NZOSS Council for 2016-17

Yesterday's AGM, included participants from around New Zealand using open standards-based video conferencing software to meet, virtually, and fulfil our Society's obligations for an Annual General Meeting. 

The assembled group has provided us with a streamlined Council (as intended) for the coming year:

1. Rob Elshire (Palmerston North)
2. Steven Ellis ( Auckland)
3. Danny Adair (Wellington)
4. Daniel Reurich (Wellington)
5. Dave Lane (Christchurch)
6. Tim McNamara (Wellington) - incumbent, Vice President

Rob is a new addition to the council (welcome aboard!) and the others have all had at least one term.

Our Vice President is Tim McNamara, and President is Dave Lane. Daniel Reurich accepted another term as our Treasurer, and we are still to appoint a Secretary.

We're very grateful to our previous Councillors for their hard work and, in many cases, very long service! We would like to thank

• Grant Paton-Simpson (Auckland)
• Rose Lu (Wellington)
• birgit bachler (wellington)
• Brent Wood (Wellington)
• Marek Kuziel (Christchurch)
• Peter Harrison (Auckland)
• Nicolás Erdödy (Oamaru, North Otago)
• Jaco van der Mewe (Auckland)
• Matthew Holloway (Wellington)

for all they have done, and, we're sure, will continue to do to "share the freedom of open source software, open data, and open standards for the benefit of all New Zealanders".

For his great service to the Society, we would especially like to thank Peter Harrison who is stepping down from the Council to focus on another organisation of which he's the President, the New Zealand Association of Rationalists and Humanists. Peter is both a former President of the Society as well as its founder (in 2003).

Our new, smaller Council means that we will have an easier time organising monthly meetings (and achieving quorum necessary for formal decision making!), but we will be looking to these committed members of our community (and others, too) to help us by leading various initiatives we will be pursuing in the coming year.

We also look forward to substantially increasing our financial membership this year. We believe we have a significant role to play in New Zealand's civil society, and that our contribution has value to many. We will be making it easy and, we hope, compelling for our informal community to support the Society both with their good will and participation as well as their $20-$40 for an annual membership!

We're looking forward to working with you all this coming year.

Read Full Story from Latest News https://nzoss.org.nz/content/nzoss-council-for-2016-17
This article by dave originally appeared on nzoss.org on October 23, 2016 at 12:27PM

NZ Open Source Award 2016 Finalists Announced

From the NZOSA press release email:

"The judges have completed their review of the many projects and individuals nominated for awards this year, and have announced the finalists for each category.  

“The quality of all of the nominations was very impressive. We are fortunate to have so many people here using open source technology and philosophy to deliver amazing technical, social and creative projects.

“The judges would like to congratulate all of the nominees, as all of their contributions have created significant value for our communities, research institutions and businesses.” said Jason Ryan, Chair of the judging panel.

We would like to thank the judges for all the time they put into reviewing the nominations.

View a list of the 2016 finalists - http://nzosa.org.nz/categories/

People's Choice award

Nominations for the People's Choice award are listed on the website, ready for voting, which is open until 5 September.
View People's Choice nominations - http://nzosa.org.nz/peoples-choice/

Sponsors

We would like to thank all our sponsors for the NZOSA 2016.
Platinum - Catalyst and NZRS
Silver - Redhat, SilverStripe and IITP
Bronze - Silicon Systems, NZRise and NZOSS. 

If you are interested in becoming a sponsor, please contact sponsors [at] nzosa [dot] org [dot] nz

Clinton Bedogni Prize for Open Systems

Once again The University of Auckland Department of Computer science is presenting the Clinton Bedgoni prize for open systems at the NZOSA gala dinner, applications close on 27 August.  More details and nomination forms are available at  https://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/our_department/Clinton_Bedogni/

Gala dinner

The gala dinner is being held on Tuesday 25 October at Te Papa in Wellington. 
Tickets are $45, to reserve your ticket contact awards [at] nzosa [dot] org [dot] nz

Preview	Attachment	Size
	Media Release- Finalists August 2016.pdf	1.17 MB

Read Full Story from Latest News https://nzoss.org.nz/content/nz-open-source-award-2016-finalists-announced
This article by dave originally appeared on nzoss.org on August 17, 2016 at 03:19AM

ACT calls for government open source adoption

The ACT Party has called for the NZ Government to adopt open source software, citing, among other things, the UK's transition away from Microsoft products to open source alternatives.

