*Please consider adding to your address book, which will ensure that our messages reach you and not your spam box.*
*Read and share online: *
Welcome to the *Free Software Supporter*, the Free Software Foundation's (FSF) monthly news digest and action update—being read by you and 233,478 other activists.
## TABLE OF CONTENTS
* September FSF40 challenge: Invite someone to come with you to FSF40 * Forty years, forty links * Help us welcome free software supporters from all over the world in Boston * We want to see how you use free software every day! * The US government just made it harder for the public to comment on regulations * MS confidence in Windows 11: Pay us to host VMs for you when your desktop inevitably dies * Meta illegally collected data from Flo period and pregnancy app, jury finds * August GNU Emacs news * Join the FSF and friends in updating the Free Software Directory * LibrePlanet featured resource: Group: Software/research/ProgrammingLanguages * August GNU Spotlight with Amin Bandali featuring eleven new GNU releases: Emacs, Mes, and more! * FSF and other free software events * Thank GNUs! * GNU copyright contributions * Translations of the *Free Software Supporter* * Take action with the FSF!
View this issue online here:
Encourage your friends to subscribe and help us build an audience by adding our subscriber widget to your website.
* Subscribe: * Widget:
Miss an issue? You can catch up on back issues at .
Want to read this newsletter translated into another language? Scroll to the end to read the *Supporter* in French or Spanish.
***
### September FSF40 challenge: Invite someone to come with you to FSF40
Every month during our fortieth anniversary year, we're inviting free software supporters everywhere to join us in celebrating #FSF40. For this month's challenge, invite someone to come with you to the FSF40 celebration on October 4. It could be someone who is just as involved in the free software movement as you or even someone who hadn't heard the term "free software" until you invited them. We're excited for you to join us! If you can't take part in this #FSF40Challenge, fear not—we've got three more coming.
Have an idea for a challenge? Send us a message at !
### Forty years, forty links
*From August 16*
Our fortieth anniversary is fast approaching. Here are forty links from the FSF and GNU sites that give a sense of what we've been doing all this time as we work for your freedom. Hint: some of these pages may include answers for the trivia contest we'll hold during the FSF40 celebration on October 4.
*
### Help us welcome free software supporters from all over the world in Boston
*From August 15*
We're excited to invite you to FSF40, our fortieth anniversary celebration to be held the weekend of October 4, 2025. As we mark four decades of defending and building software freedoms, your presence as a local supporter is invaluable. If you are based in the northeast United States, come celebrate forty years of software freedom achievements and show out-of-towners a great time in Boston!
*
### We want to see how you use free software every day!
*From August 14*
We want to honor the hard work that has gone into free software and its development with the FSF40 photo contest. From August 14-31, 2025, we invited free software supporters worldwide to share how they use free software on a daily basis. Stay tuned for the upcoming voting session to choose which photos best showcase free software every day!
*
### The US government just made it harder for the public to comment on regulations
*From August 18 by Matthew Gault*
In the middle of August, POST was deactivated for third party organizations, making it impossible to bypass regulation.gov's nonfree JavaScript. POST is a very common function that allows an API key holder to gather comments from people with their own forms and submit these comments on their behalf. Because of the difficulty in making a public comment on a regulation without using the online form, it often pushes users to choose between freedom and speaking up. While some sources do report that you can submit comments via mail, the work that would go into that is often quite challenging. This tool getting disabled functions as a chilling effect on user's freedoms and free speech, and a strong push to force more people to use a web site that doesn't respect their freedom.
* * *
### MS confidence in Windows 11: Pay us to host VMs for you when your desktop inevitably dies
*From August 13 by Gareth Halfacree*
If you or your job uses Windows 10, not only is Microsoft forcing you to switch to Windows 11, it is now asking users to pay for hosting on a secondary device when Windows 11 inevitably crashes your older device. There are many users and organizations that will not have the luxury of owning multiple devices, nor should they need to in order to use the device that they have paid for and should expect to work. This is another one of Microsoft's artificial, money-making "problems," creating a supposed necessity. Users should be given the choice which version of an operating system they want to use, and more generally, which updates to implement.
