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LXer Suffering From Scattered Outages

By FOSS Force on February 15, 2016 |

Community, Internet, Media and News

LXer Suffering From Scattered OutagesLXer temporary landing page

Breaking News

Last updated Tuesday, February 16 at 12:15 a.m.

If you’ve been trying to get on LXer and having no luck, it’s not just you. Today the site is unreachable for at least much of the U.S.

The popular Linux and FOSS website LXer seems to be unreachable in many parts of the U.S. today. In the areas affected, users trying to reach the site are taken to a Network Solutions holding page instead.

We first became aware of the problem at about 7 a.m. EST when an attempt to access the site took us to a Network Solutions landing page. We had visited the site several times in the previous hour without difficulty. At about 8 a.m., access to the site returned briefly, but by 9 a.m. the site was again unreachable. We haven’t been able to access the site since.

LXer temporary landing page
Many of those attempting to visit the popular Linux and FOSS site “LXer” today are seeing this page instead.
Continue readingLXer Suffering From Scattered Outages
‘Declaration of Independence of Cyberspace’ Turns 20, Opera Fetches $1.2 Billion & More…Opera logo

‘Declaration of Independence of Cyberspace’ Turns 20, Opera Fetches $1.2 Billion & More…

By Christine Hall on February 12, 2016 |

Browsers, Community, Desktops, Distros, Internet and News

FOSS Week in Review Two important Internet events happened 20 years ago this week and a web browser gets an unexpected — to us —…

Continue reading‘Declaration of Independence of Cyberspace’ Turns 20, Opera Fetches $1.2 Billion & More…
India Shuts Down Zuckerberg’s ‘Free Basics’Internet.org "Free Basics"

India Shuts Down Zuckerberg’s ‘Free Basics’

By Christine Hall on February 9, 2016 |

Community, Internet, Media and News

Indian government chooses net neutrality over a Facebook backed scheme that would bring limited free Internet.

On Monday, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India shot down Free Basics, a scheme that offers free Internet access to a limited number of websites, which includes selected local news and weather sites, the BBC, Wikipedia and some health sites. The plan is backed by Facebook and six tech companies: Samsung, Ericsson, MediaTek, Opera Software, Nokia and Qualcomm. Free Basics has been available in India since February, 2015 and remains available in 35 other countries.

The ruling is seen as a victory for net neutrality.

Christine Hall

Christine Hall has been a journalist since 1971. In 2001, she began writing a weekly consumer computer column and started covering Linux and FOSS in 2002 after making the switch to GNU/Linux. Follow her on Twitter: @BrideOfLinux

FOSSForce.com
Continue readingIndia Shuts Down Zuckerberg’s ‘Free Basics’
Spring 2016 ‘Big Tent’ Linux and FOSS ConferencesGreat Wide Open FOSS conference logo

Spring 2016 ‘Big Tent’ Linux and FOSS Conferences

By Christine Hall on February 1, 2016 |

Community

Two down and one to go for the big Linux and FOSS conferences for the winter of 2016.

Today linux.conf.au 2016 gets cranked up for a five day run in the land down under for a big tent show where registration is sold out. This comes on the heels of another big show which folded its tent last night, FOSDEM 2016, the two day event that ran this weekend in Brussels. Both of these came after the most hyped SCALE ever — and evidently rightfully so. The first-of-the-year Linux and FOSS lovefest vacated the Pasadena Convention center a little over a week ago, not to return until March 2-5, 2017, a very late date for that event.

As the big winter events get entered in the record books, organizers of other conferences are already getting cranked-up for a full slate of events scheduled for this spring, so anyone who missed the chance to hobnob and rub shoulders with like-minded FOSS folks this winter need have no regrets, because a Linux or FOSS festival is certain to be coming to your neck of the woods soon.

