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The Debian Project http://www.debian.org/
The Debian Project joins the OSI press@debian.org
March 30th, 2012 http://www.debian.org/News/2012/20120330
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The Debian Project joins the OSI
The Debian Project is pleased to announce that it is joining the Open
Source Initiative ("OSI") [1] as an affiliate. The OSI was founded in
1998 by Eric S. Raymond and Bruce Perens, with the aim of explaining,
advocating, and protecting the term "open source". Debian shares the
OSI's desire to encourage Free Software. Debian's Social Contract
commits it to producing a system which is 100% free [2].
1: http://opensource.org/
2: http://www.debian.org/intro/free
The OSI's Open Source Definition [3] is closely based on the Debian
Free Software Guidelines [4], the document that defines the types of
software licenses which the Debian Project accepts. For many years now,
the OSI has helped the "Open Source" trademark gain recognition,
particularly in the corporate world. The OSI recently decided to
pursue this mission by becoming a member-led organisation, and as a
first step has invited Free and Open Source Software projects to
become affiliate members.
3: http://opensource.org/docs/osd
4: http://www.debian.org/social_contract#guidelines
By becoming an affiliate of the OSI, the Debian Project recognises the
OSI's history of efforts towards goals shared by both organisations.
However, the Debian Project will not automatically adopt OSI decisions
on the acceptability of particular software licenses and will maintain
an independent license review process.
"For widespread Free Software adoption we still need to overcome many
challenges," said Stefano Zacchiroli, Debian Project Leader. "While
Debian is perfectly suited to face technical challenges, other
organisations are better suited to face more political ones, like
anti-Free Software corporate FUD, or unjust worldwide laws that make it
illegal to share pieces of Free Software. I value the work that OSI is
doing in those areas. Thanks to their new affiliation scheme, I'm
looking forward to Debian taking an active role in OSI."
Simon Phipps of the OSI welcomed Debian to the organisation, saying,
"It's great to have Debian joining the new affiliate scheme; the
project's breadth of experience will be a valuable addition. The Board
is keen to make progress and having a diverse and representative
Affiliate membership is crucial if we are to make well-founded
decisions in each of the challenging changes we anticipate."
About the Open Source Initiative
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The OSI are the stewards of the Open Source Definition (OSD) [5] and
the community-recognised body for reviewing and approving licenses as
OSD-conformant. The OSI is actively involved in Open Source
community-building, education, and public advocacy to promote awareness
and the importance of non-proprietary software.
5: http://opensource.org/docs/osd
About Debian
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The Debian Project was founded in 1993 by Ian Murdock to be a truly
free community project. Since then the project has grown to be one of
the largest and most influential open source projects. Thousands of
volunteers from all over the world work together to create and maintain
Debian software. Available in 70 languages, and supporting a huge range
of computer types, Debian calls itself the "universal operating system".
Contact Information
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For further information, please visit the Debian web pages at
http://www.debian.org/ or send mail to <press@debian.org>.
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