*
### Meta illegally collected data from Flo period and pregnancy app, jury finds
*From August 5 by Jon Brodkin*
When you can't examine the code behind an app like Flo, one of the most popular period-tracking applications, you have no guarantee of what the app is doing in the background or who your information is shared with. Flo may have been caught red-handed giving Google and Meta access to users' private in-app communications, but be aware that not every nonfree software or app is similarly revealed to be violating users' privacy in addition to their freedoms. Individual users of Flo could not have prevented this illegal data-sharing, but if the software was free, they could have at least known what they were getting into by using the app. If you're currently using an app like Flo, or some other app that has access to sensitive data, consider storing that sensitive data in a place that deserves to be trusted.
* *
### August GNU Emacs news
*From August 31 by Sacha Chua*
In these issues: standard-keys-mode, vecdb, and more!
### Join the FSF and friends in updating the Free Software Directory
Tens of thousands of people visit directory.fsf.org each month to discover free software. Each entry in the Directory contains a wealth of useful information, from basic category and descriptions to version control, IRC channels, documentation, and licensing. The Free Software Directory has been a great resource to software users over the past decade, but it needs your help staying up-to-date with new and exciting free software projects.
To help, join our weekly IRC meetings on Fridays. Meetings take place in the #fsf channel on Libera.Chat and usually include a handful of regulars as well as newcomers. Libera.Chat is accessible from any IRC client—Everyone's welcome!
The next meeting is this Friday, September 5 from 12:00 to 15:00 EDT (16:00 to 19:00 UTC). Details here:
*
### LibrePlanet featured resource: Group: Software/research/ProgrammingLanguages
Every month on [the LibrePlanet wiki](https://libreplanet.org/wiki/Main_Page), we highlight one resource that is interesting and useful—often one that could use your help.
For this month, we are highlighting the Group: Software/research/ProgrammingLanguages resource. The goal of this page is to understand the status of various programming languages and toolchains. It can help people deciding on a programming language to choose or to learn, or enable people to understand where distributions need contributions to support well a language. It could also contain information on what language works where or if we can target specific operating systems with free software or not. You are invited to help update, adopt, spread, and improve this important resource.
*
Do you have a suggestion for next month's featured resource? Let us know at .
### August GNU Spotlight with Amin Bandali featuring eleven new GNU releases: Emacs, Mes, and more!
Eleven new GNU releases in the last month (as of August 31, 2025):
For announcements of most new GNU releases, subscribe to the info-gnu mailing list: .
To download: nearly all GNU software is available most reliably from . Optionally, you may find faster download speeds at a mirror located geographically closer to you by choosing from the list of mirrors published at , or you may use to be automatically redirected to a (hopefully) nearby and up-to-date mirror.
A number of GNU packages, as well as the GNU operating system as a whole, are looking for maintainers and other assistance. Please see if you'd like to help. The general page on how to help GNU is at .
If you have a working or partly working program that you'd like to offer to the GNU project as a GNU package, see .
As always, please feel free to write to me, , with any GNUish questions or suggestions for future installments.
### FSF and other free software events
* September 20, 2025, online, [Community meetup in Palm Beach County, Florida, United States](https://www.fsf.org/events/community-meetup-palm-beach-county-fl) * October 3-5, 2025, Manila, Philippines, [State of the Map](https://2025.stateofthemap.org/) * October 4, 2025, Boston, Massachusetts, [FSF 40 celebration](https://my.fsf.org/civicrm/event/info?reset=1&id=135) * October 4, 2025, online, [FSF40 celebration](https://my.fsf.org/civicrm/event/info?reset=1&id=136) * October 4, 2025, Harbin, China, [Community meetup](https://www.fsf.org/events/community-meetup-harbin-china) * October 12-14, Raleigh, North Carolina, [ATO](https://2025.allthingsopen.org/) * November 7-8, Seattle, Washington, [SeaGL](https://pretalx.seagl.org/2025/) * November 21-23, 2025, online, [FSF hackathon](https://my.fsf.org/civicrm/event/info?reset=1&id=134)
### Thank GNUs!
We appreciate everyone who donates to the Free Software Foundation, and we'd like to give special recognition to the folks who have donated $500 or more in the last month.
*
This month, a big Thank GNU to:
* Antonio Carzaniga * Brewster Kahle * Casper Freksen * de Rie Family Giving Fund * John Gilmore * John Wheeler * Matomo.org * Podbielniak Giving Fund
You can add your name to this list by donating at .
