BOSTON, Massachusetts, USA -- Wednesday, September 25th, 2019 -- The Free Software Foundation (FSF) today awarded Respects Your Freedom (RYF) certification to the Free Software Wireless-N Mini Router v2 (TPE-R1200) from ThinkPenguin, Inc. The RYF certification mark means that these products meet the FSF's standards in regard to users' freedom, control over the product, and privacy.

This is ThinkPenguin's fourteenth device to receive RYF certification in 2019. The FSF announced certification of seven devices from ThinkPenguin on March 21st, as well as announcing six additional certifications on May 16th. ThinkPenguin continues to expand their collection of RYF-certified devices, already the largest collection of any RYF retailer. This is the first wireless router to receive RYF certification since the Free Software Wireless-N Mini Router (TPE-R1100) in 2016. This latest addition offers users several improvements over previously certified devices.

"The TPE-R1200 is a more powerful version of a previously RYF-certified router and ships with some new features, including two external RP-SMA antennas that provide for a greater wireless range. For those looking to hack on the router, there is a new, more powerful CPU, as well as significantly more NAND, NOR, and RAM," said Christopher Waid, founder and CEO of ThinkPenguin.

As with previous routers from ThinkPenguin, the Free Software Wireless-N Mini Router v2 ships with an FSF-endorsed fully free embedded GNU/Linux distribution called libreCMC. It also comes with a custom flavor of the U-Boot boot loader, assembled by the maintainer of libreCMC and former FSF intern Robert Call. The router enables users to run multiple devices on a network through a VPN service, helping to simplify the process of keeping their communications secure and private. While ThinkPenguin offers a VPN service, users are not required to purchase a subscription, and the device comes with detailed instructions on how to use the router with a wide variety of VPN providers.

"Protecting privacy is more important than ever. It's exciting to have an updated option for users seeking to shield their networks and their personal data," said the FSF's executive director, John Sullivan.

The first Free Software Wireless-N Mini Router served as an example case study in excellent free software license compliance for devices in Copyleft and the GNU General Public License: A Comprehensive Tutorial and Guide.

"ThinkPenguin continues its tradition of exemplary work with the latest edition of the router. It's great to have an organization like ThinkPenguin showing the world what is possible when it comes to offering freedom-respecting devices. They continue to raise the bar in terms of their dedication to offering products that meet the stringent criteria of the Respects Your Freedom certification program," said the FSF's licensing and compliance manager, Donald Robertson, III.

To learn more about the Respects Your Freedom certification program, including details on the certification of these ThinkPenguin devices, please visit https://fsf.org/ryf.

Retailers interested in applying for certification can consult https://www.fsf.org/resources/hw/endorsement/criteria.

About the Free Software Foundation

The Free Software Foundation, founded in 1985, is dedicated to promoting computer users' right to use, study, copy, modify, and redistribute computer programs. The FSF promotes the development and use of free (as in freedom) software -- particularly the GNU operating system and its GNU/Linux variants -- and free documentation for free software. The FSF also helps to spread awareness of the ethical and political issues of freedom in the use of software, and its Web sites, located at https://fsf.org and https://gnu.org, are an important source of information about GNU/Linux. Donations to support the FSF's work can be made at https://donate.fsf.org. Its headquarters are in Boston, MA, USA.

More information about the FSF, as well as important information for journalists and publishers, is at https://www.fsf.org/press.

About ThinkPenguin, Inc.

Started by Christopher Waid, founder and CEO, ThinkPenguin, Inc. is a consumer-driven company with a mission to bring free software to the masses. At the core of the company is a catalog of computers and accessories with broad support for GNU/Linux. The company provides technical support for end-users and works with the community, distributions, and upstream projects to make GNU/Linux all that it can be.

Media Contacts

Donald Robertson, III
Licensing and Compliance Manager
Free Software Foundation
+1 (617) 542 5942
licensing@fsf.org

ThinkPenguin, Inc.
+1 (888) 39 THINK (84465) x703
media@thinkpenguin.com

The board will be conducting a search for a new president, beginning immediately. Further details of the search will be published on fsf.org.

For questions, contact FSF executive director John Sullivan at johns@fsf.org.

BOSTON, Massachusetts, USA -- Thursday, September 12th, 2019 -- A global community of students, teachers, and activists are taking part in the Defective by Design campaign's 13th annual International Day Against DRM. Though from different backgrounds, countries, and perspectives, participants in the campaign share the common cause of opposing Digital Restrictions Management (DRM), a widespread technology that places heavy restrictions on how people access digital media.

