[K12OSN] Our Free Software Keynote at NECC

[Tom Hoffman]

Last year at NECC I felt like 2006 should be the year that one of the
NECC keynotes should feature an open source figure, like GNOME founder
Miguel Icaza, for example, but it didn't seem very likely.  However,
as you might have seen (
http://www.iste.org/Template.cfm?Section=Home&Template=/ContentManagement/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=10096
) Nicholas Negroponte from MIT is giving the second keynote (on July
sixth, the middle day of the conference).  He's not Richard Stallman
(for better or worse), but he is promoting the first laptop for
students designed to run Linux, so it should be a step forward for
consciousness of open source at NECC, and something we can build on.

I think it is a good time to discuss what we can do to make NECC 2006
(in San Diego) a big success for free software in education.  Every
year we have the opportunity at NECC to have a showcase in the Free
Software Center / email garden.  I'd like to have a full slate of
talks and presentations lined up ahead of time this year, so we can
distribute flyers, particularly at other free software related talks
(and the keynote).  We also should reach out to the Moodle community
and try to use Moodle presentations in the Free Software Center to
draw in people.

I'm going to have some other business in San Diego this summer, so
I'll probably get there early and/or stay later, so I'll be around to
help.  Also, I can probably use some of the SchoolTool budget for
small things, like printing flyers or posters.

Anyhow, now is probably a good time to start discussing plans.

--Tom