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FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap

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Re: FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap

#41

Post by positron26 »

As a US citizen, when I see the phrase "European digital sovereignty," I'm a bit concerned that our OSS enthusiast and activist allies in that geography are learning to associate American OSS with American tech companies and US government. This could deepen the old free/libre vs open source divide that seems to have polarized along the separation by the Atlantic ocean. If so, in a time where Americans may be soon head-to-head with a runaway tyrannical government, our EU allies will be busy retreating into free/libre commensalist thinking that seem tunnel-visioned on using government funding to escape MS Word, something that is going to be the last thing on their minds if actual sovereignty concerns emerge.

The more general goal will remain to protect all individual freedoms from all tyrannical governments, not to depend on them. It will remain to use better information technology to enhance the functioning of all governments and to create healthy competition in all markets to protect consumer choice. American OSS has not forgotten this one bit. Our country is just having a moment, and it won't help if EU OSS participation writes us off as casualties while EU OSS focuses on "uniquely European" solutions.

Re: FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap

#42

Post by napolux »

ptx wrote: post #39

> One of my personal highlights of FOSDEM 2026 was a wonderfully simple yet brilliant idea by the Mozilla Foundation: giving away free cookies. They had an opportunity there to restore the "Cookies are delicious delicacies" message [1] in a more appropriate context, but it seems that's not the sign they went with. [1] https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=213186

They do this every year since a while :)

Re: FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap

#43

Post by Tomte »

patrickmcnamara wrote: post #14
ongy wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The most important realization about FOSDEM is really: There's no way you can fully experience it or do it optimal. It's really about making sure you get value out of it, listen to some interesting talks and meet some people.

It's about collecting stickers.

It‘s about getting a selfie with the blue PostgreSQL elephant wandering around campus. :-)

Re: FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap

#44

Post by yunnpp »

positron26 wrote: post #41

As a US citizen, when I see the phrase "European digital sovereignty," I'm a bit concerned that our OSS enthusiast and activist allies in that geography are learning to associate American OSS with American tech companies and US government. This could deepen the old free/libre vs open source divide that seems to have polarized along the separation by the Atlantic ocean. If so, in a time where Americans may be soon hea…

I don't think anyone is confused about American OSS and American corporations run amok with wealth accumulation and regulatory capture. It's a European conference held at a time when governments are waking up to the realization that foreign-owned proprietary software is a bad idea, and the idea of "digital sovereignty" has been around for a bit and did not originate at FOSDEM. The governments also seem to understand that OSS helps with transparency and minimizing costs by investing into a commons (though the message bears repeating; FSFE, EDRI and such do a good job getting it out), so hopefully they'll stick with that and not replicate the US model.

Re: FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap

#46

Post by positron26 »

yunnpp wrote: post #44
positron26 wrote: post #41

As a US citizen, when I see the phrase "European digital sovereignty," I'm a bit concerned that our OSS enthusiast and activist allies in that geography are learning to associate American OSS with American tech companies and US government. This could deepen the old free/libre vs open source divide that seems to have polarized along the separation by the Atlantic ocean. If so, in a time where Americans may be soon hea…

I don't think anyone is confused about American OSS and American corporations run amok with wealth accumulation and regulatory capture. It's a European conference held at a time when governments are waking up to the realization that foreign-owned proprietary software is a bad idea, and the idea of "digital sovereignty" has been around for a bit and did not originate at FOSDEM. The governments also seem to understand…

> I don't think anyone is confused about American OSS and American corporations run amok...

You literally just lumped it all together, exactly the fallacy I'm voicing my concern about.

> foreign-owned proprietary

OSS is global. "Foreign owned" is relative. If Americans reject "European" open source, it would make zero sense.

> the US model

What even is "the US model?" The things that are being described as "American" or "European" here are not inherently national.

Re: FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap

#47

Post by voldemolt »

wiz21c wrote: post #17
haunter wrote: post #13

> Not every open source project exists to solve geopolitical problems, and not every contributor arrives with a policy agenda. FOSDEM has always thrived on its diversity of motivations, and maintaining that balance will be increasingly challenging. It’s not just the FOSS scene but there is an increasing crowd (mostly on the internet) of “everything is political”. Honestly I’m not sure what will happen in the coming y…

with AI we have entered capitalistic computing, where it's the scale of computing that makes it political (before, it was a clever idea that brought the political thing, like MP3, encryption, etc.). As it is massive scale (think 2GWatt data centers), I'm afraid the poor little FOSS guy won't be able to be as relevant as before. It's not David against Goliath anymore, it's FOSS against billions of zombies. I happen to…

[dead]

Re: FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap

#48

Post by fvdessen »

I for one found this event really sad. It's like the OSS community has rejected the past 5 years of software and technological changes and now choses to live in a retro computing bubble.

We're in 2026, hardware is made in dark factories in shenzhen in fully automated assembly lines by the million of units. Software is written using LLMs hosted in gigantic datacenters. Millions of people are now writing their own software with vibe coding platforms from their phones

What is the FOSDEM community's answer to the real concerns that these changes pose ? Let's hand solder raspberry pis ! let's self host LLMS from 2 years ago on FreeBSD ! Look, i can run wasn linux on this risc-v cpu !

These takes are completely out of touch with reality, no wonder that nobody younger than 40 was attending the conference. The next generation is doing something else and rightly so.

Re: FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap

#50

Post by positron26 »

ksec wrote: post #34
haunter wrote: post #13

> Not every open source project exists to solve geopolitical problems, and not every contributor arrives with a policy agenda. FOSDEM has always thrived on its diversity of motivations, and maintaining that balance will be increasingly challenging. It’s not just the FOSS scene but there is an increasing crowd (mostly on the internet) of “everything is political”. Honestly I’m not sure what will happen in the coming y…

>It’s not just the FOSS scene but there is an increasing crowd (mostly on the internet) of “everything is political”. Judging from HN we are pass that already. Absolute Peak of it was 2014 - 2017. But I guess this is a new trend especially in EUR.

The trend is global and inherent to online psychological coupling and self-selection bias. The longer we go without healthy information spaces, the more the population will regress.

There does however seem to be a "free/libre" vs open source rift along the Atlantic ridge, and it is being wedged apart by the US government flirting with a return to isolationism mixed with bullying and self-enforced credible threat geopolitics.

It is really counter-productive for Europeans to think American OSS people are monolithic with US tech giants and the US federal government. Nonetheless, pluralism is good, and innovation will win, so I suppose it's just another hairpin in the game.

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