FSFE supporters Vienna

On the second Veganmania street festival this year taking place on the Danube island in Vienna from August 25. to 27. we finally managed to borrow a sturdy tent. We could get it for free from a local animal rights organisation. This was great for withstanding the high temperatures during the event because it provided urgently needed shade. The only downside was that the name of the well known organisation was printed onto the tent. This caused many people to mistake our information stall for one of this other organisation despite none of our banners, posters and information indicated any relation to this subject or organisation – at least on first glance. Of course this didn’t hinder us to clarify the confusion and to point out the most important subject on our desk: independence on personal electronic devices.

As usual many people did use this opportunity to learn more about free software and the advantages it brings. Other than that we had many encounters with people who already use free software and were as happy as surprised to find us at this event. Of course we could easily give the reasoning why we feel that free software is a perfect addition to a vegan lifestyle. After all, most people decide to go vegan because they don’t want to harm others. And if you apply the same thought to the world of software you end up with free software.

Again I need to order more information material for the next instalment of our information desk on 8. and 9. October this year at the third Veganmania summer festival in Vienna in front of the city hall. Usually there are only two Veganmanias each year but since it is the 25. anniversary of the event in 2023 a third one will take place at this prestigious and hard to get location.
We noticed an interesting re-occurring phenomenon concerning a difference in how male and female people approach our information desk. Of course this is just a tendency and there are exceptions but in general most men will only approach our desk because they already know about free software and they want to check out what material we do offer. And female visitors of our desk mostly aren’t familiar yet with free software but are willing to find out what it is about.

Many people were especially interested in ways to improve their privacy and independence on their mobile phones. Unfortunately many of those did use iOS devices and we couldn’t offer them any solutions on this totally locked down platform. Android is far from being ideal but it at least gives most users the opportunity to go for more privacy focused solutions. Even if they didn’t want to forego all proprietary software they can at least use F-Droid as an app store to add free software apps to their mix. And it is of course always good to know that you can actually upcycle your mobile after the original OS stopped providing security updates by installing a free alternative Android system like LineageOS.

Especially the brochure for decision makers in the public sector investigating what advantages free software brings to the table in this area is still in higher demand than I anticipated. I really need to order more of those.

A large amount of different stickers seems to attract many people. I need to replace some of my over the years rather worn out posters. And I am still not certain if I should actually invest in my own tent because one that can withstand wind, rain and many years of service isn’t cheap. But using a tent with the information of an other organisation printed on it hasn’t proven to be ideal for the confusion it creates.

I also consider joining the annual Volksstimmefest with our FSFE information stall, but I am not convinced how good this idea is because it seems to be more focused on concerts and has a clear tendency to be a left wing political event. Since I don’t consider free software to be a predominantly left wing subject I am somewhat reluctant to position it so clearly in this spectrum.
Manning the desk for three days was somewhat exhausting since my usual helper couldn’t be there due to a clash of appointments. Nevertheless, I consider the information desk on Veganmania 2023 on the Danube island as an other successful event where I was able to inform many people about ways to improve their independency in the digital realm by employing free software.