Thursday, 18 September 2008

Sun Sponsors Software Freedom Day, Increases Open Source Awareness

Sun Microsystems, Tuesday announced a global call to action for organizations and consumers to embrace open source software as part of its sponsorship of Software Freedom Day (SFD). Held on September 20, 2008, SFD is an annual worldwide celebration of free and open source software...

Sun Microsystems, Tuesday announced a global call to action for organizations and consumers to embrace open source software as part of its sponsorship of Software Freedom Day (SFD).

Held on September 20, 2008, SFD is an annual worldwide celebration of free and open source software and is designed to educate the public, to celebrate the virtues of open source software and encourage its use.

Sun, an official sponsor of SFD 2008, said in a statement that it’s committed to open source communities and technologies and will be hosting more than 100 events around the globe at elite technical universities and educational institutions to equip students with free and open source technologies to aid their learning.

Sun is also encouraging its employees to support Software Freedom Day activities by running a series of global events to raise awareness which include more than 130 university campuses and open source communities.

Sun employees from 60 countries are expected to participate in SFD 2008.

"Software Freedom is about creating a digital platform for trust and longevity, particularly in a future where more and more of our lives are dependent upon technology," said Pia Waugh, president of Software Freedom International, the organization behind Software Freedom Day.

"It is important we can participate in and trust the software we use and Software Freedom Day is designed to draw attention to the importance of open source technology. Through reaching a broad audience, we want to foster a general understanding of software freedom, and encourage adoption of free software and open standards. We appreciate the collaboration and support on this effort from leading visionary technology companies like Sun Microsystems."

Software Freedom Day was established in 2004 when 70 teams from across the globe participated. Since that time it has grown in popularity as more than 600 teams from over 80 countries plan to celebrate this year's Software Freedom Day.

"Attitudes towards open source are maturing rapidly," said Simon Phipps, chief open source officer, Sun Microsystems.

"Software is no longer solely the domain of the developer. This is especially relevant in this 25th anniversary year of the GNU Project with more and more businesses moving away from proprietary technologies that deny them freedom and flexibility and introducing open source software into their organization. By sponsoring Software Freedom Day, Sun is helping new audiences across the globe embrace open source and recognize the impact that it can have in organizations of all sizes."

Sun has made a huge commitment to open source software over the years, contributing billions of dollars in developer time, sponsorships and donations, as well as releasing several codes under open source including OpenSolaris, OpenJDK and OpenOffice.org.