### GNU copyright contributions
Assigning your copyright to the Free Software Foundation helps us defend the GNU GPL and keep software free. The following individuals have assigned their copyright to the FSF (and allowed public appreciation) in the past month:
* Collin Funk (GNU sed) * Lua Viana Reis (GNU Emacs) * Matthias Meijers (GNU Emacs) * Rudolf Erwin Polzer (GNU Chess) * Sean Devlin (GNU Emacs) * tusharhero (GNU Emacs) * Will Reed (GNU Guile)
Want to see your name on this list? Contribute to GNU and assign your copyright to the FSF.
*
### Translations of the *Free Software Supporter*
El *Free Software Supporter* está disponible en español. Para ver la versión en español haz click aquí:
**Para cambiar las preferencias de usuario y recibir los próximos números del *Supporter* en español, haz click aquí:**
Le *Free Software Supporter* est disponible en français. Pour voir la version française cliquez ici:
**Pour modifier vos préférences et recevoir les prochaines publications du *Supporter* en français, cliquez ici:**
If you no longer wish to receive the *Free Software Supporter* in English (but still receive other communications in English), you can opt out [here][7].
[7]: https://my.fsf.org/node/75
### Take action with the FSF!
Contributions from thousands of individual associate members enable the FSF's work. You can contribute by joining at . If you're already a member, you can help refer new members by adding a line with your member number to your email signature like:
> I'm an FSF member — Help us support software freedom! >
The FSF is always looking for [volunteers](https://www.fsf.org/volunteer). From rabble-rousing to hacking, from issue coordination to envelope stuffing — there's something here for everybody to do. Also, head over to our [campaigns section](https://www.fsf.org/campaigns) and [take action on software patents](https://endsoftwarepatents.org/), [Digital Restrictions Management](https://www.defectivebydesign.org/), [free software adoption](https://libreplanet.org/wiki/Group:Freedom_Ladder), [OpenDocument](https://www.fsf.org/campaigns/opendocument/download), and more.
**Do you read and write Portuguese and English?** The FSF is looking for translators for the *Free Software Supporter*. Please send an email to with your interest and a list of your experience and qualifications. -- Interested in helping us expand our reach?
* Follow us on Mastodon at and PeerTube at , showing your support for federated social networks. * Get active on the LibrePlanet wiki: . * Share on your blog or [social network](https://www.fsf.org/share) that you support us, and why you do so. * Subscribe to our RSS feeds: . * Join us as an associate member: ; and display your membership button () on your website.
Read our Privacy Policy: .
Sent from the Free Software Foundation,
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You can unsubscribe from this mailing list by visiting
https://my.fsf.org/civicrm/mailing/unsubscribe?reset=1&jid=169999&qid=95291974&h=a9ec30c76992815b. To stop all email from the Free Software Foundation, including Defective by Design, and the Free Software Supporter newsletter, visit
Welcome to the Free Software Supporter, the Free Software Foundation's (FSF) monthly news digest and action update—being read by you and 233,478 other activists.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
September FSF40 challenge: Invite someone to come with you to FSF40
Forty years, forty links
Help us welcome free software supporters from all over the world in Boston
We want to see how you use free software every day!
The US government just made it harder for the public to comment on regulations
MS confidence in Windows 11: Pay us to host VMs for you when your desktop inevitably dies
Meta illegally collected data from Flo period and pregnancy app, jury finds
August GNU Emacs news
Join the FSF and friends in updating the Free Software Directory
LibrePlanet featured resource: Group: Software/research/ProgrammingLanguages
August GNU Spotlight with Amin Bandali featuring eleven new GNU releases: Emacs, Mes, and more!
Want to read this newsletter translated into another language? Scroll to the end to read the Supporter in French or Spanish.
September FSF40 challenge: Invite someone to come with you to FSF40
Every month during our fortieth anniversary year, we're inviting free software supporters everywhere to join us in celebrating #FSF40. For this month's challenge, invite someone to come with you to the FSF40 celebration on October 4. It could be someone who is just as involved in the free software movement as you or even someone who hadn't heard the term "free software" until you invited them. We're excited for you to join us! If you can't take part in this #FSF40Challenge, fear not—we've got three more coming.
Have an idea for a challenge? Send us a message at campaigns@fsf.org!
Forty years, forty links
From August 16
Our fortieth anniversary is fast approaching. Here are forty links from the FSF and GNU sites that give a sense of what we've been doing all this time as we work for your freedom. Hint: some of these pages may include answers for the trivia contest we'll hold during the FSF40 celebration on October 4.
