Discover great free and open source software at our next meetup

We’ll be holding our next meetup on Wednesday 20 April at Birmingham Open Media and we’d love it if you could join us and get involved!

Following on from well-attended practical session on protecting your online privacy and security, we’ll be introducing you to some amazing software packages and tools which you are completely free and legal for you to download.

 

All the software we’ll be introducing you to will be free and open source. Free software is software that gives you the user the freedom to share, study and modify it. That means it not only costs you nothing to use it (free as in beer), but gives you the right to make changes and contribute improvements (free as in freedom).

Free software and digital rights

As well as helping people access to software they would not otherwise be able to afford, free and open source software is really to protecting our privacy, security and human rights online. Because anyone can study and modify the software code, it is easier to spot and fix security bugs. And because no single company controls the software, it is harder for governments to forces companies to spy on their users as in the recent FBI versus Apple court case.

You can find out more about free software on the Free Software Foundation website.

You should come to this meetup if:

• You need software such as Adobe Photoshop or Microsoft Office for work or education but can’t afford the licence. GIMP is a high quality free alternative to Photoshop while LibreOffice can replace MS Office.
• Your laptop is a good few years old and is struggling to run Windows. The open source Ubuntu operating system could breathe new life into your computer.
• You’re worried about how much control Facebook, Google and Apple have over digital and want to find viable alternatives such as Firefox web browser and Signal private messenger.

Don’t forget to bring your laptop/tablet/smartphone with you so that we can try out rather than just talk about software!

RSVP via our Meetup page

We look forward to seeing you on Wednesday 20 April.

 

 

Join us on 17 February to learn how to protect your online privacy and security

Please join us at Birmingham Open Media on 17 February for a special workshop focused on helping you reclaim your online privacy and security.

At the session you’ll find out more about how companies and governments are tracking you online and why this is bad news for your human rights and puts you at greater risk of being a victime of online crime. More importantly, we’ll show you some simple, practical steps you can take to boost your online privacy and security without having to totally change the way you use the internet.

At the session you’ll also have the chance to find out the latest news about the government’s plans to greatly expand surveillance and hacking through the Investigatory Powers Bill (AKA the Snoopers’ Charter) and what you can do to stop it becoming law.

Don’t forget your laptop, tablet or smartphone

We want the workshop to be as practical as possible so please bring along your laptop, tablet and/or smartphone so that we can show you some great apps, browser extensions and other tips.

Sign up via our Meetup page

As usual, you can find out more and RSVP for our events via our Meetup page

ORG Birmingham Meetup

Birmingham Open Media

A big thank you goes out to our hosts Birmingham Open Media (BOM), who have supported Open Rights Group Birmingham from day one. If you’re not familiar with the work they do, you can visit BOM Tuesdays to Saturdays between 10.30am and 5pm.

Keep in touch

You can keep in touch with all the latest developments by following us on Twitter @OpenRightsBrum.

See you on the 17th!

Francis

Open Rights Group Birmingham