While the NZOSS is gratified to see Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) being advocated by the ACT Party (and the Greens have similarly advocated it for at least the past decade) we think that FOSS sells itself if the playing field is level. At present it is not. The UK's transition has been made possible by its mandatory adoption of open standards. Without that change, adopting FOSS is blocked by the fact that corporate software suppliers control the documents everyone produces, and they can unilaterally change those proprietary formats to ensure that the FOSS alternatives are never quite fully compatible as has been the case for the past 20 years.

We would love to see the NZ government make good on the goals of the D5 Charter, to which we have formally been signed up (thanks Minister Dunne), which among other admirable things include: adoption of open standards, and broader use of open source software. We advocate that the NZ government formally mandate the use of open standards, because upon doing so, government software procurement will be on a level playing field, and at that point we are confident that FOSS will increasingly be the best choice on all criteria.

Read Full Story from Latest News https://nzoss.org.nz/content/act-calls-for-government-open-source-adoption
This article by dave originally appeared on nzoss.org on August 08, 2016 at 01:14AM

Attend ITx - NZOSS steam on Day 3

This year the IITP's annual conference, ITx, is a bit different from years past. It will feature 11 other national technology organisation's "streams" as well, including one for the NZOSS community discussing aspects of open source, open business, open data, and open standards. We've got speakers, a lightning talk session (so put together a 5 minute presentation about your favourite open topic) and a panel discussion.

We're finalising our programme now, but we encourage NZOSS community members to take part: you can sign up for the conference (either the full conference, or just the 3rd day NZOSS stream) and please contact us regarding sponsorship.

Read Full Story from Latest News https://nzoss.org.nz/content/attend-itx-nzoss-steam-on-day-3
This article by dave originally appeared on nzoss.org on May 18, 2016 at 06:25AM

NZ Open Source Awards 2016 - nominations now open!

We're very pleased to share with you that the NZ Open Source Awards will be run again this year (2016), thanks to Catalyst IT.

If you're using or contributing towards open source software here in NZ, please nominate the projects, communities and individuals you'd like to see recognised at the awards, which will be held in October.

You're welcome to nominate yourself and your own projects - don't be shy!

Read Full Story from Latest News https://nzoss.org.nz/content/nz-open-source-awards-2016-nominations-now-open
This article by dave originally appeared on nzoss.org on May 18, 2016 at 06:16AM

TPPA compromises NZ Data Sovereignty

Section 14.13.2 of the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA) states:

No Party shall require a covered person to use or locate computing facilities in that Party’s territory as a condition for conducting business in that territory

That is a surprisingly innocuous statement given its apparent profound implication. It suggests that no TPPA participating country may require that vendors it selects to hold sensitive data, be it government or citizen data held in trust by the government.

The term "covered person" specifically excludes financial institutions or (based on my interpretation) institutions holding "credit rating" information... It does not, however (again, by my interpretation) make an exception for sensitive data like personal health data or tax status.

Section 14.2.3(a) tempers this somewhat. It does exclude government procurement from this requirement:

"This Chapter shall not apply to: (a) government procurement;"

Again, it comes down to how the term "government procurement" is interpreted. Most cloud services do not trigger government procurement regulations due to their relatively low up-front cost. Similarly, many quasi governmental organisations, like Primary Health Organisations (PHOs), who hold sensitive patient records, may not be bound by this either.

The Australian government has long had a policy that all government and citizen data it holds in trust on behalf of the people of Australia must be held in IT infrastructure based in the Australian territorial jurisdiction. It would appear that Australia will have to abandon this very prudent policy if it signs onto the TPPA.

Sadly, New Zealand government has been very keen to allow storage of government and citizen data it holds in trust (e.g. the IRD's systems holding citizen taxpayer records) in commercial cloud computing facilities outside the NZ territorial jurisdiction.

The NZ government rationale for that has been the relative lack of NZ-based cloud providers, making that requirement cost prohibitive.

Now, however, a number of multinational and domestic cloud service vendors have infrastructure based here in NZ. The TPPA clause 14.13.2 would prohibit the NZ government for doing the sensible thing and tightening its data sovereignty policy to require that NZ government data, which could have national security implications, and the data it holds in trust on behalf of its constituents, NZ businesses and citizens, be held within the NZ territorial jurisdiction.

Ultimately, it all comes down to the specific interpretations of various terms, like "covered person", and one thing is certain: lawyers advising governments and businesses will be much much wealthier as a result of the TPPA. To my mind, that's a regression, not progress.