Christine Hall

Christine Hall has been a journalist since 1971. In 2001, she began writing a weekly consumer computer column and started covering Linux and FOSS in 2002 after making the switch to GNU/Linux. Follow her on Twitter: @BrideOfLinux

FOSSForce.com
Continue readingSpring 2016 ‘Big Tent’ Linux and FOSS Conferences
SourceForge’s New Owners, Mint’s New Apps & More…Wirefly.com

SourceForge’s New Owners, Mint’s New Apps & More…

By Christine Hall on January 29, 2016 |

Browsers, Business, Community, Internet, Media and News

FOSS Week in Review

Thank goodness this week is over. After our Larry Cafiero spent last week “putting out fires,” as he puts it, at SCALE 14x, I’ve spent the last couple of days doing the same here at FOSS Force. It seems our article on Slashdot’s sale attracted some unruly types to the comments, forcing us to put the shields up on our comments site-wide for the first time in our nearly six year history. You can still comment, but you might have to wait a while for us to notice it and approve it for publication. We’ll take the shields down as soon as we determine it’s safe to do so.

Meanwhile, here’s the FOSS news highlights for the week…

SourceForge’s new owners aren’t exactly what you might expect to be purchasing a site that for all intents and purposes revolves around free and open source software. The new owners, SourceForge Media, is a subsidiary of BIZX, and while that may sound like some huge and gigantic mega corporation, it’s an LLC owned by Southern California residents Roger and Logan Abbott, who are probably either father and son or brothers, we’re not sure. What we do know is that their background is in telecommunications, not exactly the sort of business experience you’d expect for someone entering the share-and-share-alike world of FOSS, where there’s no such thing as vendor lock-in.

Christine Hall

Christine Hall has been a journalist since 1971. In 2001, she began writing a weekly consumer computer column and started covering Linux and FOSS in 2002 after making the switch to GNU/Linux. Follow her on Twitter: @BrideOfLinux

FOSSForce.com
Continue readingSourceForge’s New Owners, Mint’s New Apps & More…
SourceForge and Slashdot Have Been SoldSourceForge logo

SourceForge and Slashdot Have Been Sold

By Christine Hall on January 28, 2016 |

Community, Media and News

Slashdot Media, which owns the popular websites SourceForge and Slashdot, has been sold to SourceForge Media, LLC, a subsidiary of web publisher BIZX, LLC. Financial terms of the sale were not revealed in the press release announcing the sale, which was published today on the website EIN News.

This afternoon I exchanged a few emails with Logan Abbott who is one of the owners of BIZX and the president of the SourceForge Media subsidiary which he said “was formed for the purposes of this transaction.”

Christine Hall

Christine Hall has been a journalist since 1971. In 2001, she began writing a weekly consumer computer column and started covering Linux and FOSS in 2002 after making the switch to GNU/Linux. Follow her on Twitter: @BrideOfLinux

FOSSForce.com
Continue readingSourceForge and Slashdot Have Been Sold

BSD at SCALE 14x

By Larry Cafiero on January 28, 2016 |

Community and Operating Systems

Larry the BSD Guy

As I may have mentioned during the SCALE 14x coverage, one of the disadvantages of the glorious burden of working for a great event such as SCALE is that I don’t get out of the media room enough. The fact is, I can’t — herding the cats known as the tech media and processing various social media posts around the event keeps me in the room.

But I do get to go fix things occasionally, and that’s when I make the rounds on the expo floor.

BSD had itself its own row of booths in the expanded expo hall — FreeBSD, the FreeBSD Foundation, and OpenBSD were all neighbors on the exhibit floor. As is common for all the conferences we attend, Dru Lavigne and I — she moreso than me — got to catch up on things, and I took the time to drop in on her “Doc Like and Egyptian” presentation (though, burdened with a radio, I was called away to put out a minor “fire,” rhetorically speaking, in the press room).

Larry Cafiero

Larry Cafiero, a.k.a. Larry the Free Software Guy, is a journalist and a Free/Open Source Software advocate. He is involved in several FOSS projects and serves as the publicity chair for the Southern California Linux Expo. Follow him on Twitter: @lcafiero

Continue readingBSD at SCALE 14x
Open Source Gaming News From SCALE 14xSCALE 14x

Open Source Gaming News From SCALE 14x

By Hunter Banks on January 27, 2016 |

Community and Gaming

Gaming on Linux

Hopefully, everyone who was able to attend enjoyed SCALE 14x this past weekend, especially the Game Night which went off without a hitch, thanks to the SCALE staff and the efforts of a certain FOSS Force gaming writer. There were a few presenters with interesting Gaming information, and others with plans later down the pipeline that can be expanded upon later

