforts to make it usable to the max. It went well, and there also was a nice discussion afterward.

The slides of our presentation can be found here. A video might also become available, and in any case here is already a pre-view of the new UI we’re (Bruno, Wybo & Charles here and there :) making (full size here):

Last wednesday I attended the discussion-meeting of the Dutch Internet Society called: “the unworkable internet”. It was about a Dutch ISP who was almost extradited to India for hosting the site of a foundation that was critical towards child-labor practices in some Indian companies… Especially scary about this is that no check or veto by an European judge is possible before extradition.

A defamation case in India, and a request from them is enough, even if no case like this would be possible in Europe because of the protection of free speech (and other human rights) we enjoy here. The treaties the Dutch (and many other western nations) have with countries like India often still stem from the 19th century, when the political and especially the technical situation was completely different. The closest thing one could do back then without setting foot on Indian soil was probably defamation over telegraph-wire. So surely there should change something here (and there)...

Version 3 of the Affero GPL has just been released by the Free Software Foundation (FSF). It seems that the FSF is endorsing the Affero GPL more openly now than they used to: “The FSF recommends that people consider using the GNU AGPL for any software which will commonly be run over a network”.

It seems now finally the FSF is no longer taking sides in the sense in which Archis – even if currently working for Microsoft – already stated in his GPLv3: Is Stallman taking sides.

Nevertheless I still wonder if and in what ways Stallmans own views might have changed or might be changing in his upcoming article on this matter.

But regardless; we are happy with the new license, and after reading it carefully, we decided to use it for OgOg and LogiLogi Manta as it reflects our views on Free Web-software better than version 2.

Let’s hope the FSF as of now continues to be as much for Freedom on the Web as we are.

When I sent Why Freedom Matters for Web 2.0 to Richard Stallman, it basically only contained a link to the video of my presentation about freedom and the web at T-Dose 2007. He then replied to me that it was inconvenient for him to download and play (OGG)-video’s on his machine, so hereby for him, and for all of you, the substance of the presentation written out. For those who want to view the video and can’t play OGG but other formats, try Google video, but keep in mind what you just did, while watching or reading.

Why freedom matters for the web ? Many acknowledge the importance of Free Software; code that one can use for any purpose, modify and share, because of the freedoms it ensures. But now with the growth of Web 2.0, more and more software runs on remote servers and via the Web-Loophole in the GPL this means that it does not need to be free from the viewpoint of normal users (no access the code on remote servers), even if GPLed. Nor does it in principle need to be free in this broad sense according to Stallman’s current views (which can be found here). Why this is a problem, and why I think that Freedom does matter for the web I will now explain. For this I will first try to make clear what this so called Web 2.0 could be.

Web 2.0 can be understood as a division of labor for the web itself. Functions that used to be there in many sites, like the front-page, the profile-page, search, pictures, a login, avatars, etc., are now becoming separate services like Digg, one’s Blog, Google, Flickr, OpenID / MS Passport, and Gravatar to name a few. These are essentially pie-sliced applications that in varying degrees can be tied together in mashups, not unlike to how small, specialized programs can be piped together in the Unix philosophy.

Freedom matters, not just for software like your Operating System or Firefox, but also for live web-applications. And with more and more functionality and social uses of software moving to the web it will soon only matter more.

About this was my talk at the T-Dose conference of one and a half week ago. I only now come to write about it as my (Wybo’s) father died just 10 days before the conference, and I’ve spent much time with my family since then. And yet even after this unsettling confrontation with the uncertainties of life, freedom for the Web still matters to me.

The presentation first goes into the nature of Web 2.0, and why freedom matters there. Then follows an intermezzo about our project LogiLogi Manta, which is nearing completion. After that it tells about the tendency of many – and especially a certain well known search-engine from Mountain View – to be open at every level except where it would matter most; their own level. Then the distinction is made between 3 planes of freedom for the web; code, data, and community- rights. Two of these 3 levels of freedom go beyond the already much more widely acknowledged importance of Free Software.

So if you have 30 minutes to spare, I would say; have a look at the presentation for yourself. A video is online here in the Ogg-format (If you’re not Dutch you can skip the first 2 minutes of the video, my talk is in English as of that point), and here is a different video in mov-format. A google-video is upcoming ;)

The sheets can be browsed or downloaded as a pdf.

Besides this the conference was great with interesting people like Bas de Lange of Software Freedom Day and Oliver Cleynen of GNU/Linux Matters. Oliver held a talk that is of interest too in the context of Freedom and Freedom for the Web. It can be viewed here

Most web2.0 software is community-software. Software around which a virtual community forms. People writing, talking, socializing, and presenting themselves through carefully crafted identities. These identities and their belongings can be quite valuable to us, whether directly or indirectly through the time and effort we invested in them. But to what extent are we free to do what we want with our creations on the web ?

What can we do, and what not on the web ? Most likely there will be policies on sites about what is ok, and what a nono. These are what most of us would see as examples of regulations. But are there any other ? Yes we think so, there is the software itself: enabling some things, making other things hard, and making zillions of things even plain impossible. The software running on the server is effectively a law of nature in virtual communities…