Want to join?

Free Software Foundation Latin America permanently invites all Free Software promoters, developers, enthusiasts and activists in Latin American countries to become active members in our organization, so as to establish a social fabric of the initiatives being planned or executed in all of our region.

Every person, group or organization that wishes to be part of FSFLA can do so. All it takes is to share information about local activities for Free Software underway in your region or be an active part of some committee or workgroup in our organization.

Benefits:

  • Being connected with activities in Latin American countries related with the Free Software Movement.
  • Being invited to be part of campaigns and strategies for Free Software in a coordinated way with other Latin American members.
  • Taking part in meetings we hold in some of the countries.
  • Being allowed to represent the organization (some conditions apply) to promote and defend Free Software.
  • The best benefit of all: work in family for Free Software.

Requirements

The only requirement is to agree without reservations with the following premises:

  • Defend software users and developers rights and freedoms;
  • Fight for your freedom, and others', to run the software you use for any purpose you wish;
  • Fight for your freedom, and others', to study its source code, if you wish, and to adapt it so that it does what you wish;
  • Fight for your freedom, and others', to copy, distribute and publish it when you wish, with or without improvements you may have made, so that you, we and everyone can use computers in freedom.
  • Explicitly warn about the dangers of Privative Software in any percentages whatsoever, for a small binary portion whose source code is not known may cancel out in a major way the freedoms of many other parts of the Software and your freedoms as a user (or as groups, institutions and countries) that makes use of information technology.

Fields of Action

There are several direct and indirect ways to participate and contribute to FSFLA's work and objectives. Each of these sections has its mailing list. Please subscribe and send an email introducing yourself. Include detailed text about your participation and proposals that you would like to lead or contribute in.

  • Announcements: Regular information about our work, such as monthly bulletins and publishing of press releases.
  • Discussion: General list for discussion on Free Software-related topics, its use, distribution and development in Latin America.
  • Translations: For everyone who can cooperate with translation of documents, web pages, newsletters and other information needed for FSFLA's work in some of the organization's work languages.
  • Anti-DRM campaign: If you want to join the fight against the DRM (Digital Restrictions Management) menace in Latin America, join the workgroup of the Anti-DRM campaign.
  • Campaign against "Softwares Impostos": If you want to participate in FSFLA's campaign against "Softwares Impostos" (Imposed/Tax Software), send your ideas, suggestions and dilations to this list.
  • Free Open Standards: If you're interested in getting involved in actions of spreading knowledge and encouraging adoption of standards that promote interoperability and avoid monopolies and exclusive dependencies, and of dilation and opposition to proprietary standards, this is the group for you.
  • (GNU)2 initiative: To increase FSFLA's contact with communities and activists committed to Free Software in Latin America, we've launched the GNU National User Groups initiative (GNU GNU in Spanish and Portuguese). If you're a member of one such organization or would like to start one and want to share experiences, join the mailing list.
  • Legal Issues: FSFLA's legal issues work group is devoted to analyzing anything related with legal aspects of Free Software, legislation, rules, free trade agreements and other legal actions related with use, distribution and development of Free Software.
  • Events, booths and promotion: Discussion about FSFLA's presence in events, preparation of booths and promotional material, volunteering to be present at stands in events to present Free Software philosophy, FSFLA's, FSF network's and GNU project's work and objectives, or simply be there to present our promotional materials: T-shirts, buttons, flyers, flags, stickets, etc.
  • Web Site: FSFLA's web site is under permanent construction. Information pertaining to Free Software in FSFLA's geographical work area, be it news, events, legislation, politics, etc, can be presented on the web site and is always welcome.
  • Education: To carry out one of FSFLA's high-priority objectives, we have a mailing list for discussion about Free Software in education, to which we invite academics, educators and interested activists.
  • Business Models: We also have a mailing list to work on business models and assistance to profitable projects, be them individual or collective, at companies, cooperatives of by independent professionals who wish to work on Free Software-based businesses.
  • Public Administration: This group is intended to support public administrations and government entities that already work with Free Software or are evaluating the political decision to add it to their agendas.
  • Press: If you work on press or advocacy and would like to cooperate with FSFLA's communication work, we count on you to this end. Even though information discussed in the list is not confidential, coordinated publication is desirable, therefore we request readers and participants to wait for official announces before publication.

Contact us

When we're online you can find us on irc.libera.chat on the #fsfla channel.

You can also contact us by email at the address info@fsfla.org.

Welcome

You're welcome to take an active role in FSFLA joining efforts for Free Software in our continent!