The Open Internet Tools Project has partnered with FreedomBox, InformSec and ISOC-NY to host a circumvention tools hackfest in NYC right before HOPE. We’ve got four days to plan, code and learn! If you want to hack on anti-censorship or anti-surveillance tools, bring your project, bring your skills and bring your friends. This event will be focused on writing code and solving design problems. We won’t have any long presentations (there will be enough of those at HOPE), though we will have lightning talks and will give away a door prize or two.
Where: Columbia Law School, Jerome Greene Hall, 116th and Amsterdam
When: July 9 – 12, 10 am
Who: Privacy and free communication hackers like you
Please RSVP to kaurin at openitp.org and tell us what you plan to work on, what kind of projects and people you hope to meet, and which days you will join us.
Feel free to repost this invite or to link to it: http://openitp.org/?q=node/12
Some modest travel stipends are available for amazing projects. Email James Vasile (james at openitp.org) about those.
Some projects we know will attend: Commotion Wireless, Cryptocat, Guardian Project, Brave New Software and the Lantern Project, and Access.
Big thanks to our partners, all of whom are contributing crucial support and resources.
Eben Moglen is going to speak about “Freedom in the Cloud” at Friday’s meeting of the Internet Society.
- What: ISOC-NY Public Meeting: Eben Moglen – ‘Freedom In The Cloud’
- When: Fri. Feb 5 2010 7pm-9pm
- Where: Room 109, Warren Weaver Hall, 251 Mercer Street NYC
- Webcast: http://www.livestream.com/isocny
If you’ve never had the pleasure of seeing Eben drop a speech in person, do yourself a favor and attend. It’s always a treat. My only caveat is that anybody expecting Eben to make lots of references to Billy Dee Williams will probably be disappointed.
On December 6th, I will be speaking at the Joomla Developer’s Conference. My topic will be the intersection of commercial development and Joomla, with some emphasis on GPL considerations. If you are a third-party commercial developer of Joomla extensions, this is where you want to be. We’re going to talk about a number of strategies for sustained development that are specific to the ecosystem that has grown around Joomla.
And, as always, if you see me there, feel free to introduce yourself!
See you at the conference!
This Friday, I’ll be testifying before the New York City Council’s Committee on Technology in Government, which is conducting a hearing on Net Neutrality. Specifically, they are considering Gale Brewer‘s proposed resolution asking Congress to pass the Internet Freedom Preservation Act of 2009, which would:
Makes it the duty of each Internet access service provider to:
(1) not block, interfere with, discriminate against, impair, or degrade the ability of any person to use an Internet access service;
(2) not impose certain charges on any Internet content, service, or application provider;
(3) not prevent or obstruct a user from attaching or using any lawful device in conjunction with such service, provided the device does not harm the provider’s network;
(4) offer Internet access service to any requesting person;
(5) not provide or sell to any content, application, or service provider any offering that prioritizes traffic over that of other such providers; and
(6) not install or use network features, functions, or capabilities that impede or hinder compliance with these duties. Requires the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to promulgate related rules.
Prohibits construing this Act to prohibit an Internet access provider from engaging in reasonable network management.
Requires the FCC to:
(1) promulgate rules to ensure that an Internet access service provider does not require a consumer, as a condition on the purchase of any Internet access service, to purchase any other service or offering; and
(2) take certain actions, including regarding private transmission capacity services.
This is a good opportunity to help the City Council understand how net neutrality principles protect New Yorkers. The City has franchise agreements with the various ISPs. Eventually, I’d like to see net neutrality principles become part of those agreements. This is how we start down that road.
If you work with an organization that loves freedom, democracy and technology, come represent! Tell the Council why they need to pass Resolution 712-A.
I have a meeting tomorrow night, but I wish I could attend this:
On Tuesday, July 28, 2009 from 6-8 PM at DCTV’s Third Floor Conference Room (located at 87 Lafayette Street) Council Member Gale A. Brewer invites all members of the New York City technology community to discuss the recently released Broadband Technology Opportunities Program (BTOP) funding that has been made available through the federal stimulus package which passed in February 2009. The purpose of this event is to help galvanize interested applicants around common goals. Please distribute this invitation widely and invite all pertinent stakeholders to attend.