Help us welcome free software supporters from all over the world in Boston
From August 15
We're excited to invite you to FSF40, our fortieth anniversary celebration to be held the weekend of October 4, 2025. As we mark four decades of defending and building software freedoms, your presence as a local supporter is invaluable. If you are based in the northeast United States, come celebrate forty years of software freedom achievements and show out-of-towners a great time in Boston!
We want to see how you use free software every day!
From August 14
We want to honor the hard work that has gone into free software and its development with the FSF40 photo contest. From August 14-31, 2025, we invited free software supporters worldwide to share how they use free software on a daily basis. Stay tuned for the upcoming voting session to choose which photos best showcase free software every day!
The US government just made it harder for the public to comment on regulations
From August 18 by Matthew Gault
In the middle of August, POST was deactivated for third party organizations, making it impossible to bypass regulation.gov's nonfree JavaScript. POST is a very common function that allows an API key holder to gather comments from people with their own forms and submit these comments on their behalf. Because of the difficulty in making a public comment on a regulation without using the online form, it often pushes users to choose between freedom and speaking up. While some sources do report that you can submit comments via mail, the work that would go into that is often quite challenging. This tool getting disabled functions as a chilling effect on user's freedoms and free speech, and a strong push to force more people to use a web site that doesn't respect their freedom.
MS confidence in Windows 11: Pay us to host VMs for you when your desktop inevitably dies
From August 13 by Gareth Halfacree
If you or your job uses Windows 10, not only is Microsoft forcing you to switch to Windows 11, it is now asking users to pay for hosting on a secondary device when Windows 11 inevitably crashes your older device. There are many users and organizations that will not have the luxury of owning multiple devices, nor should they need to in order to use the device that they have paid for and should expect to work. This is another one of Microsoft's artificial, money-making "problems," creating a supposed necessity. Users should be given the choice which version of an operating system they want to use, and more generally, which updates to implement.
Meta illegally collected data from Flo period and pregnancy app, jury finds
From August 5 by Jon Brodkin
When you can't examine the code behind an app like Flo, one of the most popular period-tracking applications, you have no guarantee of what the app is doing in the background or who your information is shared with. Flo may have been caught red-handed giving Google and Meta access to users' private in-app communications, but be aware that not every nonfree software or app is similarly revealed to be violating users' privacy in addition to their freedoms. Individual users of Flo could not have prevented this illegal data-sharing, but if the software was free, they could have at least known what they were getting into by using the app. If you're currently using an app like Flo, or some other app that has access to sensitive data, consider storing that sensitive data in a place that deserves to be trusted.
Join the FSF and friends in updating the Free Software Directory
Tens of thousands of people visit directory.fsf.org each month to discover free software. Each entry in the Directory contains a wealth of useful information, from basic category and descriptions to version control, IRC channels, documentation, and licensing. The Free Software Directory has been a great resource to software users over the past decade, but it needs your help staying up-to-date with new and exciting free software projects.
To help, join our weekly IRC meetings on Fridays. Meetings take place in the #fsf channel on Libera.Chat and usually include a handful of regulars as well as newcomers. Libera.Chat is accessible from any IRC client—Everyone's welcome!
LibrePlanet featured resource: Group: Software/research/ProgrammingLanguages
Every month on the LibrePlanet wiki, we highlight one resource that is interesting and useful—often one that could use your help.
For this month, we are highlighting the Group: Software/research/ProgrammingLanguages resource. The goal of this page is to understand the status of various programming languages and toolchains. It can help people deciding on a programming language to choose or to learn, or enable people to understand where distributions need contributions to support well a language. It could also contain information on what language works where or if we can target specific operating systems with free software or not. You are invited to help update, adopt, spread, and improve this important resource.
To download: nearly all GNU software is available most reliably from https://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/. Optionally, you may find faster download speeds at a mirror located geographically closer to you by choosing from the list of mirrors published at https://www.gnu.org/prep/ftp.html, or you may use https://ftpmirror.gnu.org/ to be automatically redirected to a (hopefully) nearby and up-to-date mirror.
We appreciate everyone who donates to the Free Software Foundation, and we'd like to give special recognition to the folks who have donated $500 or more in the last month.
Assigning your copyright to the Free Software Foundation helps us defend the GNU GPL and keep software free. The following individuals have assigned their copyright to the FSF (and allowed public appreciation) in the past month:
Collin Funk (GNU sed)
Lua Viana Reis (GNU Emacs)
Matthias Meijers (GNU Emacs)
Rudolf Erwin Polzer (GNU Chess)
Sean Devlin (GNU Emacs)
tusharhero (GNU Emacs)
Will Reed (GNU Guile)
Want to see your name on this list? Contribute to GNU and assign your copyright to the FSF.
