Contents

1. SELF International Conference February 2nd, 2007
2. SELF Update: July - December 2006
3. Expert Group Meeting on Free Software
4. Open Document Format and OpenXML
5. EC study on the economic impact of Free Software
6. British Governmental Agency Issues Warnings Against Using Windows Vista
7. Agenda
8. About

1. SELF International Conference February 2nd, 2007

International Conference on Science, Education and Learning in Freedom

After the advent of information and communication technology human society is drastically transforming into a very different world. Perhaps, no other human invention introduced such a transformation, except may be agriculture. However, not many among us are aware of another parallel revolutionary under-current that is shaping up as a novel cultural and political movement, tiding under the waves of the ICT revolution. This movement is growing at an unprecedented pace influencing the way how science, software and other kinds of symbolic forms are created, published and distributed. This culture is often called copyleft, identified with the Free Software Movement, because this movement took off by an innovative use of existing copyright law by Richard Stallman, who founded the movement by publishing software under a copyleft license. This license is essentially about giving four fundamental rights to the user of the software published under the copyleft license: to use it for any purpose, to understand how it works, to make modifications, and to distribute the modifications.

One of the major outcomes of this revolution is the GNU/Linux operating system (popularly known by its misnomer, Linux). This copyleft movement is currently transforming other fields of human creativity as well - science, poetry, music, cinema and other symbolic forms. Of these, the most popular success story is Wikipedia.org, the largest multilingual encyclopedia of the world. There are other, not yet fully fructified, movements such as the public library of science, open music, etc.

We are variously bombarded by most media, often exclusively, about the various aspects of ICT revolution, but very little awareness is commonly found about the copyleft movement. The main purpose of this conference therefore is to bridge this gap and generate awareness about this revolution, and also invite far greater participation from all sections of the community. The conference will inform about the copyleft movement in general, and its relation to science and education in particular. We have very eminent speakers from around the world including Richard Stallman, who will address the conference from the USA over a video conference. A snapshot of the gnowledge portal will be distributed in a DVD containing free software and free knowledge resources, including Wikipedia, to all participants.

Venue: Homi Bhabha Auditorium, TIFR, Mumbai
Day: 2nd February 2007
Time: 9am - 6pm

The conference will include four main tracks:

1. Inauguration and Launching of the community portal: Gnowledge.org
2. SELF: Science, Education and Learning in Freedom
3. Copyleft in Science, Software, Education and Culture
4. Open Standards

Hosts:
Shobo Bhattacharya, Director TIFR
Arvind Kumar, Centre Director, HBCSE
Gnowledge Laboratory, HBCSE

Invitees/Speakers (not all confirmed yet):

• Hinde ten Berge / Internet Society Netherlands
• Nagarjuna G / HBCSE, TIFR
• Georg Greve / President, Free Software Foundation Europe
• Arvind Gupta / IUCAA, Pune
• Venkatesh Hariharan / Redhat India
• Federico Heinz / Fundacion Via Libre, Argentina
• Mathais Klang / University of Gothenburg, Sweden
• C.N. Krishnan / NRC, FOSS
• Prof. Arvind Kumar / HBCSE, TIFR
• Sasi Kumar / FSF India
• Siva Kumar / Head, Computer Science, IIT Mumbai, OSSRC
• Lawrence Liang / Alternative Law Forum, Bangalore
• Arun M / Secretary, FSF India
• David Megias / Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, Spain
• Chandita Mukherjee / Comet Media
• Jonas Oberg / Free Software Foundation Europe
• Dragoslava Pefeva / Internet Society, Bulgaria
• DB Phatak / KRESIT, IIT Mumbai
• S. Ramkrishnan / CDAC
• Richard M. Stallman / President, Free Software Foundation
• Wouter Tebbens / Internet Society Netherlands & SELF project coordinator

Conference is open for registration. Please register online before 23th January 2007. Conference registration fees will be Rs. 200/- which will be collected at registration desk on the day of conference.