On Saturday, October 12th, there will be two events held in Boston: a protest outside of the Pearson Education offices at 501 Boylston Street, followed by an evening "hackathon," or collaboration session, on unrestricted and truly shareable educational materials at the offices of the Free Software Foundation (FSF) at 51 Franklin Street.

Typically, DRM is used to restrict a user's access to music, films, and software. It is embedded in both physical and digital media, such as the "copy protection" on a Blu-ray disc or the mechanism that prevents recording (or even taking screenshots) from services like Netflix. Increasingly, however, it has been extending into the realm of education. Pearson Education and similar publishers' move to a "digital-first" method of textbook distribution is an example of this. This new method of educational publishing forces students away from the reliability of a paper book, moving them instead to a temporarily "rented" text that can only be accessed under strictly specific conditions and for a limited amount of time. In many cases systems like these also require a constant Internet connection for authentication purposes, to make sure the reader is authorized to access their book, and additionally collects telemetric data based on their reading habits.

"DRM is about more than just 'bad' file formats or streaming services. It is more than just an inconvenience. DRM is a concerted attack on free society," said Greg Farough, campaigns manager at the FSF. "It isn't just that DRM is an ineffective method of protecting copyright, or that it undermines historic preservation of digital media. It is fundamentally unethical and anti-education. The International Day Against DRM is one way we can empower people to take a strong stance against DRM, and educate others on its importance. I'm very glad that this year we will be able to voice our dissent against DRM, as well as demonstrate that it is possible to envision a world without it."

Now in its 13th year, Defective by Design has a long history of campaigning for a user's rights to control their media and the devices they use to interact with it. Likewise, being the anti-DRM campaign of the FSF, it is inspired by the spirit and community of the global movement for user freedom. This year, Defective by Design is not only encouraging people to protest against Pearson, but is also sponsoring local and remote "hackathons" on collaboratively edited and shareable textbooks like those produced by FLOSSManuals and Wikibooks.

The campaign is encouraging people to participate in a variety of online and in-person actions, coordinated through the Web site dedicated to the anti-DRM cause at DefectivebyDesign.org. To be part of Defective by Design's year-round anti-DRM campaigns, supporters can join the low-volume Action Alerts email list. Those interested in more active participation in the fight against DRM are invited to join the FSF's LibrePlanet wiki to document the new developments and threats DRM poses to user freedom worldwide.

Along with blockchain technologies, artificial intelligence, and algorithms, DRM has been a hot issue this year, and has been reported on widely in the press:

• Reacting to Microsoft's announcement that they would be closing down their ebook store (and with it, the forcible deletion of many of its users ebook libraries), Wired wrote a popular article on the "ebook apocalypse" users of the service faced.

• The MIT Press issued a landmark study on the use of DRM in streaming media services, analyzing both the technical and ethical implications of the popularity of Spotify and its ability to leverage DRM-restricted media to gather data and even psychologically manipulate its users. During their work on Spotify Teardown: Inside the Black Box of Streaming Music, the authors received a cease and desist notice from the company.

• Writing for Locus Magazine, author and technologist Cory Doctorow wrote on the "broken promise" of DRM, calling the shift from a user's "owning" a piece of digital media to "licensing" it a return to feudalism.

• An article addressing the shutdown of the digital video service UltraViolet appeared in Forbes, highlighting it as a Hollywood failure to control the flow of digital media.

The campaign is inviting other organizations to participate, by contacting info@defectivebydesign.org to have their names added to a list of supporters, and to discuss possible actions. In 2018, organizations like the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Creative Commons, iFixIt, and the Document Foundation were partners.

About Defective By Design

Defective by Design is the Free Software Foundation's campaign against Digital Restrictions Management (DRM). DRM is the practice of imposing technological restrictions that control what users can do with digital media, creating a product that is defective by design. DRM requires the use of proprietary software, and is a major threat to computer user freedom. It often spies on users as well. The campaign, based at https://defectivebydesign.org, organizes anti-DRM activists for in-person and online actions, and challenges powerful media and technology interests promoting DRM. Supporters can donate to the campaign at https://crm.fsf.org/civicrm/contribute/transact?reset=1&id=40.

About the Free Software Foundation

The Free Software Foundation, founded in 1985, is dedicated to promoting computer users' right to use, study, copy, modify, and redistribute computer programs. The FSF promotes the development and use of free (as in freedom) software -- particularly the GNU operating system and its GNU/Linux variants -- and free documentation for free software. The FSF also helps to spread awareness of the ethical and political issues of freedom in the use of software, and its Web sites, located at fsf.org and gnu.org, are an important source of information about GNU/Linux. Donations to support the FSF's work can be made at https://donate.fsf.org. Its headquarters are in Boston, MA, USA.