If you no longer wish to receive the Free Software Supporter in English (but still receive other communications in English), you can opt out here.
Take action with the FSF!
Contributions from thousands of individual associate members enable the FSF's work. You can contribute by joining at https://my.fsf.org/join. If you're already a member, you can help refer new members by adding a line with your member number to your email signature like:
Do you read and write Portuguese and English? The FSF is looking for translators for the Free Software Supporter. Please send an email to campaigns@fsf.org with your interest and a list of your experience and qualifications.
*Please consider adding to your address book, which will ensure that our messages reach you and not your spam box.*
*Read and share online: *
Welcome to the *Free Software Supporter*, the Free Software Foundation's (FSF) monthly news digest and action update—being read by you and 233,478 other activists.
## TABLE OF CONTENTS
* September FSF40 challenge: Invite someone to come with you to FSF40 * Forty years, forty links * Help us welcome free software supporters from all over the world in Boston * We want to see how you use free software every day! * The US government just made it harder for the public to comment on regulations * MS confidence in Windows 11: Pay us to host VMs for you when your desktop inevitably dies * Meta illegally collected data from Flo period and pregnancy app, jury finds * August GNU Emacs news * Join the FSF and friends in updating the Free Software Directory * LibrePlanet featured resource: Group: Software/research/ProgrammingLanguages * August GNU Spotlight with Amin Bandali featuring eleven new GNU releases: Emacs, Mes, and more! * FSF and other free software events * Thank GNUs! * GNU copyright contributions * Translations of the *Free Software Supporter* * Take action with the FSF!
View this issue online here:
Encourage your friends to subscribe and help us build an audience by adding our subscriber widget to your website.
* Subscribe: * Widget:
Miss an issue? You can catch up on back issues at .
Want to read this newsletter translated into another language? Scroll to the end to read the *Supporter* in French or Spanish.
***
### September FSF40 challenge: Invite someone to come with you to FSF40
Every month during our fortieth anniversary year, we're inviting free software supporters everywhere to join us in celebrating #FSF40. For this month's challenge, invite someone to come with you to the FSF40 celebration on October 4. It could be someone who is just as involved in the free software movement as you or even someone who hadn't heard the term "free software" until you invited them. We're excited for you to join us! If you can't take part in this #FSF40Challenge, fear not—we've got three more coming.
Have an idea for a challenge? Send us a message at !
### Forty years, forty links
*From August 16*
Our fortieth anniversary is fast approaching. Here are forty links from the FSF and GNU sites that give a sense of what we've been doing all this time as we work for your freedom. Hint: some of these pages may include answers for the trivia contest we'll hold during the FSF40 celebration on October 4.
*
### Help us welcome free software supporters from all over the world in Boston
*From August 15*
We're excited to invite you to FSF40, our fortieth anniversary celebration to be held the weekend of October 4, 2025. As we mark four decades of defending and building software freedoms, your presence as a local supporter is invaluable. If you are based in the northeast United States, come celebrate forty years of software freedom achievements and show out-of-towners a great time in Boston!
*
### We want to see how you use free software every day!
*From August 14*
We want to honor the hard work that has gone into free software and its development with the FSF40 photo contest. From August 14-31, 2025, we invited free software supporters worldwide to share how they use free software on a daily basis. Stay tuned for the upcoming voting session to choose which photos best showcase free software every day!
*
### The US government just made it harder for the public to comment on regulations
*From August 18 by Matthew Gault*
In the middle of August, POST was deactivated for third party organizations, making it impossible to bypass regulation.gov's nonfree JavaScript. POST is a very common function that allows an API key holder to gather comments from people with their own forms and submit these comments on their behalf. Because of the difficulty in making a public comment on a regulation without using the online form, it often pushes users to choose between freedom and speaking up. While some sources do report that you can submit comments via mail, the work that would go into that is often quite challenging. This tool getting disabled functions as a chilling effect on user's freedoms and free speech, and a strong push to force more people to use a web site that doesn't respect their freedom.