More information and registration

Contribution by Nagarjuna G., HBCSE/TIFR

2. SELF Update: July - December 2006

Since its incentive in July 2006 several important parts towards the realisation of the platform have been researched and put into practice.

*** Legal Policy ***

The SELF Legal Policy outlines the definitions used in the SELF project as well as the policies for decisions regarding important legal matters, how to come to terms with potential contradictions and how to assure the legal maintainability of the project after the funding period from the European Commission.

We have described definitions that will be used within the SELF project to describe what is Free Software, an Open Standard, or Free Educational Material and Documentation. Of these, the definition of Free Software is the most well understood and generally accepted. There is not yet such a wide common understanding of what is an Open Standard, and even less agreement on Free Educational Material or Documentation.

A thorough discussion of free documentation licenses, derivative works, volunteer contributions and other related issues is in process in order to obtain a complete scenario of the material creation process. All comments on this matter are most welcome!

http://selfproject.eu/en/LEG

*** Materials ***

An important element of the SELF Project is research on available materials and detection of potential gaps. During the past months a list of over 50 materials that meet the criteria of the platform has been built. These criteria require amongst others that the learning materials are free content, in other words, they follow the copyleft principles of the Free Software movement. On top of that, the SELF Project values the use of Open Standards highly. While the SELF Platform collects content in an open standard it also follows didactic standards for its own operation to facilitate the exchange with other platforms and applications. Therefore Open Standard formats are always preferable to proprietary formats. Outdated technical materials are discarded, since their value is merely historic and they present little didactic value. The learning materials for the SELF Platform must meet didactic requirements, are required to have a minimal structure and a minimal quantity and quality of contents.

The SELF Project gives a high priority to educational software and desktop applications. That is why several teams will be set up to create new materials. In these teams experts, educational specialists and trainers will collaborate to create and advance learning materials. Additionally research will be done on the needs of organisations and users to increase and expand the amount of available materials. In a later stage of the project users of the platform can improve their own contents collaboratively while gaining expertise, prestige and recognition within the community. Simultaneously their participation helps to improve the SELF materials enhancing the SELF community. As a result the community model of the SELF Platform assures a prevailing situation for those who provide efforts to the platform and those who use it.

http://selfproject.eu/en/LMEG

*** Standards ***

SELF Consortium partner Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (Spain) has researched digital format candidates to be used in the SELF Platform. The SELF team has described e-learning standards that can be used internally by the SELF Platform to manage learning materials.

According to the analysis provided in the report, the first list of supported formats is provided online. The report published on the SELF Standards used is not intended to provide an exhaustive list of supported formats. It is just a first analysis of several formats and additionally the analysis is subject to a further study by the standards experts of the SELF Project. Three alternatives which may be used as open standards for the internal representation of the Learning Objects in the SELF Repository are the Learning Object Meta-data Standard (LOM), the Shareable Content Object Reference Model (SCORM) and IMS Learning Design (IMS LD). Apart from that, the Open Document Format will be one of the import and export formats to facilitate a free flow of educational materials to and from SELF.

In November 2006 the Learning Standards Expert Group (LSEG) has been constituted in order to help define the learning standards and guidelines for the contents of the platform. They advice, provide feedback and test demonstrating versions and the final version of the SELF Platform, emphasising the implementation of the learning standards.

http://selfproject.eu/en/LSEG

*** Platform Definition ***

The SELF Platform is a web-based platform where users can go and find information and educational materials on Free Software and Open Standards, while at the same time it is a collaborative production environment for the creation of new materials and improvement and translation of existing materials.

Summarised it serves three main functions:

1. a central point of access to educational materials about Free Software and Open Standards.
2. a collaborative production facility for the community of users to work with the learning materials in a multi-language environment, with multiple standard formats and assuring quality levels in innovative ways.
3. a community of interested people and organisations that communicate with each other through the platform.

