Free Software 4 Climate

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Free Software 4 Climate



Nowadays the ecological part of our lives is more important every day that passes.
Young people like Greta Thunberg are fed up of talks without actions.

Free software guarantees to the users four essential freedoms [1], but the aspect that sometimes it is not fully appreciated is the ecological aspect of these essential freedoms.
Free software means users are free to change, share and run the program, individually and in groups.
Free software it is thought and developed for the community, not corporations, it is humanity heritage, not an heritage of a single developer or corporation. In free software planned obsolescence is not an option, just ethic software that respect the users and developers is created. Free software respect also the hardware it runs on.

You can use a GNU [2] plus Linux operating system on computers that are twenty years old without any problems, you can use an editing video software like Kdenlive[3] on laptops with more then 10 years of activity without having to worry about expensive license fees.

Smartphones have became an "use and dispose" object, like computers. Searching on the internet you can find lots of info on how this technology is being "recycled" [4]; it exists also a fully libre operating system for smartphones and tablets: Replicant [5].

The carbon footprint of an object is something that is not always considered when buying a product, but it is important for our fragile planet. Every time we buy a product, especially a new one, we add indirectly CO2 in the atmosphere. Recycling and using our electronics products, like smartphones and computers, for as long as possible it is essential for our planet.

The laptop where I am writing this article has been bought used, not refurbished, for less then 100 euro, it was a top of the line when it came out more then 10 years ago, now it runs only on free software, it has graphical and video editing software too. It is always free software like Krita, Gimp and Kdenlive. Just ethical, ecological and free, as in freedom of speech, software, this is what we all need.

The carbon footprint of this laptop has remained pretty much the same, but at least it has been saved by the disgrace of non free software, a great laptop have been saved from the planned obsolescence.



Liberate a laptop too!

Install a free, as in freedom of speech, operating system today!

https://www.gnu.org/distros/free-distros.html

It surely costs less CO2 a liberated laptop compared to a new one, or to an used one destined to planned obsolescence.

As it was written above it is also possible to liberate even tablets and smartphones thanks to Replicant, you can learn more about this free operating system here:
www.replicant.us
Free software means users are free to change, share and run the program, individually and in groups. With these freedoms, the users control what the program does. When a device's software is free, the manufacturer can't use its power over the software to force the device into obsolescene, or hurt users in other ways. This is why we reject the products of Apple, Google and Microsoft.
Even an extensive use of centralized social networks like Facebook, Instagram and others one puts our planet in danger. These social networks resides in many servers, that often, if not always, run at full capacity even if not needed, just to be ready to comply to the user demands as soon as possible.

Decentralized social networks exist, Mastodon [6] is just one example, Mobilizon [7] another one.

Federated social network are not centralized, but the network resides in many computer usually hosted by the community. In this way no one has access to all the data on the network, and the workload is distributed making it a more ecological choice.

Other examples of federated networks, but for media content are MediaGoblin [8] and PeerTube [9].

Most of the people ignore that there are licenses that give you the four (4) essential freedoms:


[1]The Free Software Definition
[2]What is GNU?
[3]Kdenlive
[4]Computer recycling West Africa style
[5]Replicant
[6]Mastodon
[7]Mobilizon
[8]MediaGoblin
[9] PeerTube

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