Read Full Story from Latest News https://nzoss.org.nz/content/tppa-compromises-nz-data-sovereignty
This article by dave originally appeared on nzoss.org on February 03, 2016 at 12:19AM

Wellingotn Council Meeting Report

NZOSS 2016 Council Meetup Report

This past weekend (16-17 Jan 2016) ten (out of 13) NZOSS Councillors met in Wellington, at the Catalyst IT offices in Willis Street.

 

First, many thanks to Catalyst for providing us with this space, and for your ongoing commitment to free and open source software!

 

We asked ourselves some tough questions, including questioning our basic purpose for existence, and had an intense and wide-ranging discussion on the future of the NZOSS. It was a bit of a watershed that ended with some very useful and positive conclusions. I, for one, am very pleased with the results. The following outlines some of our decisions and inspiration.

Decisions:

• We composed a new NZOSS Mission Statement - The NZOSS exists to "share the freedom of open source software, open standards, and open information for the benefit of New Zealand."       

• We agreed that we should have and promote a Code of Conduct to make explict our expectations of individual behaviour in our community. We will review that adopted by the NZ Python Users Group of which 3 officers are also NZOSS councillors.

• We agreed to urgently review the Society's membership management system (and website CMS, among other things). Our primary candidate for replacing our current creaky system is the same one that NZPUG is currently trialling, called Tendenci. Because NZPUG is committed to completing its adoption of Tendenci by March 2016 (assuming it meets their migration criteria, which currently seems likely) the NZOSS could rapidly adopt it. We could then also use it as a new website CMS platform. For the record, Tendenci is an open source platform, built on the Python Django framework, running on an entirely FOSS stack.

• We should focus on one key campaign issue to build relevance, reputation and membership. In particular the whole of government approach to software procurement presents a major risk to open source in New Zealand. Other options are discussed within the "Proposed Initiatives" section.

Proposed Initiatives

• We recognised that the greatest periods for the NZOSS have occurred when we have had well defined campaigns, like blocking Microsoft's software patent application, their attempt to get their OOXML format certified as an ISO Standard, the Copyright black-out, and ending software patents in NZ. We identified a new mission: ensuring that local suppliers and open source technologies are an option for NZ government procurement. This will require campaigns related to IT procurement (probably left to NZRise) and a campaign to compell NZ Government to mandate the use of open standards for all software where possible.    

• Another Campaign would be to get the Ministry of Education's NCEA standard to include (or at least recognise) FOSS technologies.   

• We decided to focus our fund raising efforts on those campaigns as well as identifying and contacting possible business sponsors for our stream at the ITX conference.

• We will invite affilated organisations to offer our financial members a 10% discounts: InternetNZ, NZPUG, IITP, NZRise, NZTech, Linux AU, Canterbury Software Cluster, others?

• We will similarly approach local FOSS-friend suppliers to ask for member discounts: Nice Gear, Catalyst Cloud, Rimu Hosting?

• We will offer physical (laptop stickers!) and digital badges (website icons) for members, and possibly further NZOSS swag (pending suitable designs and the ability to produce compelling offerings)

Conferences

ITx 2016 - July 2016

We will be running a one-day FOSS stream during this conference (press release) which will combine the communities of 12 NZ tech and education organisations. It gives us the chance to showcase FOSS activities and potentially get some FOSS-related issues into the broader industry discussion. Things like

• online voting,

• the need for open standards in government IT procurement,

• TPPA's potential implications for the Tech Sector, or perhaps

• Creative Commons licensing for the public sector - NZGOAL.

 

Our ITx planning team (if you'd like to participate, let us know!):

• Daniel Reurich (NZOSS liaison with IITP)

• Peter Harrison

• Nicolas Erdody

• Steve Ellis

• Dave Lane   

We have already received two requests from FOSS-related groups to present in our stream. We need to put together a programme for our stream and engage with compelling speakers - this conference gives us an opportunity to reach a very broad and (arguably) influential demographic - existing IT professionals.

 

For both conferences, we would appreciate suggestions for FOSS-focused keynote-worthy candidates.

OpenSource//OpenSociety 2016

We agreed to continue discussing NZOSS' involvement with the Enspiral-led OpenSource//OpenSociety conference (repeating last year's conference, but without the primary sponsorship from Github). We agreed not to take a financial risk with the conference from a funding point of view. We will be keen to help direct the open source aspects of the conference, and recommend the Enspiral organisers on candidates for Keynote presentations and advise on the appropriate use of terminology and other open source-related lore to maximise the chances of success for this Wellington-focused event.

 

We consider this event compelling because it attracts an interesting demographic of up-and-coming technical developers and last time (2015) it attracted a substantial and diverse collection of people including many designers as well as educators and government employees whose involvement in the NZOSS would greatly enhance our impact and ability to undertake our mission.

