BOSTON, Massachusetts, USA -- Wednesday, February 28, 2018 -- The Free Software Foundation (FSF) today published its Fiscal Year (FY) 2016 Annual Report.

The report is available in low-resolution (11.5 MB PDF) and high-resolution (207.2 MB PDF).

The Annual Report reviews the Foundation's activities, accomplishments, and financial picture from October 1, 2015 to September 30, 2016. It is the result of a full external financial audit, along with a focused study of program results. It examines the impact of the FSF's programs, and FY2016's major events, including LibrePlanet, the creation of ethical criteria for code-hosting repositories, and the expansion of the Respects Your Freedom computer hardware product certification program.

"More people and businesses are using free software than ever before," said FSF executive director John Sullivan in his introduction to the FY2016 report. "That's big news, but our most important measure of success is the support for the ideals. In that area, we have momentum on our side."

As with all of the Foundation's activities, the Annual Report was made using free software, including Inkscape, GIMP, and PDFsam, along with freely licensed fonts and images.

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://my.fsf.org/donate. 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 Contacts

Georgia Young
Program Manager
Free Software Foundation
+1 (617) 542 5942 x 17
campaigns@fsf.org

BOSTON, Massachusetts, USA -- Tuesday, January 30, 2018 -- The Free Software Foundation (FSF) announced it has received a record-breaking charitable contribution of 91.45 Bitcoin from the Pineapple Fund, valued at $1 million at the time of the donation. This gift is a testament to the importance of free software, computer user freedom, and digital rights when technology is interwoven with daily life.

"Free software is more than open source; it is a movement that encourages community collaboration and protects users' freedom," wrote Pine, the Pineapple Fund's founder. "The Free Software Foundation does amazing work, and I'm certain the funds will be put to good use."

"The FSF is honored to receive this generous donation from the Pineapple Fund in service of the free software movement," said John Sullivan, FSF executive director. "We will use it to further empower free software activists and developers around the world. Now is a critical time for computer user freedom, and this gift will make a tremendous difference in our ability, as a movement, to meet the challenges."

The anonymous Pineapple Fund, created to give away $86 million worth of Bitcoin to charities and social causes, "is about making bold and smart bets that hopefully impact everyone in our world."

The FSF believes free software does impact everyone, and this gift from the Pineapple Fund will be used to:

• Increase innovation and the number of new projects in high priority areas of free software development, including the GNU Project;

• Expand the FSF's licensing, compliance, and hardware device certification programs;

• Bring the free software movement to new audiences;

• Contribute to the long-term stability of the organization.

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 Contacts

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

The keynote speakers for the tenth annual LibrePlanet conference will be anthropologist and author Gabriella Coleman, free software policy expert and community advocate Deb Nicholson, Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) senior staff technologist Seth Schoen, and FSF founder and president Richard Stallman. Register for this year's conference here!

LibrePlanet is an annual conference for people who care about their digital freedoms, bringing together software developers, policy experts, activists, and computer users to learn skills, share accomplishments, and tackle challenges facing the free software movement. The theme of this year's conference is Freedom. Embedded. In a society reliant on embedded systems -- in cars, digital watches, traffic lights, and even within our bodies -- how do we defend computer user freedom, protect ourselves against corporate and government surveillance, and move toward a freer world? LibrePlanet 2018 will explore these topics in sessions for all ages and experience levels.

Gabriella (Biella) Coleman is best known in the free software community for her book Coding Freedom: The Ethics and Aesthetics of Hacking. Trained as an anthropologist, Coleman holds the Wolfe Chair in Scientific and Technological Literacy at McGill University. Her scholarship explores the intersection of the cultures of hacking and politics, with a focus on the sociopolitical implications of the free software movement and the digital protest ensemble Anonymous, the latter in her book Hacker, Hoaxer, Whistleblower, Spy: The Many Faces of Anonymous.

Deb Nicholson is a free software policy expert and a passionate community advocate, notably contributing to GNU MediaGoblin and OpenHatch. She is the Community Outreach Director for the Open Invention Network, the world's largest patent non-aggression community, which serves the kernel Linux, GNU, Android, and other key free software projects. A perennial speaker at LibrePlanet, this is Nicholson's first keynote at the conference.

"They are all too modest to say it, but these speakers will blow your mind," said FSF executive director John Sullivan. "Don't miss this opportunity to hear about how technology controls our core freedoms, how people are working together in communities to build software that truly empowers, and how you can both benefit from and contribute to these efforts."

Seth David Schoen has worked at the EFF for over a decade, creating the Staff Technologist position and helping other technologists understand the civil liberties implications of their work, helping EFF staff better understand technology related to EFF's legal work, and helping the public understand what the products they use really do. Schoen last spoke at LibrePlanet in 2015, when he introduced Let's Encrypt, the automated, free software-based certificate authority.

