Re: [lp-ca-on] FSOSS 2015 Accepting Presentation Proposals

[Sergio Durigan Junior]

On Monday, July 13 2015, Blaise Alleyne wrote:

> On 13/07/15 12:22 AM, Sergio Durigan Junior wrote:
>> On Sunday, July 12 2015, Blaise Alleyne wrote:
>>> [...]
>>> - Presentations that any of us might want to make individually (Sergio 
>>> presented
>>> on gdb last year, and I spoke about software freedom and net services)
>> 
>> TBH I'm kind of tired of speaking about GDB on every conference I
>> attend.  If I manage to go to FSOSS this year, I'll want to talk about
>> something else.  Some of you know about my idea of creating a Free
>> solution for tax reports on Canada; maybe I could at least expose the
>> problem and start a brainstorm to solve this?
>> 
>
> I think that could be an interesting talk, though maybe with a bit of a 
> broader
> scope? Many people hate filing taxes, or work with a professional who handles
> that anyways. But there's also the problem that the Software Freedom 
> Conservancy
> is trying to solve about accounting solutions for non-profit organizations. 
> (And
> you have fantastic free software applications, like CiviCRM, with lots of
> Canadian connections... but often being forced to integrate with Quickbooks
> accounting, because there isn't a solid free software option for most 
> non-profits.)

Itches, itches...  :-).  I am personally very concerned about next
year's tax report season; I will probably have to resort to a
proprietary solution once more (this year I used H&R's "expertise", but
I don't feel any better knowing that they have used proprietary software
themselves).  OTOH, an "accounting solution" is not something I'm
desperately needing (although I recognize its importance, of course), so
I certainly wouldn't be the best person to talk about it.

As for your other (valid) point that many people hate filing taxes
themselves and choose to ask for professional guidance, I could feel
that this year.  Nevertheless, the professionals are still using
proprietary software, so we should address them when giving the talk
(yeah, I know, I don't think many accountants will attend FSOSS, but
still...).

> It could be even broader (since many people still might not get exciting about
> accounting/taxes), in terms of niche areas where there is still a pressing 
> need
> for free software solutions, where we haven't yet or have only recently
> developed solutions, e.g. form accounting to BIOS software and
> LibreBoot,

Cool.  Lukas (if he's still reading the list) told me he wanted to buy a
Libreboot from Gluglug.  It would be awesome to raise awareness about
these machines.  I am also saving to buy a ThinkPenguim notebook as
well, but last time I checked they are still coming with proprietary
BIOS.

> or the
> challenges with online video streaming and proprietary codecs and HTML5 DRM...

Oh, that would be an awesome talk!

> Replicant's battles with proprietary drivers on mobile computers... etc...

I'd prefer a broader topic: how can we help getting rid of the binary
blobs that are present in the Linux kernel?  This would encompass
Replicant of course, but I think it's important to not limit this to
mobile things...

> A kind of quick status report on the current battlefronts, the edges where
> software freedom advocates are still removing proprietary dependencies...

BTW, another good (and hot) topic would be to discuss the recent SFC x
VMWare lawsuit, and possible implications.  Karen Sandler (from SFC)
gave some talks about this topic; we could certainly use a lot of
material from them.

> Just thinking out loud. The scope could be expanded or adjusted for breadth or
> depth. *shrugs*

Nice, thanks for expanding the ideas!

>>> - In what way could we be active and present at this event as a group?
>> 
>> I don't remember seeing booths there last year; did I miss something?
>> If I did, then having a booth at the conference would be the first step,
>> I think.
>> 
>
> I think there might have been some by the registration desk last year... I
> remember a few years back... Though mostly companies/sponsorship though, so we
> might need to talk to them about pricing/options for a group like ours.

Oh, I didn't consider that they would charge any price for local groups.
Well, if it's expensive then I'd say this is a no-no, at least for now.

>> Another (obvious) idea is giving a talk about our group there,
>> explaining where we come from, what's the focus of the group, and what
>> are our ideas for improving software freedom for our community.  I would
>> be very interested in giving this talk with you guys, but if I'm not
>> there, please do it!  :-)
>> 
>
> This could be interesting, if we think we have enough content for it? Maybe 
> it'd
> be a good goal to work towards though, force us to get our ideas together a 
> bit
> more?

Yeah, of course we don't have too much to talk about now ;-), but as you
said, a good way of having something concrete to talk about is saying
you will give a presentation about it!

Cheers,

-- 
Sergio
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