Free Software Foundation
Free Software Foundation (FSF) is a non-profit organisation founded in 1985 by Richard Stallman to support the free software movement (free as in freedom), and in particular the GNU project.
From its founding until the mid-1990s FSF's funds were mostly used to employ software developers to write free software. Since the mid- to late 1990s there are now many companies and individuals writing free software, so FSF's employees and volunteers mostly work on legal and structural issues for the free software community.
Current work of FSF
- GPL Enforcement
- FSF have the resources and the will to enforce the GPL and other GNU licenses. FSF handles around 50 GPL violations per year and tries to bring the other party into compliance without involving the courts. As of January 2004, no one has yet taken FSF to court over a copyright dispute.
- GNU Licenses
- The GNU GPL is the most widely used license for Free Software projects. The current version (version 2) was released in 1991 but FSF are working on a version 3. FSF have also published the GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL), and the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL).
- Guardian of copyrights
- FSF holds the copyrights to all GNU software and some non-GNU Free Software. They require copyright assignment papers from each contributor to GNU packages so that they can defend the software in court if a dispute arises, and so that if there is a need to change the license of a work, it can be done without having to contact all contributors that have ever worked on the software.
- The Free Software Directory
- This is a listing of software packages which have been verified as free software. Each package entry contains 47 pieces of information such as the project's homepage, developers, programming language, etc. The goals are to provide a search engine for free software, and to provide a cross-reference for users to check if a package has been verified as being free software. FSF has received a small amount of funding from UNESCO for this project. It is hoped that the directory can be translated in to many languages in the future.
- Maintaining the Free Software Definition
- FSF maintain many of the documents that define the Free Software movement
- Legal Education
- FSF hold seminars about legal aspects of using the GPL, and offers a consultancy service for lawyers.
- Project Hosting
- FSF provide project hosting via their website.
- FSF Award for the Advancement of Free Software
- An annual award.
Structure
Membership
On November 25, 2002 the FSF launched the FSF Associate Membership program for individuals. In April 2004 they had over 2044 members. On March 5 2003 they launched a Corporate Patronage program for commercial entities. As of April 2004, they have 45 corporate patrons.
Organizational
FSF has a board of directors with six members:
- Geoffery Knauth, Senior Software Engineer at SFA, Inc.
- Lawrence Lessig, Professor of Law at Stanford University
- Eben Moglen, Professor of Law and Legal History at Columbia University
- Henri Poole, Founder of CivicActions, a grassroots campaign technology consulting firm.
- Richard Stallman, Founder of FSF and the GNU Project and author of the GNU GPL, Versions 1 and 2
- Gerald Sussman, Professor of Computer Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Other positions held:
- Richard Stallman: President
- Eben Moglen: General Counsel
- Dan Ravicher: Senior Counsel
- Peter Brown: Financial Controller
- Lisa "Opus" Goldstein: Business Manager
- David "Novalis" Turner: GPL Compliance Engineer
- Janet Casey, Free Software Directory maintainer
- John Sullivan, programs administrator
- Ted Teah, Copyright Assignments clerk
- Ravi Khanna
- Ted Teah
Previous employees:
- Leslie Proctor Public Relations
- Robert J. Chassell: Founding Director and Treasurer
- Tim Ney CEO 1998-2001
- Thomas Bushnell GNU hacker, GNU Hurd
- Roland McGrath GNU hacker, GNU Libc, Make, GNU Hurd
- Leonard Tower GNU hacker
- Mike Haertel GNU hacker, diff, grep
- Pete TerMaat GNU hacker, GDB
- Phil Nelson GNU hacker
- Jay Fenlason GNU hacker, sed
- Brian Fox GNU hacker, Bash
- Noboyuki Hikichi GNU hacker
- Paul Rubin GNU hacker, cpp
- Ariel Rios GNU hacker, Guile
- Boston, Massachusetts. The office is managed by Bradley Kuhn.
Sister organisations
In 2001, Free Software Foundation Europe was founded in Germany to act as a "hub" for the Free Software organisations of Europe. In 2003, Free Software Foundation India was founded in Kerala. On the 20th anniversary of the GNU Project (January 5 2004), the Irish Free Software Foundation was founded to promote free software in Ireland.
