It is easy to think that the software patents issue is this year's news. But it is worth reflecting on the fact that, in New Zealand as elsewhere, practically the entire IT industry has been campaigning against software patents for years. What was highly unusual *this* year was an New Zealand IT vendor organisation, NZICT, coming out in favour of software patents.

Seven open source experts, chosen for their eminence in or championship of open source technology, will form the judging panel of the 2010 Open Source Awards, which will be announced at a gala ceremony in Wellington on Tuesday 9th November.

This recent article by AJ Park is a gross misrepresentation of the New Zealand Commerce Select Committee's position and the publicly stated Government position.

http://www.internationallawoffice.com/Newsletters/Detail.aspx?g=555f15a9-c09c-4cd6-a20f-f4ea66b0fcf5

It states:

"The news that the government intends computer program inventions to be patentable in the same way as in Europe is important to New Zealand industry, not just for multinational companies.

by Peter Harrison

I wish to Congratulate Rachel in becoming President. We are honoured to have a new President that has the proven track record of success in the open source field that you do. In order for the NZOSS to be strong we need capable people with real passion for free and open source software. We are therefore very luck to have Rachel at the helm to take the solemn responsibility of piloting the society into the future.

Rachel Hamilton-Williams has been elected President of the New Zealand Open Source Society in yesterday's Annual General Meeting. After gaining a degree in Sociology from Massey University Rachel started her own business, Wellington based Katipo Communications in 1996. Katipo has created many open source software solutions, including the award winning Koha Library Management Software. Joining Rachel on Council will be three new councillors, Brenda Wallace, Scott Newton and Peter Fletcher.

The 2010 AGM of the New Zealand Open Source Society has been held. Thanks to all those who took the time to attend.

Wednesday the 28th of July starting at 5pm.

The meeting will be conducted via an IRC channel for minutes and logging purposes. There will also be a conference line open.

The IRC channel is:

irc://chat.freenode.net #nzoss

Instructions to access the conference call are:

- Conference Dial-in Number: +1 (661) 673-8600
- Participant Access Code: 1051251#

Note that this is an International Toll call and normal toll charges will apply.

The Final Agenda is:

• Apologies
• Presidents Report
• Financial Report and Statement of Accounts
• Acceptance of Minutes of 2009 AGM
• Election of Officers and Council

The healthAlliance, which runs ICT for several northern DHBs has put out an expression of interest for an Enterprise Content Management Solution.

The relevent documentation can be found on GETS:

https://www.gets.govt.nz/Default.aspx?show=TenderDetail&TenderID=30383

In the tender documents there is the following statement:

"We are open to solutions from open source vendors, proprietary solution vendors and hosted solution providers"

OnlineGroups.Net has just released the latest version of GroupServer, an open source web-based mailing list manager. Via email, GroupServer works like traditional mailing list managers but it also has a web forum interface for reading and making posts, and list administration.

GroupServer provides the kind of web interface that users of Google Groups enjoy. Being open source, it also provides the administrative freedom that mailing list administrators expect.

Minister of Commerce Simon Power today announced that further amendment to the Patent Bill is neither necessary nor desirable, and that the insertion of an exception for software would prevail. He has also asked IPONZ to formulate draft guidelines and seek the views of interested parties regarding patents involving embedded software.