[Scale-planning] Free Software Representation at SCaLE

[Lei Zhang]

If you look at the mission statement on [1], the topic for SCALE is
Open Source software. We do not restrict ourselves to only Free
Software, nor do we give special consideration to Free Software.
SCALE tries to cater to everyone, thus there is a good mix of talks
about various aspects of Open Source software.

With regards to your claim that Tom Callaway's talk is the only Free
Software talk, I would like to point out Bradley Kuhn from the FSF gave
a talk as well. While you may feel Oracle projects are not "perfectly"
Free Software, as far as I am concerned, BTRFS is licensed under the
GPL, and thus equally as Free as any other software licensed under the
GPL.

Additionally, Debian probably have had a booth at SCALE every year, and
the FSF and SFLC have had booths at SCALE in past years.

If you feel Free Software is under-represented, please encourage Free
Software speakers to submit presentations for future SCALE events, and
for Free Software groups to apply for a booth at SCALE.

[1] https://www.socallinuxexpo.org/scale10x/about-scale
[2] https://www.socallinuxexpo.org/scale10x/presentations/12-years-floss-license-compliance-historical-perspective

On Tue, Jan 24, 2012 at 07:22:19PM -0800, Mark Holmquist wrote:
> Hi!
> 
> I didn't want to voice this concern before the conference (figuring
> that, like me, the planning team had plenty to do already), but now I
> have something pretty important to say. Read on.
> 
> Some background: I'm a Free Software user. That means that when you tell
> me "Southern California Linux Expo", I wonder why "GNU" isn't included.
> I also wonder why BSD and Haiku (among other, non-Linux operating
> systems) are included.
> 
> But those things are not the real reason I'm emailing today. It is
> because, this year, I noticed a marked absence of free software talks
> and programs. The FOSS Mentoring program, which was a step in the right
> direction, remained (though, I think, was added very late). Many other,
> new programs were added that represent the Open Source ideals. There are
> also new programs that represent the Linux community. There were
> presentations on nonfree cloud services (in fact, the Saturday keynote
> focused on one). There were several presentations on Oracle projects,
> which cannot be in *perfect* keeping with Free Software ideals. In fact,
> the only other example of a Free Software presentation I can see is Tom
> Callaway's, for which I commend him.
> 
> This brings me to a question: Is the Free Software community so
> diminutive that no speakers wanted to address them? Or is this a
> preference of the SCaLE planners that is manifesting in policy? Another
> question: Is it wise, given this conference's need for attendees, to
> systematically exclude any community that would otherwise want to
> attend? I hope to discuss this further upon replies.
> 
> I, for one, refused to attend for those very reasons, so I hope that you
> will consider changing these policies, or maybe asking for term-agnostic
> presentations, before next year's conference. Thanks.
> 
> -- 
> Mark Holmquist
> Student, Computer Science
> University of Redlands
> MarkTraceur at gmail.com
> 
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