A more detailed definition can very soon be found online at http://selfproject.eu/en/TEG

*** Organisational Strengthening ***

The establishment of an Advisory Board is in progress. The Advisory Board will play a key role in the development and implementation of the SELF Platform, and will guide the goals, form and content of the SELF platform. The Advisory Board can strengthen our links with the target groups who should benefit from the SELF Platform and help with generating ideas to make the SELF project become self-sustainable. We have invited individuals with each their own knowledge and expertise, who can raise awareness of the Platform, and can act as connectors in different regions and areas. As we are in the process of inviting people to the Advisory Board we cannot yet identify certain names. We expect to be able to publish their names the soonest.

We have envisioned basic principles for a partnership strategy, which we call the SELF Support Programme (SSP). SELF can benefit from many different types of contributions. We have organised them into four main sections: Education, Technology and Services, External Communications, and Distribution. In the coming months we will be inviting organisations to join the programme, thereby complementing the user activities and help us make a sustainable organisation.

A set of founding principles that reflect our shared thoughts and ideas as a basis for the development of the platform have been put into action. These founding principles help guide our work over time and are the means by which we articulate what is and has been intrinsically important to the organisation.

*** Future Thoughts ***

In 2007 we expect to proceed with the development of the platform and presentation of the initial results. Alongside refining and elaborating our current efforts more Expert Groups will be announced soon. Main Quality Assurance mechanisms will be defined and implemented. A pilot version of the platform will be launched coming summer and later this year we will present an international, multi-language version of the SELF Platform. We will spread our wings and embrace organisations and individuals to help us form a sustainable community in order to become the central platform with high quality educational and training materials about Free Software and Open Standards.

The SELF team wishes you all the best for 2007!!

3. Expert Group Meeting on Free Software

On 19-21 December 2006 in Cairo, Egypt, was held an Expert Group Meeting on Free Software and Open Source Software Solutions for the Public Sector in the Arab Region. The meeting was jointly organised by the ICT Division of the Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) and the Information and Communication Technology for Development in the Arab Region (ICTDAR), a regional programme of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), in collaboration with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).

One of the agenda topics of the expert group meeting was defined as: (c) FOSS solutions for government and higher education sectors. The adoption of FOSS in the government and educational sectors is of great importance in the Arab region. This is attributed to the high expenditure of governments in the region for the introduction and use of ICTs in these sectors. Specific software solutions and deployment will be addressed for the e-government and education sectors.

The second day of the meeting was dedicated to FOSS in Education. The speakers presented the experience of the Arab world in the field of Free Software and Open Source in the following presentations:

• From Open Source to Open Educational Resources: Challenges and Opportunities for the Arab World by Y. Monsef;
• SCORM and Open Systems to develop collective intelligence A case study on Moodle Plus e-learning platform by P. Gedeon;
• FOSS in schools - by W. Ghanem;
• Open Source Learning Management Tools by H. Kreitem;
• Enhancement of Learning Management System at the Arab Open University by T. Sarie;
• Open Standard and Content Policies by S. Abraham.

APDIP provided for the meeting CDs with their publications, which are also published under Creative Commons licenses. APDP distributed the IOSN Live CD, developed for the School in the Asian-Pacific Region, containing a fully usable GNU/Linux operating system and Free Software applications, as well as publications and training materials.

Asia-Pacific Development Information Programme is an initiative of the UNDP (United Nations Development Programme) and "aims to promote the development and application of information and communication technologies (or, ICTs) for sustainable human development". Its sphere of work is the Asia-Pacific region. APDIP says it "aims to meet its goals by focussing on three inter-related core areas". The first is policy development and dialogue, the second is access, and the third being content development and knowledge management. From its publications, APDIP says it "collaborates with national governments, regional, international and multi-lateral development organisations, UN agencies, educational and research organisations, civil society groups, and the private sector". It does this with the aim of "integrating ICTs in the development process. Among the techie community, one of the better-known initiatives of the APDIP is the International Open Source Network (or, IOSN), which is supported by the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) of Canada. IOSN has been termed a "centre of excellence for Free/Open Source Software (FOSS), Open Content and Open Standards" in the Asia-Pacific region.

More information about APDIP and their e-library is available.

Contribution by Dessi Pefeva, ISOC.bg

4. Open Document Format and OpenXML

At its meeting of 6 December 2006, the PEGSCO (Pan-European eGovernment Services Committee) endorsed the following recommendations supported by the IDABC Expert Group (European Commission).