* * *
### MS confidence in Windows 11: Pay us to host VMs for you when your desktop inevitably dies
*From August 13 by Gareth Halfacree*
If you or your job uses Windows 10, not only is Microsoft forcing you to switch to Windows 11, it is now asking users to pay for hosting on a secondary device when Windows 11 inevitably crashes your older device. There are many users and organizations that will not have the luxury of owning multiple devices, nor should they need to in order to use the device that they have paid for and should expect to work. This is another one of Microsoft's artificial, money-making "problems," creating a supposed necessity. Users should be given the choice which version of an operating system they want to use, and more generally, which updates to implement.
*
### Meta illegally collected data from Flo period and pregnancy app, jury finds
*From August 5 by Jon Brodkin*
When you can't examine the code behind an app like Flo, one of the most popular period-tracking applications, you have no guarantee of what the app is doing in the background or who your information is shared with. Flo may have been caught red-handed giving Google and Meta access to users' private in-app communications, but be aware that not every nonfree software or app is similarly revealed to be violating users' privacy in addition to their freedoms. Individual users of Flo could not have prevented this illegal data-sharing, but if the software was free, they could have at least known what they were getting into by using the app. If you're currently using an app like Flo, or some other app that has access to sensitive data, consider storing that sensitive data in a place that deserves to be trusted.
* *
### August GNU Emacs news
*From August 31 by Sacha Chua*
In these issues: standard-keys-mode, vecdb, and more!
### Join the FSF and friends in updating the Free Software Directory
Tens of thousands of people visit directory.fsf.org each month to discover free software. Each entry in the Directory contains a wealth of useful information, from basic category and descriptions to version control, IRC channels, documentation, and licensing. The Free Software Directory has been a great resource to software users over the past decade, but it needs your help staying up-to-date with new and exciting free software projects.
To help, join our weekly IRC meetings on Fridays. Meetings take place in the #fsf channel on Libera.Chat and usually include a handful of regulars as well as newcomers. Libera.Chat is accessible from any IRC client—Everyone's welcome!
The next meeting is this Friday, September 5 from 12:00 to 15:00 EDT (16:00 to 19:00 UTC). Details here:
*
### LibrePlanet featured resource: Group: Software/research/ProgrammingLanguages
Every month on [the LibrePlanet wiki](https://libreplanet.org/wiki/Main_Page), we highlight one resource that is interesting and useful—often one that could use your help.
For this month, we are highlighting the Group: Software/research/ProgrammingLanguages resource. The goal of this page is to understand the status of various programming languages and toolchains. It can help people deciding on a programming language to choose or to learn, or enable people to understand where distributions need contributions to support well a language. It could also contain information on what language works where or if we can target specific operating systems with free software or not. You are invited to help update, adopt, spread, and improve this important resource.
*
Do you have a suggestion for next month's featured resource? Let us know at .
### August GNU Spotlight with Amin Bandali featuring eleven new GNU releases: Emacs, Mes, and more!
Eleven new GNU releases in the last month (as of August 31, 2025):
For announcements of most new GNU releases, subscribe to the info-gnu mailing list: .
To download: nearly all GNU software is available most reliably from . Optionally, you may find faster download speeds at a mirror located geographically closer to you by choosing from the list of mirrors published at , or you may use to be automatically redirected to a (hopefully) nearby and up-to-date mirror.
A number of GNU packages, as well as the GNU operating system as a whole, are looking for maintainers and other assistance. Please see if you'd like to help. The general page on how to help GNU is at .
If you have a working or partly working program that you'd like to offer to the GNU project as a GNU package, see .
As always, please feel free to write to me, , with any GNUish questions or suggestions for future installments.
### FSF and other free software events
* September 20, 2025, online, [Community meetup in Palm Beach County, Florida, United States](https://www.fsf.org/events/community-meetup-palm-beach-county-fl) * October 3-5, 2025, Manila, Philippines, [State of the Map](https://2025.stateofthemap.org/) * October 4, 2025, Boston, Massachusetts, [FSF 40 celebration](https://my.fsf.org/civicrm/event/info?reset=1&id=135) * October 4, 2025, online, [FSF40 celebration](https://my.fsf.org/civicrm/event/info?reset=1&id=136) * October 4, 2025, Harbin, China, [Community meetup](https://www.fsf.org/events/community-meetup-harbin-china) * October 12-14, Raleigh, North Carolina, [ATO](https://2025.allthingsopen.org/) * November 7-8, Seattle, Washington, [SeaGL](https://pretalx.seagl.org/2025/) * November 21-23, 2025, online, [FSF hackathon](https://my.fsf.org/civicrm/event/info?reset=1&id=134)
### Thank GNUs!
We appreciate everyone who donates to the Free Software Foundation, and we'd like to give special recognition to the folks who have donated $500 or more in the last month.
