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POSSCON Cancelled Until 2017

POSSCON 2016

POSSCON has been cancelled. The surprise announcement was made Thursday by way of an email from IT-oLogy, the nonprofit organization which hosts the event. The conference, which focuses on the enterprise and is targeted at IT professionals who develop or use open source software, was scheduled to be held in Columbia, S.C. on April 12-13.

POSSCon 2016 email logoThis is the second time in three years that IT-oLogy’s longest running conference has been cancelled. In 2014 the event was cancelled, evidently due to logistical problems as IT-oLogy was in the process of launching the first Great Wide Open conference in Atlanta. Last year there was no Atlanta event, and POSSCON was successfully rebooted in Columbia, attracting around 850 atendees.

SCALE 14X Gets Rolling for the Weekend

SCALE 14X Friday

One of the fears — one of the many in having an established conference at a brand spanking new venue — is this: Suppose they gave an outstanding Friday keynote, and nobody came? All those sleepless nights worrying about it were essentially for naught, since Cory Doctorow’s keynote at SCALE 14X Friday was a standing room only success.

The keynote kicked off yet another day of SCALE at its new digs, and the Pasadena Convention Center has gotten high marks among attendees. The wide-open exhibit hall, holding 143 exhibitors, was a complete hit with both attendees and vendors alike.

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

Linux Foundation Sells Out, Brave New Browser & More…

FOSS Week in Review

We’re just barely past the relatively quiet news days that are the holiday season and already the news is getting to be quite contentious. So much so that I’ve been tempted to call this edition of the Week in Review “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly,” but I’m afraid that might turn into some kind of trademark dispute. I am reminded by our opening story, however, of the old Pogo quip from the funny pages: “We have met the enemy and he is us.”

Linux Foundation LogoLinux Foundation adopts plantation model: The biggest FOSS story this week came on Wednesday when free software activist and Linux kernel developer Matthew Garrett made public that on last Friday the Linux Foundation had dropped community representation from its board.

The Linux Foundation’s board has always been weighted heavily in favor of corporations and money, with a large majority of the foundation’s board being elected by member corporations. The nine platinum members, who each pay $500,000 yearly in membership dues, elect up to ten board members (or one each for up to ten directors), the sixteen gold members elect three, and the more than 250 silver members elect only one. Until last week, individual members, who pay $99 in annual dues, elected two members to the board, not enough to influence foundation policy in a vote, but enough to give the community some say in the decision making process.

Not any longer.

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

SCALE 14X: Making the Mark and Getting Ready for Doctorow

SCALE 14X Thursday

One of the drawbacks of having to work a show like SCALE is that I don’t get to go to enough sessions while I’m here. As the traffic cop at the intersection of old and new media, it’s my job to marshal the publicity team’s forces into taking the information happening at the show and then processing it for the wider public consumption.

Pasadena Convention Center - SCALE 14x
The calm before the perfect storm, complete with plaza-sweeping Zamboni: The hall at the Pasadena Convention Center is ready for SCALE 14X attendees.
That said — and fighting off rumors Thursday morning that, yes, I am the one to introduce Mark Shuttleworth at the UbuCon keynote that starts the entire UbuCon and SCALE 14X on Thursday (not to worry, I didn’t) — SCALE 14X Thursday kicked off a new era in the conference; specifically one where it become a major player in the FOSS expo constellation, and perhaps the biggest independent show in North America.

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

SCALE 14X Thursday: New Morning in Pasadena

SCALE 14X Thursday

Starting today, the Southern California Linux Expo — SCALE 14X in this year’s 14th annual iteration — moves from being hotel-based event busting at the seams to hold all the exhibitors and sessions to being a full-fledged, freewheeling convention center-based event with wide-open spaces and widespread talks.

The setup is done for today, with exhibitors readying their booths for the opening of the floor tomorrow after Cory Doctorow gives his Friday keynote. But let’s not get ahead of the story for Thursday.

The schedule is posted online, if you’re at the event. If not, you can still follow along at the link.

