Nominations for the 18th annual Free Software Awards opened at LibrePlanet 2015, right after the most recent Free Software Awards were presented -- and we need you to nominate more projects by November 1st, 2015 at 23:59 UTC. To nominate an individual for the Award for the Advancement of Free Software or a project for the Award for Projects of Social Benefit, send your nomination along with a description of the project or individual to award-nominations@gnu.org.

If you know a free software contributor or project that deserves celebration, don't hesitate to nominate them! This is your opportunity to publicly recognize people and projects that have inspired you. Your nominations will be reviewed by our awards committee and the winners will be announced at LibrePlanet 2016.

Award for the Advancement of Free Software

The Free Software Foundation Award for the Advancement of Free Software is presented annually by FSF president Richard Stallman to an individual who has made a great contribution to the progress and development of free software, through activities that accord with the spirit of free software.

Last year, Sébastien Jodogne was recognized with the Award for the Advancement of Free Software for his work on free software medical imaging with his project Orthanc

Award for Projects of Social Benefit

The Award for Projects of Social Benefit is presented to the project or team responsible for applying free software, or the ideas of the free software movement, in a project that intentionally and significantly benefits society in other aspects of life.

We look to recognize projects or teams that encourage people to cooperate in freedom to accomplish tasks of great social benefit, and those that apply free software ideas and lessons outside the free software community. A long-term commitment to one's project (or the potential for a long-term commitment) is crucial to this end.

This award stresses the use of free software in the service of humanity. We have deliberately chosen this broad criterion so that many different areas of activity can be considered. However, one area that is not included is that of free software itself. Projects with a primary goal of promoting or advancing free software are not eligible for this award (we honor individuals working on those projects with our annual Award for the Advancement of Free Software).

We will consider any project or team that uses free software or its philosophy to address a goal important to society. To qualify, a project must use free software, produce free documentation, or use the idea of free software as defined in the Free Software Definition. Projects that promote or depend on the use of non-free software are not eligible for this award. Commercial projects are not excluded, but commercial success is not our scale for judging projects.

Last year, Reglue received the award, in recognition of its work giving GNU/Linux computers to underprivileged children and their families in Austin, TX.

Eligibility

In the case of both awards, previous winners are not eligible for nomination, but renomination of other previous nominees is encouraged. Only individuals are eligible for nomination for the Advancement of Free Software Award (not projects), and only projects can be nominated for the Social Benefit Award (not individuals). For a list of previous winners, please visit https://www.fsf.org/awards.

Current FSF staff and board members, as well as award committee members, are not eligible.

The tentative award committee members are: Hong Feng, Marina Zhurakhinskaya, Yukihiro Matsumoto, Suresh Ramasubramanian, Fernanda Weiden, Matthew Garrett, Jonas Öberg, Wietse Venema, Vernor Vinge, Rob Savoy, Harald Welte, and Andrew Tridgell.

Instructions

After reviewing the eligibility rules above, please send your nominations to award-nominations@gnu.org, on or before Sunday, November 1st, 2015 at 23:59 UTC. Please submit nominations in the following format:

• In the email message subject line, either put the name of the person you are nominating for the Award for Advancement of Free Software, or put the name of the project for the Award for Projects of Social Benefit.
  

• Please include, in the body of your message, an explanation (forty lines or less) of the work done and why you think it is especially important to the advancement of software freedom or how it benefits society, respectively.
  

• Please state, in the body of your message, where to find the materials (e.g., software, manuals, or writing) which your nomination is based on.
  

Attend the Free Software Awards at LibrePlanet 2016

Want to be in the room when the winners are announced? Registration will open soon for the LibrePlanet conference, March 19-20 2016, in Cambridge, MA. You can meet the award winners and take part in a program devoted to the world of free software. Remember: Free Software Foundation members attend LibrePlanet gratis!

