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Software Freedom Day (SFD) is an annual worldwide celebration of 
SFD wiki
contains individual team pages describing their plans as well as helpful information to get them up to speed. Events themselves vary between conferences explaining the virtues of Free and Open Source Software, to workshops, demonstrations, games, planting tree ceremonies, discussions and InstallFests.
Press coverage
Software Freedom Day
Intellectual property activism International observances Unofficial observances September observances Saturday observances Holidays and observances by scheduling (nth weekday of the month) Recurring events established in 2004
Software Freedom Day (SFD) is an annual worldwide celebration of Free Software
Free software, libre software, libreware sometimes known as freedom-respecting software is computer software distributed open-source license, under terms that allow users to run the software for any purpose as well as to study, change, distribut ...
organized by the Digital Freedom Foundation
Digital Freedom Foundation (DFF) is a non-profit organization established in 2004. The group is the lead organizer of Software Freedom Day, and Hardware Freedom Day, as well as other "digital freedom days".
History
The organization was fou ...
(DFF). SFD is a public education effort with the aim of increasing awareness of Free Software and its virtues, and encouraging its use.
SFD was established in 2004 and was first observed on 28 August of that year. About 12 teams participated in the first Software Freedom Day. Since that time it has grown in popularity and while organisers anticipated more than 1,000 teams in 2010 the event has stalled at around 400+ locations over the past two years, representing a 30% decrease over 2009.
Since 2006, Software Freedom Day has been held on the third Saturday of September. In 2025, this event will be held on the 20th of September.
Organization
Each event is left to local teams around the world to organize. Pre-registered teams (2 months before the date or earlier) receive free schwag sent by DFF to help with the events themselves. ThSFD wiki
contains individual team pages describing their plans as well as helpful information to get them up to speed. Events themselves vary between conferences explaining the virtues of Free and Open Source Software, to workshops, demonstrations, games, planting tree ceremonies, discussions and InstallFests.
Past events
Note on the figures above: it is difficult to find figures of the early years. The maps on the SFD website are only reliable after 2007, however some years such as 2009 saw extra teams from two different sources which did not "officially" register with DFF. There was about 80 teams from China and a hundred from the Sun community (OSUM) who heavily subsidized goodies for their teams. In the early year of SFD the map was an optional component not connected with the registration script and therefore some teams did not go through the troubles of adding themselves.Sponsors
In the past, the event has been sponsored by entities likeCanonical Ltd.
Canonical Ltd. is a privately-held computer software company based in London, England. It was founded and funded by South African entrepreneur Mark Shuttleworth to market commercial support and related services for Ubuntu and related projects. ...
, IBM
International Business Machines Corporation (using the trademark IBM), nicknamed Big Blue, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company headquartered in Armonk, New York, and present in over 175 countries. It is ...
, Sun Microsystems
Sun Microsystems, Inc., often known as Sun for short, was an American technology company that existed from 1982 to 2010 which developed and sold computers, computer components, software, and information technology services. Sun contributed sig ...
, DKUUG
The Danish UNIX systems User Group (, DKUUG) is a computer user group focused around UNIX. It was the first Internet provider in Denmark and also created and maintained the .dk internet domain for the country.
Founded 18 November 1983, DKUUG is ...
, Google
Google LLC (, ) is an American multinational corporation and technology company focusing on online advertising, search engine technology, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, consumer electronics, and artificial ...
, Red Hat
Red Hat, Inc. (formerly Red Hat Software, Inc.) is an American software company that provides open source software products to enterprises and is a subsidiary of IBM. Founded in 1993, Red Hat has its corporate headquarters in Raleigh, North ...
, Linode
Linode () is an American cloud hosting provider that focused on providing Linux-based virtual machines and cloud infrastructure.
From the time of its launch in 2003, Linode provided virtual private server (VPS) hosting.
Linode was acquired by ...