Media Contact

Greg Farough
Campaigns Manager
Free Software Foundation
(617) 542-5942
campaigns@fsf.org

The CLE seminar is a regular program from the FSF, where a select a group of experts and experienced instructors in the free software community provide a comprehensive overview of current affairs in GPL Enforcement and Legal Ethics. We invite legal professionals, law students, free software developers, and anyone interested in licensing and compliance topics to join. While registration is open to the public, this seminar is a special opportunity for legal professionals and law students who can potentially earn continuing legal education (CLE) credits for participating (approval pending). The program will be available shortly on the event page.

Register now for early registration prices. Regular pricing starts on September 16th. FSF Associate members, as always, get discounted entry. Registration for this event closes on Friday October 4th, 2019.

Attendees of the full day seminar will learn about copyleft and other important concepts in the GNU family of licenses, best practices in the free software licensing enforcement process, ethical considerations important to any lawyer working with clients involved in free software, and other current topics in free software licensing.

We are also opening up the event for potential sponsorships; offering a unique opportunity to align with the FSF and the professional ethics considerations in free software. Sponsors will receive complimentary passes to this event, as well as additional benefits. For more information, you can contact us at zoe@fsf.org.

The sessions will be led by experts and respected leaders in the free software community, including:

• Bradley Kuhn, president of the Software Freedom Conservancy and a member of the Board of Directors of the FSF;

• Justin C. Colannino, JD, Open Source & Standards Attorney at Microsoft;

• Marc Jones, JD, in-house counsel and compliance engineer at CivicActions; and

• Donald R. Robertson, III, JD, licensing and compliance manager of the Free Software Foundation.

FSF executive director John Sullivan will also be giving introductory and closing remarks.

A detailed agenda, as well as curriculum materials, will soon be posted on the event page. If you have any questions, or if you would like to sponsor this event, please contact licensing@fsf.org.

Thanks in advance for helping us spread the word, and we hope to see you at the event.

Register now!

Event page

The full list of FSF board members can be found at https://www.fsf.org/about/staff-and-board.

A longtime free software activist and founder of FSF Latin America, Oliva brings decades of experience in the free software movement to the FSF board. In the community, he is held in especially high regard for being the chief developer of the GNU Linux-libre project, a version of the kernel Linux that removes all nonfree bits from the kernel's source code, enabling users around the world to run fully free versions of the GNU/Linux operating system, and is a program of vital importance in the cause for software freedom. For his deep commitment and tireless work in free software, Oliva was the recipient of the 2016 Advancement of Free Software award given annually by the FSF.

Aside from being a contributor to the GNU Project since 1993, Oliva is an accomplished public speaker and author on the importance of software freedom. He worked as a computer engineer at Red Hat from 2000 to 2019, making large contributions to crucial components of the GNU toolchain like GCC and the GNU C library. Most recently he has announced the founding of the 0G project, a vision for mobile phones that free users from the constant danger posed by bulk surveillance.

Upon his nomination to the board, Alexandre stated, "In 2017, I borrowed from Edward Snowden's 2016's LibrePlanet speech and qualified the FSF as the lighthouse of the free software movement, the reliable reference point that lights the path to software freedom. How exciting, and what a wonderful challenge it is to become part of a team that has to figure out what the path to be lighted is, and how to keep the lights shining through such dark times!"

Commenting on Oliva's nomination, FSF executive director John Sullivan said, "Alex's steadfast commitment to free software principles, along with his technical contributions aimed at helping others around the world live free lives, have inspired so many of us at the FSF and in the free software movement. This is great news for our members and supporters -- the FSF will benefit enormously from his increased involvement."

About the Free Software Foundation

The Free Software Foundation, founded in 1985, is dedicated to promoting computer users' right to use, study, copy, modify, and redistribute computer programs. The FSF promotes the development and use of free (as in freedom) software -- particularly the GNU operating system and its GNU/Linux variants -- and free documentation for free software. The FSF also helps to spread awareness of the ethical and political issues of freedom in the use of software, and its Web sites, located at https://fsf.org and https://gnu.org, are an important source of information about GNU/Linux. Donations to support the FSF's work can be made at https://donate.fsf.org. Its headquarters are in Boston, MA, USA.

More information about the FSF, as well as important information for journalists and publishers, is at https://www.fsf.org/press.

Media Contact

John Sullivan
Executive Director
Free Software Foundation
+1 (617) 542 5942
campaigns@fsf.org