Skip to content, sitemap or skip to search.

Personal tools
Join now
You are here: Home Volunteer

Volunteer for the FSF and GNU

by Free Software Foundation Contributions Published on Mar 22, 2006 03:10 PM
Volunteers are key to the success of projects organized by the Free Software Foundation and the GNU Project. An important part of our role at the FSF is coordination of volunteers. People write to us to say they want to help, and we connect them with tasks that need to be done, projects that need contributors, and ideas that could be developed.

Read this page in Spanish.

We also collect the ideas that people send to us for new projects, resources, and campaigns. Send your ideas to us at info@fsf.org and we will consider integrating it with this list.

Volunteers and staff at the LibrePlanet 2009 conference

Additionally, we offer unpaid internship positions throughout the year. Read more about how to apply for FSF internships.

Are you an activist, or an organizer?

  • Join the FSF community team!
  • Join our campaigns and take direct action now, head over to our campaigns center.
  • Connect your free software user group with the FSF. Write to us at info@fsf.org.
  • Attend local free software events and government hearings. We post these events either at https://www.fsf.org/news, or at https://www.fsf.org/events and share them with the Free Software Supporters mailing list. Write to us at info@fsf.org if you see an event you'd like to attend on behalf of the FSF.
  • Organize in your state, region or country, and connect to other free software activists at https://libreplanet.org. Get started by listing your free software activism group. Help us plan and have a presence at events you organize. Write to us at info@fsf.org for materials.
  • Organize member events on behalf of the FSF, either independently or in connection with an existing event. We will be happy to recommend speakers and provide materials and some helpful instructions for how to do it effectively. Contact us at membership@fsf.org with some basic information about the size and kind of event you want to have.
  • Visit schools and universities in your area and tell the students what free software is all about. Add your name, availability, and expertise to the list of teaching volunteers on the LibrePlanet wiki and email your contact details to info@fsf.org and we're happy to connect you with teachers and professors in your area. Feel free to use the teaching materials on the wiki and upload your own materials to share them with other activists.

Are you a writer, a ranter, a thinker, a politically minded individual?

  • Write a free software blog. We will be publishing blog entries from people in the community at https://www.fsf.org/blogs. Please let us know about free software issues that are going on in your local community. Is your school requiring the use of proprietary software in order to complete coursework? Do you help people in your town convert their systems to free software? Send your entries to info@fsf.org.
  • Write for our Free Software Bulletin. Twice a year, we publish a printed newsletter with articles of long-term interest to our supporters. Much of it is written by FSF staff and board members, but we welcome outside contributions as well. Send your article or article proposal to info@fsf.org.
  • Help post speech videos on audio-video.gnu.org. If you want to volunteer to do this, please write to campaigns@fsf.org.
  • Set an example by switching to a *completely* free software operating system. The easiest way to do that is to install and use one of the free GNU/Linux distributions.

Are you local?

  • The FSF is always in need of some help around the office. If you are in the Boston area and want to help out, we'd love to have you come by. Learn more about volunteer office tasks at the LibrePlanet wiki page.
  • Stuff envelopes. Sometimes we do mailings, and we have to stuff a lot of envelopes. If you are in the Boston area and want to be available on-call for this exciting work, let us know at info@fsf.org.

Are you a news junkie, a professional web surfer?

  • Be an Issue Coordinator. Choose one of the issues that the FSF focuses on or should focus on and follow it closely over time. If you have a sustained interest in an area such as DRM, Treacherous Computing or Free BIOS and would like to be responsible for coordinating news gathering and posting on this topic, let us know at info@fsf.org.
  • Send us links to and summaries of news stories you read about that are related to free software. We do our best to monitor all of the relevant news, but in the end we depend on people to write to us and let us know that something we should be concerned about is brewing. If you hear about something, let us know at info@fsf.org.

Are you a hacker?

  • Help with projects on our High Priority Projects list. These are not always GNU projects, but they are always projects that are important to the free software world, often because they do something that replaces a prominent proprietary program.
  • Are you a GNU/Linux user?

    Are you multilingual?

    Are you a designer?

    • Contribute graphics and design ideas. We are always looking for new logos and graphics to use on our web pages, in our printed materials, and for t-shirts and other items for sale in our shop. A recent example is the logo for the GPLv3 process, which was designed by a volunteer. If the graphics are smaller than 2 MB, you can send them right to us, otherwise please send a link to info@fsf.org. Here are some suggestions for future products that might inspire you.

    Are you a law geek?

    • Be a Licensing Volunteer. Help us answer the many questions we receive every day at the FSF regarding the use and abuse of free software licenses. If you are interested, write to licensing@fsf.org and tell us a bit about your background, both legal and with the free software community. Please also run through the GPL quiz and let us know how you do.
    Document Actions

    The FSF is a charity with a worldwide mission to advance software freedom — learn about our history and work.

    fsf.org is powered by:

     

    Send your feedback on our translations and new translations of pages to campaigns@fsf.org.