Pending Tasks

• new website with membership management capabilites

• get a charitable Paypal Account to allow for online payments via Credit Card in NZD

• website content review - we need to decide which content to migrate from our existing website at and which content is no longer relevant.

• directory of FOSS businesses

• capability matrix of our council and members

• clarify and document our membership policies, including those for corporate/organisational members - see https://etherpad.nzoss.org.nz/NZOSSMembershipModel for my recent efforts on achieving this.    

Statement of Principles - Proposed

The Statement of Principles is intended to clarify and complement our Mission. In keeping with the FOSS mantra of "release early and often", here is a provisional set of NZOSS principles - please improve, add, remove as you see fit. This will evolve over time. These should all be declarative statements, generally applicable to the NZOSS' behaviour, and that of its members.

• If we want to see change in the world, it must start with us

• Liberty requires vigilance - shine a light on injustice

• Protect freedoms to be open and to share

• Play to the strengths of our community

• Public interests (the Commons) should be equal to - or greater than - private interests

• Go local first

• The User = the Developer

• Unite, don't divide

• Distinguish between actions and motives - praise positive actions regardless of motivation, encourage positive motivations

• Celebrate the good rather than focusing on the bad

• Everyone can contribute

• It must all make business sense

• Strength in diversity

• Open by default    

• Participation and innovation should be permissionless

• Disruptive innovation always emerges where least expected, often as the result of playful exploration, not commercial motivations

• Create rather than denigrate

• Read AND write, not read-only

Read Full Story from Latest News https://nzoss.org.nz/content/wellingotn-council-meeting-report
This article by dave originally appeared on nzoss.org on January 22, 2016 at 01:57AM

The TPPA is only part of the story

In reading through the patent-specific parts of the leaked TPPA IP Chapter to undertake yesterday's analysis, I noticed something the implications of which concern me greatly.

I reproduce Article QQ.A.8 below for your reference (original is on page 4 of the leaked chapter):

Article QQ.A.8: {International Agreements}

1. Each Party affirms that it has ratified or acceded to the following agreements:
    (a) Patent Cooperation Treaty (1979);
    (b) Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property (1967); and
    (c) Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works (1971).

2. Each Party shall ratify or accede to each of the following agreements, where it is not already a Party to such agreement, by the date of entry into force of this Agreement forthe Party concerned:
    (a) Protocol Relating to the Madrid Agreement Concerning the InternationalRegistration of Marks (1989);   
    (b) Budapest Treaty on the International Recognition of the Deposit of Microorganisms for the Purposes of Patent Procedure (1977), as amended in 1980;
    (c) International Convention for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants(1991) (UPOV Convention);
    (d) Singapore Treaty on the Law of Trademarks (2006);
    (e) WIPO Copyright Treaty (1996); and
    (f) WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty (1996)

So, by signing the TPPA, we are implicitly accepting the terms of these 9 prior agreements.

I presume similar references to other prior agreements exist in other sections of the TPPA text (which, of course, we haven't seen).

What relevant requirements are contained in those agreements, which we "shall ratify or accede to"? How does ratifying or acceding to them force us to change our laws, policies, jurisdictions, practices or expectations?

Nevermind how appalled I am by the secrecy of this entire TPPA process - is it conceivable that our handful of negotiators - the only people in NZ who had access to this text - know all of these agreements and their legal ramifications?

By all accounts, our negotiators are clever, dedicated civil servants, but I don't think it is conceivable that they really understand the technical implications of the TPPA text, much less all these ancilliary agreements.

To me this demonstrates that - like a software user who just wants to run a piece of software to solve a problem - our government is hell-bent on clicking "I ACCEPT" on the mother of all End User License Agreements: the TPPA.

That thought terrifies me, and should petrify you, too. This isn't just a piece of software we're talking about... with your precious computer, files, music collections, and family photo galleries hanging in the breach. This is our nation, our homes, our future, and that of our children. I think it's time to get very very angry about this.

