Philippine Commons

The Document Freedom site¹ provides in its “About” page:

Document Freedom Day (DFD) is a global day for document liberation. It will be a day of grassroots effort to educate the public about the importance of Free Document Formats and Open Standards in general.

Complementary to Software Freedom Day, we aim to have local teams all over the world organise events on the last Wednesday of March. 2008 is the first year that Document Freedom Day is being called for, and we are looking for people around the world who are willing to join the effort.

DFD’s main goals are:

• promotion and adoption of free document formats
• forming a global network
• coordination of activities that happen on 26th of March, Document Freedom Day

Once a year, we will celebrate Document Freedom Day as a global community. Between those days, DFD will be focused on facilitating community action and building awareness for issues of Document Freedom and Open Standards.

There are three (3) DFD teams in the Philippines so far. We hope that you will join the DFD community.

Activities ongoing:

Korakora Proyekto: Open On-Line Dialogue “Surfers or Serfs: Digital Freedom or Digital Feudalism?” From 26 February - 26 March 2008 http://korakora.org/proyekto/dfd08/

An on-line event organized in conjunction with Document Liberation and Open Standards 26 March 2008 Document Freedom Day http://documentfreedom.org/

In response to efforts of promoting, adopting and raising awareness for Free Document Formats and Open Standards, the Philippines-based art initiative Korakora.org is organizing an open on-line dialogue entitled “Surfers or Serfs: Digital Freedom or Digital Feudalism?”

Within the context of issues addressed within the free, open-source, and open-standards community, “Surfers or Serfs” seeks to investigate realities of Freedom within the Culture of Ignorance: Are humans being turned into machines so others can exploit them without them questioning their own slavery? Why do we consider somebody “computer literate” when they can only operate the controls of a commercial computer system?

“Surfers or Serfs” also seeks to interrogate the methodologies of “free, open-source, and open-standards” from a broad philosophical perspective, in particular, the celebrated shift from the image of the computer as a complex rule based simulation system to a simple communication device that has enabled the computer to be commercially and politically exploited as a (postmodern) propaganda machine.

“Surfers or Serfs: Digital Freedom or Digital Feudalism?” opens 26 February and runs until Document Freedom Day March 26, 2008. The on-line dialogue is created and facilitated by Fatima Lasay (PH) and Trevor Batten (UK). To participate, go to http://korakora.org/proyekto/

Philippine DFD Teams:

AsiaSource-Pilipinas (Lungsod ng Maynila)

AsiaSource-Pilipinas was formed to gather delegates of Asia Source 1 and 2 from the Philippines (vernacular: Pilipinas). Asia Source camps are source camps that focused on capability-building and empowerment with Free/Open Source Software. Asia Source 1 was held in 2005 in Bangalore (India) and Asia Source 2 in 2007 in Sukabumi, Indonesia.

AsiaSource-Pilipinas was created and formally launched as a team (with the same name) for the Software Freedom Day 2007 and actively took part in the day’s activities in collaboration with other F/OSS groups in Manila, Philippines.

The group continues to promote the source camp concept and F/OSS in other activities and events organized by the International Open Source Network ASEAN+3 (IOSN ASEAN+3), a F/OSS advocacy group established by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) under its Asia-Pacific Development and Information Programme (APDIP) initiative.

AsiaSource-Pilipinas is gearing itself for the planning and organizing preparations for the forthcoming Asia Source 3, which will be hosted by the Philippines in 2009.

MABUHAY AsiaSource-Pilipinas!

JEDI (Lungsod ng Quezon)

UP Java Research & Development Center is a group of faculty members and students developing free and open Computer Science and IT course ware using Java. Our materials are all in Open Document Format.

Korakora Proyekto (Lungsod ng Quezon)

Korakora Proyekto is an arts initiative focussed on language-making. Proyekto encourages: The Commons. Free and Open Source Software as philosophy and pragmatic methodology. Creative, bootstrapping systems. Integration of knowledge, understanding, research and practical experience. “Traditional” social debate about political alternatives and choices.

1. http://www.documentfreedom.org/About ; licensed under GNU FDL [↩]