Episode 190: Karen M. Sandler on Software Freedom Conservancy (SFC)

Guest Karen M. Sandler Panelists Richard Littauer | Justin Dorfman
Show Notes In this episode of Sustain, hosts Richard and Justin
welcome Karen Sandler, Executive Director of the Software Freedom
Conservancy (SFC). Karen shares her journey from engineer to
lawyer, and how her personal health condition led her to the world
of open source. She discusses her role at SFC, the importance of
Copyleft licenses, and the organization's diversity initiative,
Outreachy. Karen also shares her personal experience with her
defibrillator pacemaker, emphasizing the need for more control over
technology. The conversation then turns to SFC's role as a fiscal
sponsor, its support for alternatives to proprietary software, and
its work in enforcing Copyleft licenses. The episode concludes with
a discussion about SFC's ongoing lawsuit with Vizio over Copyleft
license obligations. Hit download to hear much more! [00:01:46]
Karen discusses her background and how she got involved in open
source and her role at the Software Freedom Conservancy (SFC).
[00:04:44] Karen shares her personal experience with her
defibrillator pacemaker, emphasizing the need for more control over
technology. [00:09:34] Richard wants to know about how Software
Freedom Conservancy came about, and if she helped found it.
[00:10:58] Karen goes onto explain SFC's role as a fiscal sponsor,
its support for alternatives to proprietary software, and its work
in enforcing Copyleft licenses. [00:12:52] Justin is curious to
find out the status of the Vizio lawsuit, so the group discusses
SFC's ongoing lawsuit with Vizio over Copyleft license obligations.
[00:15:08] Karen explains the difference between Copyleft and
Copyright, emphasizing the importance of Copyleft. [00:17:30] Why
is this lawsuit so important? Karen explains how companies like
Vizio are not sharing source code under the terms of the Copyleft
license. [00:26:54] Richard shares the news he read about how Japan
says, “AI Model Training Doesn’t Violate Copyright,” and Karen
shares her thoughts and how it could be playing a role with things
like Microsoft Co-pilot and its effect on Open Source Code.
[00:31:55] We find out what software freedom means to Karen and the
importance of holding companies accountable for their
responsibilities under Copyleft licenses. Quotes [00:03:43] “Our
technology may not be made for us, and what are we going to do when
it's not.” [00:12:29] “It was never our purpose to just be a fiscal
sponsor. It was our purpose to support software freedom.”
[00:13:32] “The really deep thinking about licensing and whether or
not how it works out to have non Copyleft licensing and Copyleft
Licensing, how that impacts the longevity of a community and the
ability to maintain the software as open source.” [00:17:10]
“There's so much promise in devices where you can get access to the
software because you can create alternative builds, you can do
really cool stuff with them.” [00:19:42] “It's really the
downstream recipients who are the ones who are hurt by the lack of
compliance.” [00:24:03] “We’re in it for the long haul. Going to do
this slog so that we can come out at the other end and do our best
and see if we can get a good result for software freedom.”
[00:25:49] “Almost no business models rely on proprietary source
code anymore. Very few are like royalty based.” [00:29:54] “I don't
care about Copyleft necessarily. It's a strategy to get us to that
goal of software freedom.” Spotlight [00:31:55] Justin’s spotlight
is py-cord, which allows you to create Discord bots. [00:35:49]
Richard spotlights Kevin Kelly, and the Tim Ferriss Show podcast
episode he was on. [00:36:20] Karen shares a personal spotlight,
the late Marina Zhurakhinskaya. Marina helped found Outreachy and
passed away just over a year ago. Links SustainOSS
(https://sustainoss.org/) SustainOSS Twitter
(https://twitter.com/SustainOSS?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor)
SustainOSS Discourse (https://discourse.sustainoss.org/)
podcast@sustainoss.org (mailto:podcast@sustainoss.org) SustainOSS
Mastodon (https://mastodon.social/tags/sustainoss) Open
Collective-SustainOSS (Contribute)
(https://opencollective.com/sustainoss) Richard Littauer Twitter
(https://twitter.com/richlitt?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor)
Richard Littauer Mastodon (https://mastodon.social/@richlitt)
Justin Dorfman Twitter (https://twitter.com/jdorfman?lang=en)
Software Freedom Conservancy (https://sfconservancy.org/) Outreachy
(https://www.outreachy.org/) The GNOME Foundation
(https://foundation.gnome.org/) Karen Sandler Twitter
(https://twitter.com/o0karen0o?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor)
Karen Sandler FLOSS Social
(https://social.joshtriplett.org/@karen@floss.social) Karen Sandler
LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/karensandler/) Vizio Lawsuit
Article
(https://www.thestack.technology/vizio-sued-open-source-gpl-copyleft/)
FOSSY 2023 (https://2023.fossy.us/) py-cord
(https://pypi.org/project/py-cord/) Tim Ferriss Show – Kevin Kelly
“Excellent Advice for Living” Episode
(https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/669-kevin-kelly-excellent-advice-for-living/id863897795?i=1000610782498)
Tim Ferris Show Blog – Kevin Kelly
(https://tim.blog/2023/04/26/kevin-kelly-excellent-advice-for-living/)
Marina Zhurakhinskaya
(https://www.outreachy.org/blog/2022-06-14/remembering-and-honoring-marina-zhurakhinskaya-founder-of-outreachy/)
Credits Produced by Richard Littauer (https://www.burntfen.com/)
Edited by Paul M. Bahr at Peachtree Sound
(https://www.peachtreesound.com/) Show notes by DeAnn Bahr
Peachtree Sound (https://www.peachtreesound.com/) Special Guest:
Karen Sandler.