Autonomo.us group hopes to free data locked in web services
The topics of information ownership and privacy are at the forefront of the web services discussion. We've been uploading all our stuff into "the cloud," and now it's time for users to regain power over their own content. While forthcoming open data initiatives from major players like Facebook and Google are promising, a new group has formed to tackle the larger questions and chase the lofty ideal of laying out new rules for how all these services can more positively enable their users.
Dubbed autonomo.us, the group
states that it "is an independent group of hackers and activists. Many
of us create network services. All of us are concerned about their
effects on user freedom and autonomy." While not directly affiliated
with any groups like the Free Software Foundation yet, autonomo.us is
made up of various employees and members of Novell, MIT, FSF, Creative
Commons, and the GNOME Foundation.
For now, autonomo.us is just getting started and has a wiki
with essays (and more on the way) that cover questions like "What does
freedom mean for the users and developers of web services? What is at
risk? What should the free and open-source software community do to
ensure that software, and its users, stay free in this new
technological environment?"
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