FSF president Richard Stallman will present the Free Software Awards, and discuss pressing threats and important opportunities for software freedom. Dr. Richard Stallman launched the free software movement in 1983 and started the development of the GNU operating system (see www.gnu.org) in 1984. GNU is free software: everyone has the freedom to copy it and redistribute it, with or without changes. The GNU/Linux system, basically the GNU operating system with Linux added, is used on tens of millions of computers today. Stallman has received the ACM Grace Hopper Award, a MacArthur Foundation fellowship, the Electronic Frontier Foundation's Pioneer Award, and the the Takeda Award for Social/Economic Betterment, as well as several doctorates honoris causa, and has been inducted into the Internet Hall of Fame.

About LibrePlanet

LibrePlanet is the annual conference of the Free Software Foundation. Begun as a modest gathering of FSF members, the conference now is a large, vibrant gathering of free software enthusiasts, welcoming anyone interested in software freedom and digital rights. Registration is now open, and admission is gratis for FSF members and students.

For the fifth year in a row, LibrePlanet will be held at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on March 24th and 25th, 2017. Co-presented by the Free Software Foundation and MIT's Student Information Processing Board (SIPB), the rest of the LibrePlanet program will be announced soon. The opening keynote at LibrePlanet 2017 was given by Kade Crockford, Director of the Technology for Liberty Program at the ACLU of Massachusetts, and the closing keynote was given by Sumana Harihareswara, founder of Changeset Consulting.

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.

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

Media Contact

Georgia Young
Program Manager
Free Software Foundation
+1 (617) 542 5942
campaigns@fsf.org

The FSF's list showcases GNU/Linux operating system distributions whose developers have made a commitment to follow its Guidelines for Free System Distributions. Each one includes and endorses exclusively free "as in freedom" software.

After extensive evaluation and many iterations, the FSF concluded that PureOS, a modern and user-friendly Debian-derived distribution, meets these criteria.

"The FSF's high standards for distributions help users know which ones will honor their desire to be fully in control of their computers and devices. These standards also help drive the development work needed to make the free world's tools more practical and powerful than the proprietary dystopia exemplified by Windows, iOS, and Chrome. PureOS is living -- and growing -- proof that you can meet ethical standards while also achieving excellence in user experience," said John Sullivan, FSF's executive director.

"PureOS is a GNU operating system that embodies privacy, security, and convenience strictly with free software throughout. Working with the Free Software Foundation in this multi-year endorsement effort solidifies our longstanding belief that free software is the nucleus for all things ethical for users. Using PureOS ensures you are using an ethical operating system, committed to providing the best in privacy, security, and freedom," said Todd Weaver, Founder & CEO of Purism.

FSF's licensing and compliance manager, Donald Robertson, added, "An operating system like PureOS is a giant collection of software, much of which in the course of use encourages installation of even more software like plugins and extensions. Issues are inevitable, but the team behind PureOS worked incredibly hard to fix everything we identified. They didn't just fix the issues for their own distribution -- they sent fixes upstream, and are developing new extension 'store' mechanisms that won't recommend nonfree software to users. Our endorsement means we are confident not just in the current state of affairs, but also in the team's commitment to quickly address any problems that do arise."

PureOS is developed through a combination of volunteer contributions and work funded by the company Purism. The FSF's announcement today is about the PureOS distribution, which can be installed by users on many kinds of computers and devices. It is not a certification of any particular hardware shipping with PureOS. Any such endorsements will be announced separately as part of the FSF's Respects Your Freedom device certification program.

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.

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

About the GNU Operating System and Linux

Richard Stallman announced in September 1983 the plan to develop a free software Unix-like operating system called GNU. GNU is the only operating system developed specifically for the sake of users' freedom. See https://www.gnu.org/gnu/the-gnu-project.html.

In 1992, the essential components of GNU were complete, except for one, the kernel. When in 1992 the kernel Linux was re-released under the GNU GPL, making it free software, the combination of GNU and Linux formed a complete free operating system, which made it possible for the first time to run a PC without nonfree software. This combination is the GNU/Linux system. For more explanation, see https://www.gnu.org/gnu/gnu-linux-faq.html.

Media Contacts

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

Image and logo by the PureOS team licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

The Combined Federal Campaign (CFC) is the world's largest annual workplace giving campaign, allowing US federal civilian, postal, and military employees to pledge donations to nonprofit charities such as the Free Software Foundation (FSF). Last year, federal employees voluntarily participating in the CFC contributed more than $167 million to charitable causes.

The FSF's work relies on thousands of individual supporters and members across the United States and around the world, who contribute, on average, less than $200 each. "We know there are many free software supporters working in the US federal government," said FSF executive director John Sullivan. "We're glad they will have this new way to contribute to the free software movement."

Pledges to support the FSF through the Combined Federal Campaign can be made by designating the Free Software Foundation as the beneficiary charity. The FSF's CFC identification code is 63210. Donors can pledge until the end of the campaign period on January 12, 2018.

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 Contacts

Georgia Young
Program Manager
Free Software Foundation
+1 (617) 542 5942
campaigns@fsf.org