Read Full Story from Latest News https://nzoss.org.nz/content/the-tppa-is-only-part-of-the-story
This article by dave originally appeared on nzoss.org on October 11, 2015 at 12:18PM

New NZOSS Council and VP for 2015-16

Congratulations to our five new NZOSS councillors for the 2015-16 year!
They are

• Grant Paton-Simpson (Auckland)
• Steve Ellis (Auckland)
• Rose Lu (Wellington)
• birgit bachler (wellington)
• Danny Adair (Kawakawa, Northland)

Many thanks, too, to our returning councillors:

• Brent Wood (Wellington)
• Daniel Reurich (Wellington)
• Marek Kuziel (Christchurch)
• Peter Harrison (Auckland)
• Tim McNamara (Wellington)
• Nicolás Erdödy (Oamaru, North Otago)
• Jaco van der Mewe (Auckland)
• Dave Lane (Christchurch)
• Matthew Holloway (Wellington)

On behalf of the Society, I would also like to convey our heartfelt gratitude to our departing councillors who have provided many years of service to the Society! They're all extremely busy people and we know they're still working on behalf of the Society's goals but in other contexts - go well!

• Don Christie (Wellington)
• David Nind (Wellington)
• Liz Quilty (Auckland)
• Vik Olliver (Auckland)

A big congrats and thanks also to Tim McNamara who has put his hand up to take on the role of Vice President of the Society!

We're looking forward to an exciting year, pursuing a bunch of new initiatives with our updated team - more on that before too long!

Read Full Story from Latest News https://nzoss.org.nz/content/new-nzoss-council-and-vp-for-2015-16
This article by dave originally appeared on nzoss.org on September 21, 2015 at 03:23AM

NZOSS 2015 AGM - 13-19 September

The 2015 NZOSS AGM will be a not be at a specific time, but rather asynchronous over the course of a week: Sun 13- Sat 19 Sept.

We are still taking nominations for candidates for council and Vice President and President - just nominate yourself or someone else (ideally with their permission). We provide instructions if you want to nominate someone or yourself.

To vote, people will need to

1. have a working login on the NZOSS website, and, once logged in,
2. be a paid up financial member - annual subs are $40 waged, $20 unwaged, paid via bank transfer.

If you've got an organisational membership, ask me about financial membership.

We'll announce the final list of candidates on 13 Sept, and you'll be able to review their statements on the website and make your selections.

We'll also link the our president's report and I'm aiming to provide a video president's address.

On Sat 19 September, we're planning to have informal gatherings in the various centres around the country for interested folks to want to find out the results and just catch up for a chat about the organisation's activities and direction!

Read Full Story from Latest News https://nzoss.org.nz/content/nzoss-2015-agm-13-19-september
This article by dave originally appeared on nzoss.org on August 20, 2015 at 02:12AM

Open Standards NZ Initiative

Our friends have initiated a petition to educate New Zealanders about the state of our government IT procurement, and its complete capture by proprietary interests.

We in the NZOSS do not want to see our government mandate the adoption of open source software - that would not make sense. We believe that would be a natural consequence of our government "levelling the playing field" for software procurement by mandating compliance of all software procured by government with relevant vendor-neutral, royalty-free open standards.

The scourge of proprietary standards, particularly those created by default by Microsoft Office (DOC/X, XLS/X, PPT/X, etc.) is insidious: in effect, the NZ government currently mandates the use of Microsoft Office by all citizens wanting to collaborate effectively with government. Many other compliance requirements for the private sector require that businesses and organisations use specific vendor-proprietary applications and computing platforms (like Microsoft Windows). This is anti-competitive and could easily be remedied by simply requiring government software suppliers to conform to existing open standards. This will also have the positive side effects of increasing competition for government software procurement contracts, lowering prices. It also has fundamental accessibility advantages: making it possible for the private sector and citizens to comply with government communication requirements using lower cost (and no-cost) computing platforms and software.

We encourage you to add your name to the petition!

 

Read Full Story from Latest News https://nzoss.org.nz/content/open-standards-nz-initiative
This article by dave originally appeared on nzoss.org on July 27, 2015 at 06:51AM

Thanks to Catalyst and Rimu Hosting

The NZOSS would like to thank Catalyst IT for many years of website support and over two years of gratis website hosting (Catalyst IT continued managing and hosting this site after it acquired Egressive, who had hosted the site for many years prior). Catalyst provides excellent hosting services, including NZ's first OpenStack cloud service.

We have recently shifted hosting of the site to an NZOSS-managed virtual server generously sponsored by Rimu Hosting, who specialise in FOSS-based hosting infrastructure located onshore in NZ and overseas.

We are also trialing a number of new services on that infrastructure, including our own FOSS collaborative document editing platform (built on Etherpad-Lite) and a collaborative development repository for NZ-based FOSS projects, our own instance of GitLab.

Read Full Story from Latest News https://nzoss.org.nz/content/thanks-to-catalyst-and-rimu-hosting
This article by dave originally appeared on nzoss.org on May 08, 2015 at 12:52AM