Techrights

The Free Software Foundation (FSF) Turns 40 in One Month

Posted by Roy Schestowitz on Sep 03, 2025

"The founders of the FSF, started the Free Software Foundation (FSF) in 1985," said the board of the FSF (not the founders), "with the moral goal of giving users control over their computing, what we call software freedom -- and specifically to support developing the GNU operating system that would make software freedom a practical possibility. The crucial first significant decision the five founders faced was how the new organization would be governed so as to protect its goal and principles."

By that point (1985), the founders had already published papers and we previously shared (also reproduced) the original FSF paperwork/documents with the names of those who signed them.

One month to go...

As noted a few days ago, several times in fact, many people now recognise the importance of the FSF's mission, even if most people don't know what the FSF is. Some people cite Richard Stallman in relation to what Google is doing to Android. █