Simon Phipps is a director of the Open Rights Group as well as having many other connections to digital rights issues (including as president of the Open Source Initiative and as founder of digital rights consultancy Meshed Insights Ltd). Find out more at http://webmink.info



CDB: The Zombie Bill That Just Won't Die

After the invasive and over-reaching Communications Data Bill was shelved in the UK at the start of May, it's already being re-animated by politicians with strong connections to the shadowy world of the security services. All the time the core need remains unfilled, the same proposals will keep coming back until the legislature finally gives in. To fix it, we need positive legislation that fills the need, not just opposition. We'll dig into the CDBs problems and consider how to finally put this zombie to rest.



A New OSI For A New Decade

When Open Source Initiative (http://opensource.org) was founded in 1998, the term "open source" was newly coined to provide a pragmatic face to software freedom, an idea that was already at least 15 years old. Today, open source is the default for most new software business activities. OSI is re-inventing itself as a member organisation to support that change - find out how and why.