The FOSS Landscape Beyond Software

We’ve talked about only the first half of our society’s name until now. It’s time to address the latter half, Open Knowledge. Open knowledge is knowledge that is free to use, reuse, and redistribute without legal, social, or technological restriction (Open Definition 2.1). The concept is related to open source and the Open Definition, whose first versions bore the title “Open Knowledge Definition”, is derived from the Open Source Definition.

We believe that information and research should be free and accessible to everyone in the world, especially in our current age. Countless people currently without access hold the potential to offer immense support and insight, enriching humanity’s collective knowledge.

We, and many other FOSS projects, aren’t just about programming. We support, and contribute to open knowledge resources like Wikipedia (The Free Encyclopedia), OpenStreetMap (free map data), Creative Commons (public cultural work), and open access academic publishing. As buFOSS, we are planning Wikipedia Edit-a-thons to improve Wikipedia’s reliability as an information source and help our members get better at writing. Check our calendar at https://bufoss.org for the next one!