Please contact Kunal Malhotra or Sam Wong at (212) 788-6975 with questions and suggestions.
Via Jay Sulzberger.
Title: FLOSSify
Location: Eyebeam, 540 W. 21st Street, (between 10th and 11th Avenues)
Description: Adam Hyde asked me to spread the word: Come recast the book Digital Foundations into a tutorial for using free software! Right now, the book is devoted to Adobe products. We can do better. Bring a laptop and some writing skills. Beer and food provided.
Start Date: 2009-02-06
Start Time: 10:00
End Date: 2009-02-08
For more FOSS and free culture community events, check out the NYC community calendar.
Title: Susan Crawford: Computers and Society lecture
Location: NYU\’s Warren Weaver Hall, 251 Mercer St
Description: Susan Crawford joined the faculty of the University of Michigan Law School on July 1, 2008. She teaches internet law and communications law. Last year she was a visiting professor at Michigan and at Yale Law School (spring 2008). She is a member of the board of directors of ICANN and is the founder of OneWebDay, a global Earth Day for the internet that takes place each Sept. 22.
Start Time: 15:30
Date: 2008-12-01
For more FOSS and free culture community events, check out the NYC community calendar
Title: Andrew Rasiej: “Democracy, Civic Action, and Politics in a Networked World”
Location: NYU’s Warren Weaver Hall, 251 Mercer St.
Description:
Andrew Rasiej is a social entrepreneur and the Founder of Personal Democracy Forum, an annual conference and community website about the intersection of politics and technology. He is also the co-founder of techPresident. He has served as an adviser to Senator Barack Obama, Senator Hillary Clinton, Senator Tom Daschle, Congressman Dick Gephardt, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee on the use of Information Technology for campaign and policy purposes. Mr. Rasiej also maintains the position of senior technology adviser for the Sunlight Foundation.
Start Time: 15:30
Date: 2008-11-19
For more FOSS and free culture community events, check out the NYC community calendar.
Free Culture @ NYU is screening the second installment of Steal This Film, a documentary series about the rise of copyfighting as a political and social movement as well as the battle to break the stranglehold of intellectual property law on culture. They’re showing the movie this Sunday at 7pm at NYU’s Warren Weaver Hall, Room 109 (251 Mercer Street).
Just found out: One of the film’s creators, Alan Toner, is going to be at the screening. I assume he’ll be answering questions and whatnot after the movie. Also, free culture NYU has a blog post up.
For more FOSS and free culture community events, check out the NYC community calendar.
From MoveOn.Org to Change.Gov, it’s easy to be impressed by the tremendous power of online electioneering and political organization. Maybe too easy. Everybody wants to see these sites as political rather than social phenomena. I just don’t think you can gather that many people in one place without it being a social thing, first and foremost.
It’s too bad nobody is doing much to understand these movements as online communities. To my mind, the forums at FreeRepublic and the diaries at DailyKos are free culture in the sense of people who have gathered to form their own communities. They have their own servers, write their own code, and publish their own words. They’ve gone beyond disintermediation— not only do they speak directly to each other but they also critique the traditional informational filters. I’d like to see people who are smart about such things talk about what rabid politics forum posters and rabid free culture warriors have in common.
Maybe Amanda Michel can help. She’s talking at NYU on Wednesday at 3:30. Room 109 in Warren Weaver Hall (291 Mercer St). Her bio:
Amanda Michel is Director of HuffPost’s OffTheBus. Amanda started in politics during the 2003-2004 campaign cycle, working as the National Director of Generation Dean and then creating and managing the MediaCorps program for the Kerry-Edwards campaign. Along with several other Kerry-Edwards coworkers she helped co-found the New Organizing Institute in the wake of the 2004 election. Since then she’s taken her online organizing skills to media, working at Harvard’s Berkman Center for Internet & Society and on Assignment Zero, a Wired and NewAssignment.net collaboration. She is also a Knight Digital Media Fellow.
For more FOSS and free culture community events, check out the NYC community calendar.