...at least it's more honest.

Today, in Wellington, the representatives of a regime that promised a new era of "Hope" and "Change" are brow beating the rest of the world into submission. So, it's business as usual. The bastardised version of the Munroe Doctrine is yet again being used to further the very narrow goals of self interested, US based, lobbies.

Over the weekend PublicACTA has released the Wellington Declaration and asked people who interested in protecting their digital rights to sign the petition to endorse the Wellington Declaration.

It is unusual for one NGO to criticise another in public, particularly when they are involved in the same sector. Divisions can be harmful. However, when the NZICT chooses alchemy over science it really is time to call a spade a spade.

NZICT is an organisation formed by large multinationals which makes the following claims:

Law firms that supported continued software patents have published critiques of the arguments put forward by those who opposed software patents and asked for an exclusion to be added to the Patent Bill. In this article Peter Harrison, vice President of the NZOSS responds.

InternetNZ has has strongly opposed the signing of the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) by New Zealand in a submission to the Ministry of Economic Development, suggesting that the whole digital enforcement framework be removed from ACTA.

The New Zealand Open Source Society has made a submission on ACTA to the Ministry of Economic Development. The submission explores the relationship between legislation of the United States passed in 1998 called the DMCA with provisions in the Copyright Amendment Act 2008 and the leaked provisions in ACTA. The NZOSS does not wish to see a regime where citizens will be disconnected from the Internet based only on notices from rights holders, but rather maintain a position where proper judicial oversight and process will be maintained. Video here.

When the original draft of the Patent Bill was released there were no exceptions for computer software. Naturally the NZOSS weighed in and submitted it's point of view. Today our position has been vindicated by the release by the Commerce Commission report supporting an exception for computer programs in the Patent Bill. The New Zealand Open Source Society applauds the Commerce Commission on it's decision to exclude computer programs from being patentable in New Zealand.

The motto of Google is "Don't Be Evil". Its pretty easy to say something like this, but much harder to live up to. In the corporate world any action is moral if it benefits the share holders. So it is with not some inconsiderable astonishment that I find Google putting it's money where it's mouth is and actually acting morally by pulling out of China rather than continue to censor their search results.

NZOSS and Victoria University Announce Public Sector Remix IT Vendor Capability Survey Results

The New Zealand Open Source Society and Victoria University of Wellington’s School of Information Management today announced the results of an IT vendor capability survey, carried out as part of the Public Sector Remix project.

The Remix project involves a number of central, regional and local government agencies working together to trial free software for common desktop tasks such as document management, mail, calendar and browser-based information services.

On Tuesday next week Mark Osborne of Albany Senior High School will be presenting on the Open Source Information Technology systems he has employed at the school. The presentation will be held at the school at 7:30pm. Albany Senior is a leader in deployment of open source technology, and has even enabled it's students to create their own audio visual system. It is a excellent example for other schools to follow.