http://news.northxsouth.com Free software and open source development news relating to Latin America, Venezuela, Brazil, Argentina, Ecuador, Bolivia. Written in San Francisco, California. Wed, 01 Oct 2008 16:48:50 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en As countries around the world modernize their public elections process, the big problem with electronic voting machines is that the market is moving slow to provide equipment which fulfills all of the requirements for a fully democratic election. In many cases, printed proof of a citizen's vote is still needed, ... http://news.northxsouth.com/2008/10/01/improving-the-democratic-process-with-free-software-e-voting/ The Brasília Protocol (now translated to English) started the process of implementation of the Open Document Format (ODF) within the Brazilian Government. The Protocol was signed during the opening of CONSEGI 2008 by Bank of Brazil, Serpro, Dataprev, Post Office and Telegraph State Company (ECT), INPE (Institute of ... http://news.northxsouth.com/2008/09/28/brazil-begins-using-the-open-document-format/ Vator.tv is a social network for technology start-ups to connect with investors. They also host a newsroom which provides technology industry news & analysis. North by South was recently featured with this article: Developing your technology in Latin America: Near-shoring software engineering in Latin America is a side effect of ... http://news.northxsouth.com/2008/09/22/latin-american-nearshoring-as-a-side-effect-of-progressive-social-policies/ In returning from CONSEGI 2008, North by South has been extremely busy keeping up with our schedules and lives here in San Francisco. But, tonight, we've taken the time to put together the attention due to CONSEGI here on our news site. CONSEGI 2008 was history being made -- we ... http://news.northxsouth.com/2008/09/15/free-software-history-was-made-at-consegi/ CONSEGI 2008 is over and North by South was honored and excited to have been a participant in this convergence of public free software initiatives from all over Latin America. We are providing here an English-language update of some of the highlights of what we saw and who we spoke ... http://news.northxsouth.com/2008/09/15/a-full-report-back-from-consegi-2008-in-brasilia-brazil/ A more detailed update from the second day of CONSEGI will be forthcoming but this picture is from a panel called "Modelos de Licenciamento para Software Livre" (Free Software Licensing Models), which included Alexandre Oliva from the Latin American Free Software Foundation, Pedro de Rezende (University of Brasilia), Claudio Ruiz ... http://news.northxsouth.com/2008/08/28/consegi-2008-day-two/ Over 800 people were in attendance in Brasilia for the opening ceremony of CONSEGI as more people continued to stream in throughout the day. According to Sandra Sipp (Coordinator of Social Communication for SERPRO) over 2000 people registered to attend the conference, including high-ranking Brazilian officials such as Minister of ... http://news.northxsouth.com/2008/08/28/update-from-consegi-2008-day-one/ Several of us from the North by South core management team in San Francisco are heading to Brasília, the capital of Brazil, to participate in CONSEGI 2008, the International Congress of Electronic Society and Government, happening August 27 - 29, and we'll be making daily blog updates about our experiences ... http://news.northxsouth.com/2008/08/25/consegi-2008-north-by-south-heads-to-international-congress-on-free-software-in-latin-america/ Continuing our series of bringing information about the free software movement in Latin America to English readers, North by South interviewed Cláudio Filho (original in Portuguese), one of the people responsible for starting the OpenOffice.org project in Brazil (pt-BR), known in the country as BrOffice.org. The project started around 2002 ... http://news.northxsouth.com/2008/08/25/broffice-the-brazilian-openoffice-with-a-life-of-its-own/ Last week, a law case that started in San Francisco came to a conclusion in favor of free software supporters. Robert Jacobsen wrote a Java software system for controlling model railroads known as JMRI, which was released under the Artistic license. Jacobsen accused the firm Katzer/Kamind of copying and incorporating ... http://news.northxsouth.com/2008/08/25/federal-court-affirms-free-software-copyright-protections/