In the meantime did ECMA (Microsoft's standardisation partner) initiate the so called fast track procedure with the International Standardisation Organisation. This way they have their OpenXML (OOXML) specification standardised in 30 days, even though the specifications comprise of more than 6000 pages. More information can be found here.

Contribution by Wouter Tebbens, ISOC.nl

5. EC study on the economic impact of Free Software

The European Commission has completed a study on the "Economic impact of open source software on innovation and the competitiveness of the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) sector in the EU". The report outlines the key findings on the role of Free Software in the economy, with the direct and indirect economical impact, and trends, scenarios and policy strategies.

The full report can be downloaded.

6. British Governmental Agency Issues Warnings Against Using Windows Vista

The British government's Educational Communications and Technology Agency - BECTA has issued a serious warning against using Windows Vista in the British schools. The report is recommended for schools, government and partners, industry and developers.

The report found that whilst the new features of Vista add value, there are no "must have" features in the product that would justify early deployment in schools and colleges. The technical, financial and organisational challenges associated with early deployment currently make this a high risk strategy. Early deployment is therefore strongly recommended against.

The report recommends that Microsoft should facilitate a small number of pilot activities to clarify what the benefits of deploying Vista in schools and colleges would be and how much deployment would cost. The costs of a widespread deployment of Vista are currently estimated to be around £160 million while the benefits are unclear.

Schools and colleges are strongly advised to consider the findings of Becta's final report on Vista due by January 2008 before considering any wide-scale deployment.

[..]
Becta [..] calls on the ICT industry to ensure that computers for the education marketplace are delivered with a choice of Office productivity suites available, which ideally should include an open-source offering.

The ability for schools to exercise choice is further restricted by interoperability difficulties and Becta is calling on Microsoft to improve its support for the ODF interoperability standard.

Source: Veni Markovski's blog

BECTA Press Release

Full report

Contribution by Veni Markovski, ISOC.bg

7. Agenda

New Year's drinks : SELF, ISOC.nl and Free Software Working Group

January 15, 2007, Amsterdam, the Netherlands
To raise a glass on the New Year, and to be inspired on current technological developments!
Please register!

International Conference on Science, Education and Learning in Freedom

February 2, 2007, Mumbai, India
The SELF conference will help to establish a network with the community of Free Software advocates in ministry, industry, and educational institutes.
Please register!

Consol 2007

13-16 February 2007, México City, México
Consol 2007 is the Free Software Nacional Congress in México City.

• Beatriz Busaniche, on behalf of Fundación Vía Libre from Argentina, will present the SELF Project and work to establish new contacts and search interested parties in the education and business sector in Mexico.

Open Educational Resources for lifelong learning

16-17 April, 2007, Salzburg, Austria
3rd EduMedia Conference of Salzburg Research

• 17 April, 2007, 15:00 - 15:30 SELF Project, presented by Wouter Tebbens, ISOC.nl
  

NIOC Congress

17-18 April, 2007, Amsterdam, the Netherlands
NIOC is a forum for ICT in Education. The theme of the NIOC Congres
2007 is 'Learning in all stages' with subthemes
- ICT as independent speciality
- ICT in other disciplines
- Continuous learning curves
- Formats of ICT education

• During the congress Hinde ten Berge, ISOC.nl, will give a workshop on the SELF Project.

8. About

SELF News is a monthly newsletter about the SELF Project and related issues. SELF aims to be the central platform with high quality educational and training materials about Free Software and Open Standards. It is based on world-class Free Software technologies that permit both reading and publishing free materials, and is driven by a worldwide community.

Information about SELF:
http://selfproject.eu/

Consortium Partners:

• Internet Society Netherlands
• Universitat Oberta de Catalunya
• Free Software Foundation Europe
• Gothenburg University
• Internet Society Bulgaria
• Fundación Vía Libre
• Homi Bhabha Centre for Science Education

Newsletter editor:
Hinde ten Berge

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