, Nokia
Nokia Corporation is a Finnish multinational corporation, multinational telecommunications industry, telecommunications, technology company, information technology, and consumer electronics corporation, originally established as a pulp mill in 1 ...
and MakerBot Industries
MakerBot Industries, LLC was an American desktop 3D printer manufacturer company headquartered in New York City. It was founded in January 2009 by Bre Pettis, Adam Mayer, and Zach "Hoeken" Smith to build on the early progress of the RepRap Projec ...
.
Currently, this event is supported by Earth Cause, Linode
Linode () is an American cloud hosting provider that focused on providing Linux-based virtual machines and cloud infrastructure.
From the time of its launch in 2003, Linode provided virtual private server (VPS) hosting.
Linode was acquired by ...
, Mailman
A mail carrier, also referred to as a mailman, mailwoman, mailperson, postal carrier, postman, postwoman, postperson, person of post, letter carrier (in American English), or colloquially postie (in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the Unite ...
, Musescore
MuseScore Studio (branded as MuseScore before 2024) is a Free and open-source software, free and open-source music notation program for Microsoft Windows, Windows, macOS, and Linux under the Muse Group, which owns the associated online score-s ...
, Digital Peak, FSF, FSFE, Joomla
Joomla (), also styled Joomla! (with an exclamation mark) and sometimes abbreviated as J!, is a free and open-source content management system (CMS) for publishing web content on websites. Web content applications include discussion forums, p ...
, Creative Commons
Creative Commons (CC) is an American non-profit organization and international network devoted to educational access and expanding the range of creative works available for others to build upon legally and to share. The organization has release ...
, Admin Magazine, Linux Journal
''Linux Journal'' (''LJ'') is an American monthly technology magazine originally published by Specialized System Consultants, Inc. (SSC) in Seattle, Washington since 1994. In December 2006 the publisher changed to Belltown Media, Inc. in Hous ...
, Ubuntu User
''Ubuntu User'' was a paper magazine that was launched by ''Linux New Media AG'' in May 2009.
The publication is aimed at users of the Ubuntu operating system and focuses on reviews, community news, how to articles and troubleshooting tips. I ...
and Woman Tech.
Each local team can seek sponsors independently, especially local FOSS supporting organizations and often appears in local medias such as newspapers and TV.See also
* Outline of free software *Document Freedom Day
Document Freedom Day (DFD) is an annual event to "celebrate and raise awareness of Open Standards". It is celebrated on the last Wednesday of March each year. Document Freedom Day was first celebrated on 26 March 2008, and has continued to be cele ...
*Hardware Freedom Day
Hardware Freedom Day is an annual celebration organized by the Digital Freedom Foundation. The goal of Hardware Freedom Day is to celebrate the spirit of open hardware and make more people aware of using and contributing to free and hardware proj ...
*Culture Freedom Day
Culture Freedom Day is an observance of free culture. It takes place annually on the third Saturday of May. It aims at educating the worldwide public about the benefits of using and encouraging free culture as well as providing an international da ...
*Public Domain Day
Public Domain Day (PDD) is an observance of when copyrights expire and works enter into the public domain. This legal transition of copyright works into the public domain usually happens every year on January 1 based on the individual copyrigh ...
*International Day Against DRM
International Day Against DRM (IDAD), sometimes called just Day Against DRM or anti-DRM day, is a grassroots international observance of protests against digital rights management (DRM) technology. The event is intended as "a counterpoint to the ...
, promoted by the Free Software Foundation
The Free Software Foundation (FSF) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization founded by Richard Stallman on October 4, 1985. The organisation supports the free software movement, with the organization's preference for software being distributed ...
in its Defective by Design
Defective by Design (DBD) is a grassroots anti-digital rights management (DRM) initiative by the Free Software Foundation (FSF) and CivicActions. Launched in 2006, DBD believes that DRM (which they call "digital ''restrictions'' management") m ...
campaign
References
External links
{{commons categorySoftware Freedom Day
Intellectual property activism International observances Unofficial observances September observances Saturday observances Holidays and observances by scheduling (nth weekday of the month) Recurring events established in 2004