In many ways, the FISL Week represents the great achievements in Latin America over the last decade: countries that had spent decades under the repressive control of military dictatorships are now experiencing a historically unprecedented re-birth and the culture of information freedom that we write about on this news website is representative of what could be called the new “open source societies” all over Latin America. Since the end of the Cold War, only one military coup was a... Read Full Story
North by South has compiled this post which aggregates video, photos and articles about this year’s tenth anniversary of FISL, the Fórum Internacional Software Livre, held in Porto Alegre, Brazil. There were over 8,000 participants this year, including Brazilian President Lula da Silva! This page will continue to be updated as we find more links, so check back here or send us relevant links to include. Here is the Official NXS FISL10 Summary:
President Lula da Silva and the next presid... Read Full Story
North by South’s presentation at FISL10 is happening TODAY, Saturday, June 27, 2009 between 7pm - 8pm in 41F. Please join us to find out more about our unique, free software-based business model. Read Full Story
With a soaring popularity rating, President Luiz Inacio “Lula” da Silva is the most popular head of state in the entire world. A founding member of his party, the Brazilian Worker’s Party, and a former union leader who helped overthrow the military dictatorship that ruled Brazil for decades, Lula has been instrumental in the historic shift within Latin America to progressive governments within a coalition that includes Venezuela, Argentina, Bolivia, Cuba, Ecuador and about ... Read Full Story
Brazil’s impressive Digital Inclusion program (Inclusão Digital) has received extensive coverage on this website, especially in comparison to technology education in the United States. FISL is an annual opportunity for Brazil to show off its commitment to society and Lula’s initiative to provide a world-class technology education for all students. And why shouldn’t they? Brazil’s efforts to bridge the digital divide has not only achieved countless successes but has se... Read Full Story
The 10th edition of the Free Software International Forum (FISL), the biggest event of free software in Latin America and maybe one of the biggest in the world, starts today in Porto Alegre, Brazil.
North by South has been invited to speak at the mega-conference, and we will host a panel about our unique business model, on Saturday, 06/27. We will also be hanging out with the developers of our network and meeting people we work with online everyday and enjoying this very special edition of F... Read Full Story
As mentioned before on this news site (US firewall exposed by bloggers from countries like Cuba or Syria), the embargo laws in the United States have a direct impact on information technology development in the affected countries. Now, a blog from Cuba has reported that Google Wave is blocked for Cuban internet users.
The article (Spanish only) goes even deeper and itemizes other examples of how the USA embargo affects the IT development in Cuba. Here is a translation of some of the cases:
A... Read Full Story
Elastix is a complete GNU/Linux distribution with Asterisk, DHADI, Openfire, Postfix and many other free software packages. It has a user-friendly interface that integrates the best tools available for Asterisk-based PBXs, as well as its own set of utilities which allows the creation of third party modules. The software was created by PaloSanto Solutions, an IT company from Ecuador, and released to the public for the first time in March 2006. Elastix has a good support for telephony hardware... Read Full Story
Presenting the free software model as a way to provide viable and sustainable access to new information technologies while encouraging the economic and social development of a region is part of the goals of III ENSL, the Northeast Free Software Meeting and the Fourth Bahia Free Software Festival, happening on May 29-30 at the campus of Bahia State University (UNEB) in Salvador, Bahia’s capital.
The Bahia’s Free Software Project and Colivre - Cooperative of Technology Livre (Free) ... Read Full Story
The Brazilian National Support Project for Telecentros (public computer labs with free, public Internet access) intends to support the deployment of 2 - 3,000 new Telecentros and towards achieving the goal of 10,000 active Telecentros by the year 2010. Almost all of the Telecentros are built using entirely free and open source software. Adding to the social benefit of the project, the rapid timetable will be met by training Brazilian youths on how to install Linux, configure the workstations ... Read Full Story