To start the conference off on Thursday morning, Jorge Castro gave a speech regarding “Gaming on Ubuntu” as part of UbuCon. In only 15 minutes he was able to deliver a State of the Union address on gaming on Linux distros, particularly Ubuntu. He covered the pros and cons, and talked about Steam and Linux getting next gen titles. Most helpful was a reference to multiple Personal Package Archives for the Linux gamer for controllers and new drivers, as well as the proper hardware to use to complement Linux gaming. This was followed by a presentation by Didiers Roche discussing Ubuntu Make, a command line tool for developers of many kinds.

Hunter Banks

Hunter Banks has been a part of the Southern California Linux Expo (SCALE) Family for the past 13 years. When not writing about open source gaming, he’s working on creating his own games. Follow him on Twitter @SilvrChariot

Continue readingOpen Source Gaming News From SCALE 14x

Building a FOSS Force Community

By Christine Hall on January 26, 2016 |

Community and Site News

In the last couple of years we’ve begun to notice that in addition to the folks who visit FOSS Force on a regular basis to read our articles, we’re starting to see a community develop. We mainly see this in the comments sections at the bottom of each article, where many of you have become regulars by posting often, agreeing or disagreeing with our articles, and offering ideas from your own experience.

To us, it feels as if those of you who contribute your thoughts and ideas by regularly commenting have become a part of our site, a community of people who publicly represent what FOSS Force is about, just as much as Larry, Hunter, Ken, Isaac and the rest of us who write and produce the site. In other words, you’ve become a part of who we are, and although we have never met you, we feel as if you are friends of ours.

Let’s build on that, shall we? Let’s celebrate you, the community of readers who congregate and express yourselves through comments on our site, and make you an even more important part of FOSS Force than you already are. In other words, let’s do a little old fashioned community building.

Christine Hall

Christine Hall has been a journalist since 1971. In 2001, she began writing a weekly consumer computer column and started covering Linux and FOSS in 2002 after making the switch to GNU/Linux. Follow her on Twitter: @BrideOfLinux

FOSSForce.com
Continue readingBuilding a FOSS Force Community
SCALE 14X Is One for the Record BooksSarah Sharp at SCALE 14x

SCALE 14X Is One for the Record Books

By Larry Cafiero on January 25, 2016 |

Community and News

SCALE 14x Sunday

Whew. It had over 140 exhibitors, and over 185 sessions. It had just north of 3,600 people registered for the event. It had four days of peace, love and FOSS.

That was SCALE 14X.

But we’re getting ahead of Sunday’s story.

After the cacophony of Saturday night’s Weakest Geek — Ruth Suehle won her third, with talk of a dynasty in the air for that particular game — and the fun and games of, well, Game Night, Sunday rolled into Pasadena on a more quiet, thoughtful note.

Larry Cafiero

Larry Cafiero, a.k.a. Larry the Free Software Guy, is a journalist and a Free/Open Source Software advocate. He is involved in several FOSS projects and serves as the publicity chair for the Southern California Linux Expo. Follow him on Twitter: @lcafiero

Continue readingSCALE 14X Is One for the Record Books
SCALE 14X Saturday in Pictures

SCALE 14X Saturday in Pictures

By Larry Cafiero on January 24, 2016 |

Community, News and Operating Systems

Scale 14x Saturday

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls — that covers most of you: From a press standpoint, to say that SCALE 14X was busy would be a clear understatement. While the event has pretty much ratcheted itself up to the next level, staying atop the show in my capacity as the publicity chair is somewhat daunting.

So rather than tell you what happened today, I’m just going to show you. You’ll thank me for it later, trust me.

Larry Cafiero

Larry Cafiero, a.k.a. Larry the Free Software Guy, is a journalist and a Free/Open Source Software advocate. He is involved in several FOSS projects and serves as the publicity chair for the Southern California Linux Expo. Follow him on Twitter: @lcafiero

Continue readingSCALE 14X Saturday in Pictures
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