*
This month, a big Thank GNU to:
* Antonio Carzaniga * Brewster Kahle * Casper Freksen * de Rie Family Giving Fund * John Gilmore * John Wheeler * Matomo.org * Podbielniak Giving Fund
You can add your name to this list by donating at .
### GNU copyright contributions
Assigning your copyright to the Free Software Foundation helps us defend the GNU GPL and keep software free. The following individuals have assigned their copyright to the FSF (and allowed public appreciation) in the past month:
* Collin Funk (GNU sed) * Lua Viana Reis (GNU Emacs) * Matthias Meijers (GNU Emacs) * Rudolf Erwin Polzer (GNU Chess) * Sean Devlin (GNU Emacs) * tusharhero (GNU Emacs) * Will Reed (GNU Guile)
Want to see your name on this list? Contribute to GNU and assign your copyright to the FSF.
*
### Translations of the *Free Software Supporter*
El *Free Software Supporter* está disponible en español. Para ver la versión en español haz click aquí:
**Para cambiar las preferencias de usuario y recibir los próximos números del *Supporter* en español, haz click aquí:**
Le *Free Software Supporter* est disponible en français. Pour voir la version française cliquez ici:
**Pour modifier vos préférences et recevoir les prochaines publications du *Supporter* en français, cliquez ici:**
If you no longer wish to receive the *Free Software Supporter* in English (but still receive other communications in English), you can opt out [here][7].
[7]: https://my.fsf.org/node/75
### Take action with the FSF!
Contributions from thousands of individual associate members enable the FSF's work. You can contribute by joining at . If you're already a member, you can help refer new members by adding a line with your member number to your email signature like:
> I'm an FSF member — Help us support software freedom! >
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Welcome to the Free Software Supporter, the Free Software Foundation's (FSF) monthly news digest and action update—being read by you and 233,478 other activists.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
September FSF40 challenge: Invite someone to come with you to FSF40
Forty years, forty links
Help us welcome free software supporters from all over the world in Boston
We want to see how you use free software every day!
The US government just made it harder for the public to comment on regulations
MS confidence in Windows 11: Pay us to host VMs for you when your desktop inevitably dies
Meta illegally collected data from Flo period and pregnancy app, jury finds
August GNU Emacs news
Join the FSF and friends in updating the Free Software Directory
LibrePlanet featured resource: Group: Software/research/ProgrammingLanguages
August GNU Spotlight with Amin Bandali featuring eleven new GNU releases: Emacs, Mes, and more!
Want to read this newsletter translated into another language? Scroll to the end to read the Supporter in French or Spanish.
September FSF40 challenge: Invite someone to come with you to FSF40
Every month during our fortieth anniversary year, we're inviting free software supporters everywhere to join us in celebrating #FSF40. For this month's challenge, invite someone to come with you to the FSF40 celebration on October 4. It could be someone who is just as involved in the free software movement as you or even someone who hadn't heard the term "free software" until you invited them. We're excited for you to join us! If you can't take part in this #FSF40Challenge, fear not—we've got three more coming.
Have an idea for a challenge? Send us a message at campaigns@fsf.org!
Forty years, forty links
From August 16
Our fortieth anniversary is fast approaching. Here are forty links from the FSF and GNU sites that give a sense of what we've been doing all this time as we work for your freedom. Hint: some of these pages may include answers for the trivia contest we'll hold during the FSF40 celebration on October 4.
Help us welcome free software supporters from all over the world in Boston
From August 15
We're excited to invite you to FSF40, our fortieth anniversary celebration to be held the weekend of October 4, 2025. As we mark four decades of defending and building software freedoms, your presence as a local supporter is invaluable. If you are based in the northeast United States, come celebrate forty years of software freedom achievements and show out-of-towners a great time in Boston!
We want to see how you use free software every day!
From August 14
We want to honor the hard work that has gone into free software and its development with the FSF40 photo contest. From August 14-31, 2025, we invited free software supporters worldwide to share how they use free software on a daily basis. Stay tuned for the upcoming voting session to choose which photos best showcase free software every day!