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

Other Linux Expos Can Learn a Thing or Two From SCALE

SCALE 14x

SCALE 14x
Actually, I just wish this were true.
SCALE 14x is getting cranked up for the first ever SCALE at its new home in Pasadena, Calif., and already it’s obvious why this is the premiere community Linux fest in the country. For one thing, there’s the roster of great speakers, topped by such household names — in FOSS circles anyway — as Maddog Hall, Cory Doctorow and Mark Shuttleworth. Then there’s all of the cool things not always present at a Linux fest, not the least of which is the side-by-side UbuCon conference/unconference featuring all things Ubuntu and which is included in the cost of admission.

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

Finding the Right Tool for the Job

It’s been maybe two years ago, maybe three; that I was involved in a community discussion of charitable works. It stemmed from a topic I covered on my Blog of Helios and while we discussed the various means that we could be of service to others not so fortunate, one individual sought to find a way out of the discussion. “Well, I don’t know any poor people.”

ToughbookHuh. He doesn’t know any poor people he says. Well “what a coincidence”, I told him. “Neither did I until I started looking for them.” That was the last I saw or heard from said person, and it’s all for the better. We didn’t seem to have much in common.

Ken Starks

Ken Starks is the founder of the Helios Project and Reglue, which for 20 years provided refurbished older computers running Linux to disadvantaged school kids, as well as providing digital help for senior citizens, in the Austin, Texas area. He was a columnist for FOSS Force from 2013-2016, and remains part of our family. Follow him on Twitter: @Reglue

Arch Linux Gets Reader’s Choice ‘Best Distro’ Award

The FOSS Force Poll

The voting is all done for the second round of our poll to decide which GNU/Linux distro our readers would choose to receive our “Reader’s Choice Best Linux Distro” award for 2015. As in round one, Arch Linux won the day. The poll results are considered to be more a measure of a distro’s community support than any indication of a distro’s technical merits.

The first round of our poll was a qualifying round, which Arch won as well, racking up 1,376 votes. The second round of voting was “winner take all,” and with the voting lighter than in the first round, Arch still managed to put together 592 votes. In all, 2,625 votes were cast in round two, which was active for seven days.

BSD Is Ready for SCALE 14X

SCALE 14x

Larry the BSD Guy

First things first: Were I to give an award for Best Presentation Title for SCALE 14X, it would clearly go to iX Systems’ Community Manager (and all-around BSD documentation queen) Dru Lavigne for “Doc Like an Egyptian” — she wins hands down, without question. Dru speaks at SCALE on Saturday, Jan. 23, at 3 p.m.

Speaking of SCALE, the first-of-the-year Linux/FOSS event for 2016 starts next week on Thursday and runs through Sunday. Next to the Rose Bowl and the Tournament of Roses Parade, both of which took place on New Year’s Day, SCALE is the third largest event in Pasadena this month.

BSD variants and a BSD certification exam highlight the presence of the Unix family at SCALE.

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

Raspberry Picademy USA Accepting Applications

The Raspberry Pi Report

Are you an enthusiastic individual that is interested in using the Raspberry Pi in the classroom and in community education programs? Then get ready to fill out your application for Raspberry Picademy USA! This will be the first time ever that the Raspberry Pi Foundation will be offering a Picademy in the United States. If you haven’t ever heard of Picademy, or have and are looking to participate, then I’ll answer some basic questions for you on the ins and outs of Raspberry Picademy USA.

Picademy USA logoWhat is Picademy? Picademy is a two day series of classes taught by certified Raspberry Pi educators. These classes involve learning all hardware and software aspects of the Raspberry Pi. You will also be learning from some of the brightest minds that make up the Raspberry Pi Foundation.

Isaac Carter

In addition to hosting a Raspberry Pi meetup in Washington D.C., Isaac Carter is a co-host on mintCast. He’s also a software engineer who enjoys working with Java, JavaScript, and GNU/Linux. When he’s not coding, you can find him reading on any number of subjects or on the golf course.

FOSS Rock Stars at SCALE 14x

Sure you go to Linux expos such as SCALE to sharpen your coding skills and to learn about how to get your hands dirty going under the hood with you favorite open source applications. You might even go to learn a little bit about the business of open source. But you have to admit that an added attraction is just getting to see presentations from FOSS rock stars, the well known movers and shakers who have taken a big part in shaping the past, present and future of free and open source software. These are people whose presentations you’ll be tempted to attend no matter what the subject because…well, just because. Some of these are legends; some are not. But they’re all rock stars. And as usual, there’ll be an abundance of them at SCALE.

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

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