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Welcome to the GNU Project web server, www.gnu.org. The GNU Project was launched in 1984 to develop a complete Unix-like operating system which is free software: the GNU system. (GNU is a recursive acronym for ``GNU's Not Unix''; it is pronounced "guh-NEW".) Variants of the GNU operating system, which use the kernel Linux, are now widely used; though these systems are often referred to as ``Linux'', they are more accurately called GNU/Linux systems.

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GNUs Flashes

Announcing the latest book by Richard Stallman - Free Software, Free Society: The Selected Essays of Richard M. Stallman, with an Introduction by Lawrence Lessig. This essay collection covers a broad variety of topics, ranging from the history of the GNU Project, to community-building, to the dangers of the DMCA.

Please nominate candidates for the 2002 FSF Award for the Advancement of Free Software by 15 October 2002.

Here is a list of the GNU Project's latest software releases, which we update nightly.

For other news, as well as for items that used to be in this GNUs Flashes section, see What's New in and about the GNU Project.

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Urgent: Please visit http://www.digitalspeech.org and help resist the media companies' campaign to impose restrictions on what your computer can do.

European Citizens: European Commission is pushing to make all ideas patentable, proposal written by BSA. This page explains everything and tells you how you can help prevent this disaster.

US Citizens: Please sign both the Petition Against Software Patents and the Anti-DMCA Petition.

More Information

The Free Software Foundation is a tax-exempt charity that raises funds for work on the GNU Project.

The philosophy and history of the GNU project is featured in Richard M. Stallman's article The GNU Project and in several other texts in our philosophy section.

The FSF supports the freedoms of speech, press, and association on the Internet, the right to use encryption software for private communication, and the right to write software unimpeded by private monopolies.

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Updated: $Date: 2002/10/21 01:14:29 $ $Author: rms46 $