Slashdot ran a post today about Fedora Women, a new section of the Fedora Wiki dedicated to increasing the currently 1.5% of linux users and contributors who are female. I checked out the site, and found a link to Linuxchix. They have a Seattle chapter, which I was very excited about, until I found that they haven’t even updated their website in a year and a half. Fortunately, the national Linuxchix organization seems to be much more active.

I needed a laptop for law school and after much deliberation decided on a dual boot system with Linux Fedora from R^3 over a Macbook. I guess the communist in me won out over the fanboy. Here’s some of the specs:

5.4″ WSXGA+ (1680X1050) TFT Display and adds Bluetooth Wireless
Intel® Core™ Duo T2500 2.0GHz 2MB 667FSB
Memory : 2GB DDR2 667 (2×1GB)
Hard Drive : 100gb 5400 rpm SATA
CD or DVD Drive : 8X DVD-Dual RW Drive
Operating System : Dual Boot: Fedora™ Core 5 Linux + Microsoft Windows XP Pro (I didn’t want to buy it, my law school runs Examsoft, and they made me.)
Office Software : OpenOffice.org
Wireless : Intel 802.11abg

It will be arriving soon, I’ll let you know how it goes.

Here is DefectiveByDesign’s latest action, I strongly recommend checking them out. They are actively taking steps to free IP.

Join us on Wednesday July 19, at 3pm EDT (noon PDT) for a conference call with attorney Ray Beckerman. Ray is the attorney leading the legal fight against the RIAA in the USA. Learn how stopping these law suits will help stop the imposition of DRM.

At this moment there are law suits in progress that could have far reaching consequences for the Internet, copyright law, and the attempt by Big Media to push DRM down our throats. Ray has news that will help us connect the dots between DRM and the RIAA law suits, and show us what action we can take.

In our fight against DRM we face a cartel of large media corporations colluding with each other illegally. All the Big Media companies act as one in their insistence that digital restrictions on technology must be put in place. And they all act as one in their support for the RIAA-fronted law suits. This type of collusion is unprecedented and joint legal action of this nature is almost unheard of.

Competitors usually seek out a competitive advantage over one another. In the entertainment industry you would expect to see companies releasing their product in formats that are better for their customers. Instead, these “competitors” have a delicate agreement in place to force us to accept their defective products — defective because they are crippled with DRM. We can help break this agreement by applying appropriate pressure on the RIAA law suits. Join us and learn how stopping the RIAA law suits can stop DRM

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• Conference call details will be posted on DefectiveByDesign.org Tuesday at noon Pacific.

In Solidarity,

Gregory, Peter, Henri and the DRM Elimination Crew