[Fsfe-uk] new AFFS? -- was -- Re: Stephen Fry on Asus Eee

[Richard Smedley]

Hello Kevin,

On Tue, 2008-02-05 at 18:49 +0000, Kevin Donnelly wrote:
> On Tuesday 05 February 2008 18:01, Richard Smedley wrote:
> > That's rather the problem, isn't it? The lack of Free Software
> > representation in the UK.
> > Anyone feel like giving up 20 or 30 hours a week to start up
> > an FSFE-UK?
> 
> Son of AFFS, eh?  Phew!

Well actually AFFS was supposed to exist alongside FSFE-UK.
AFFS as a membership body, responding to the concerns of
members; FSFE-UK as the UK arm of FSF-Europe - as there is
an FSFE branch in most other European countries.
Unfortunately nobody here has the time to do what is, at
the least, a demanding, unpaid, part-time campaigning
job.

There's certainly a role for both an FSFE-UK, and for
a membership-based campaigning body to promote Free
Software here. For the latter, OSC is the closest that
we have, being notably successful with the iPlayer
for example. However it's a trade body. OSA (and to
a certain extent Schoolforge UK) cover education.
In the voluntary sector we have informal alliances.
LUG.org.uk is 50-50 split between pro-Free Software,
and soi-disant pragmatic ``Linux'' users.

So yes, room still for both an AFFS-type org, and
a UK arm for FSF Europe, but who has the time? 
Perhaps if people do, they could post here the
number of free hours per week (on average) that they'd
be prepared to donate.

e.g.
RS - 1 hour
iow I'm already doing a 70 hour week, and don't want to
over-promise until things calm down a bit :-/

Pob hwyl,

 - Richard

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