16 new GNU releases in the last month (as of August 24, 2015):

• ccaudio2-2.1.7
• ccscript-5.0.6
• easejs-0.2.6
• gama-1.16
• glibc-2.22
• gnupg-2.1.7
• gnu-pw-mgr-1.5
• gnutls-3.4.4
• guix-0.8.3
• icecat-31.8.0-gnu2
• libidn-1.32
• ncurses-6.0
• parallel-20150822
• sipwitch-1.9.9
• teseq-1.1.1
• ucommon-6.5.4

For announcements of most new GNU releases, subscribe to the info-gnu mailing list: http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/info-gnu.

To download: nearly all GNU software is available from http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/, or preferably one of its mirrors from http://www.gnu.org/prep/ftp.html. You can use the url http://ftpmirror.gnu.org/ to be automatically redirected to a (hopefully) nearby and up-to-date mirror.

This month, we welcome Scotty Moran as the new maintainer of GNU sysutils and Arthur Schwarz as the maintainer of the new GNU package gSlip.

A number of GNU packages, as well as the GNU operating system as a whole, are looking for maintainers and other assistance: please see http://www.gnu.org/server/takeaction.html#unmaint if you'd like to help. The general page on how to help GNU is at http://www.gnu.org/help/help.html.

If you have a working or partly working program that you'd like to offer to the GNU project as a GNU package, see http://www.gnu.org/help/evaluation.html.

As always, please feel free to write to us at maintainers@gnu.org with any GNUish questions or suggestions for future installments.

Pledge to help a friend switch to GNU/Linux today.

We've also created a new area on our site for people interested in switching from Windows. Check it out, and share it with your friends to get them excited about joining you in the free world.

The FSF maintains a list of endorsed GNU/Linux distributions, and there are myriad resources online for getting started. If your friend wants to try free software but can't be persuaded to leave Windows quite yet, show them these free programs that work on Windows. If they're thinking about buying a new computer, show them the laptops we certify through our Respects Your Freedom program. If they're the type that builds their own computer, they can use h-node, the community-maintained database of computer components that work well with free software.

We can't hope to match Microsoft's huge advertising budget, but if you're on social media (see our recommendations for user-respecting social media systems) you can help raise awareness of Windows' abuses and encourage people to switch, in your own words. Help us jam Microsoft's ridiculous #UpgradeYourWorld hashtag by including it in your posts encouraging people to steer clear of Windows.

Join the FSF and friends Friday, August 28, from 12pm to 3pm EDT (16:00 to 19:00 UTC) to help improve the Free Software Directory by adding new entries and updating existing ones. We will be on IRC in the #fsf channel on freenode.

Tens of thousands of people visit directory.fsf.org each month to discover free software. Each entry in the Directory contains a wealth of useful information, from basic category and descriptions, to providing detailed info about version control, IRC channels, documentation, and licensing info that has been carefully checked by FSF staff and trained volunteers.

While the Free Software Directory has been and continues to be a great resource to the world over the past decade, it has the potential of being a resource of even greater value. But it needs your help!

If you are eager to help and you can't wait or are simply unable to make it onto IRC on Friday, our participation guide will provide you with all the information you need to get started on helping the Directory today! There are also weekly FSD Meetings pages that everyone is welcome to contribute to before, during, and after each meeting.

GNU Press announces the release of Emacs Manual Version 24.5, which contains approximately 2.5 more years of Emacs documentation than version 24.2. Each manual comes with an Emacs Reference Card Version 24.5, which can also be purchased separately. Also, there are a few copies of Emacs Manual Version 24.2, which has now been reduced to $35.

There are a few logo knives left in the shop, and they will not be reordered. The logo knives come in two types: the larger cybertool, which is the perfect toolkit for system administrators on the go, and the rally knives, which are more compact.

An Introduction to Programming in Emacs Lisp, 3rd Edition is the perfect book to learn about programming and is now reduced in price to $25! Now, you may also pick up a copy of the book signed by Richard Stallman.

As always, if you can't find something in the store but think we should offer it, please add your suggestion to our Ideas page. And remember, associate members of the Free Software Foundation get a 20% discount on all purchases made through the GNU Press store, so if you are not a member already, join today! To keep up with announcements about new products available in the GNU Press store, subscribe to the mailing list.