The US government just made it harder for the public to comment on regulations
From August 18 by Matthew Gault
In the middle of August, POST was deactivated for third party organizations, making it impossible to bypass regulation.gov's nonfree JavaScript. POST is a very common function that allows an API key holder to gather comments from people with their own forms and submit these comments on their behalf. Because of the difficulty in making a public comment on a regulation without using the online form, it often pushes users to choose between freedom and speaking up. While some sources do report that you can submit comments via mail, the work that would go into that is often quite challenging. This tool getting disabled functions as a chilling effect on user's freedoms and free speech, and a strong push to force more people to use a web site that doesn't respect their freedom.
MS confidence in Windows 11: Pay us to host VMs for you when your desktop inevitably dies
From August 13 by Gareth Halfacree
If you or your job uses Windows 10, not only is Microsoft forcing you to switch to Windows 11, it is now asking users to pay for hosting on a secondary device when Windows 11 inevitably crashes your older device. There are many users and organizations that will not have the luxury of owning multiple devices, nor should they need to in order to use the device that they have paid for and should expect to work. This is another one of Microsoft's artificial, money-making "problems," creating a supposed necessity. Users should be given the choice which version of an operating system they want to use, and more generally, which updates to implement.
Meta illegally collected data from Flo period and pregnancy app, jury finds
From August 5 by Jon Brodkin
When you can't examine the code behind an app like Flo, one of the most popular period-tracking applications, you have no guarantee of what the app is doing in the background or who your information is shared with. Flo may have been caught red-handed giving Google and Meta access to users' private in-app communications, but be aware that not every nonfree software or app is similarly revealed to be violating users' privacy in addition to their freedoms. Individual users of Flo could not have prevented this illegal data-sharing, but if the software was free, they could have at least known what they were getting into by using the app. If you're currently using an app like Flo, or some other app that has access to sensitive data, consider storing that sensitive data in a place that deserves to be trusted.
Join the FSF and friends in updating the Free Software Directory
Tens of thousands of people visit directory.fsf.org each month to discover free software. Each entry in the Directory contains a wealth of useful information, from basic category and descriptions to version control, IRC channels, documentation, and licensing. The Free Software Directory has been a great resource to software users over the past decade, but it needs your help staying up-to-date with new and exciting free software projects.
To help, join our weekly IRC meetings on Fridays. Meetings take place in the #fsf channel on Libera.Chat and usually include a handful of regulars as well as newcomers. Libera.Chat is accessible from any IRC client—Everyone's welcome!
LibrePlanet featured resource: Group: Software/research/ProgrammingLanguages
Every month on the LibrePlanet wiki, we highlight one resource that is interesting and useful—often one that could use your help.
For this month, we are highlighting the Group: Software/research/ProgrammingLanguages resource. The goal of this page is to understand the status of various programming languages and toolchains. It can help people deciding on a programming language to choose or to learn, or enable people to understand where distributions need contributions to support well a language. It could also contain information on what language works where or if we can target specific operating systems with free software or not. You are invited to help update, adopt, spread, and improve this important resource.
To download: nearly all GNU software is available most reliably from https://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/. Optionally, you may find faster download speeds at a mirror located geographically closer to you by choosing from the list of mirrors published at https://www.gnu.org/prep/ftp.html, or you may use https://ftpmirror.gnu.org/ to be automatically redirected to a (hopefully) nearby and up-to-date mirror.
We appreciate everyone who donates to the Free Software Foundation, and we'd like to give special recognition to the folks who have donated $500 or more in the last month.
Assigning your copyright to the Free Software Foundation helps us defend the GNU GPL and keep software free. The following individuals have assigned their copyright to the FSF (and allowed public appreciation) in the past month:
Collin Funk (GNU sed)
Lua Viana Reis (GNU Emacs)
Matthias Meijers (GNU Emacs)
Rudolf Erwin Polzer (GNU Chess)
Sean Devlin (GNU Emacs)
tusharhero (GNU Emacs)
Will Reed (GNU Guile)
Want to see your name on this list? Contribute to GNU and assign your copyright to the FSF.
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Take action with the FSF!
Contributions from thousands of individual associate members enable the FSF's work. You can contribute by joining at https://my.fsf.org/join. If you're already a member, you can help refer new members by adding a line with your member number to your email signature like:
Do you read and write Portuguese and English? The FSF is looking for translators for the Free Software Supporter. Please send an email to campaigns@fsf.org with your interest and a list of your experience and qualifications.
