On 2 Nov 2007, the Free Software Foundation Europe held an event in London, UK called "Free Software as a Social Innovation" to which I was fortunate to be invited.

"I've been silent for a long time. Life is funny - one minute you're trucking along, advocating Free Software, and the next you're being pulled in 4 different directions at once. Maybe I've been absent from running my site, but I'm still advocating Free Software. Just this past weekend I helped a lady whose previous vendor left her high and dry with her non-free software licenses.

"I am a supporter and user of free software (though I admit I have not migrated entirely). I research and write about the social movement aspect of free software, and its potential as a model for alternative social organization beyond the realm of software development. I am inspired by the future envisioned by free software and take heart from its existence here and now.

The FSF is launching a new advocacy campaign, and we'd love to have you involved. One of the most important tasks for us at FSF is to help foster the understanding that free software is crucial to a free society, and that citizens should switch to free software at home and in their own work, for freedom's sake.

"On Friday 2nd November I attended the London FSFE event, Free Software as a Social Innovation. I am not really a techie (though I have been Free since 1998) and certainly not in an NGO, but had asked to go because I wanted to see some ground level advocacy in action.

I had an interesting day. Feel "Free" to read on..."

"Open source is a development methodology; free software is a social movement. For the free software movement, free software is an ethical imperative, because only free software respects the users' freedom. By contrast, the philosophy of open source considers issues in terms of how to make software “better”—in a practical sense only. It says that non-free software is a suboptimal solution.

The purpose of the Free Software Foundation (FSF) is probably obvious from its name -- but what does promoting free software mean in terms of everyday activity? Examining the roles of the organization shows how complex the FSF's advocacy role has become.

“Open Source” advocate: «...I associate much more with the "Open Source" (also as Richard defines it) camp, and am open to the existence and use of proprietary software...» --

"...Free Software Foundation Europe and M6-IT would like to invite you to a one day event at The Hub in London on the 2nd of November. The event will help people learn more about Free Software and provide opportunities for hands-on experience with the technology. It's organised as part of the work in the STACS project....