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Interview with Tracy Homer about Software Freedom and Maker Spaces
byDaniel Takamori
on January 26, 2026
My name is Tracy and I'm the Operations Manager here at Software Freedom Conservancy. Basically that means I support many different parts of the organization, from writing up contracts for project developers to banking reconciliation. I also manage our annual conference, FOSSY.
Below is a conversation I had with our Executive Director Karen Sandler about my story with free software. Part of which centers my work with Knox Makers, the Makerspace I'm a board member of. Software freedom is an issue that affects us all, and I hope to bring some light to both my own story and a wider view of how non-FOSS developers and users interact with free software in an everyday way.
Karen Sandler: How did you first encounter the idea of software freedom?
Tracy Homer: It was a slow discovery process. When I first started using Linux, it's primary draw was that it was free (as in beer). I didn't really know it had anything to do with free as in speech and copyleft licensing. Over time I've learned how important it is to be able to modify your own devices and see what goes on behind the screens in the services that hold our most personal information.
Karen: What was the first FOSS software you used?
Tracy: Inkscape, one of SFC's member projects! I use it for all kinds of design work -both for SFC and personally. If you've been to FOSSY or visited our booth at other conferences, chances are the print material was designed in Inkscape.
Karen: We know you are very involved with the makerspace, Knox Makers. How does Knox Makers use FOSS?
Tracy: Knox Makers is committed to open source software and hardware wherever possible.
We feel it is an aspect of accessibility for our members, and allows them the ability to try out and learn deeply all kinds of different tools, without having to pay expensive licensing fees, or worry about their art being sucked up by AI, or needing to buy a certain OS to run it.
We've modified some software to make it more community user friendly, and written our own plugins and tools for our member's use as well.
Knox Makers is actually how I learned of SFC in the first place, as a few of my good friends there are sustainers.
Karen: What are some projects you've recently done personally?
Tracy: I just finished a year's long project, embroidering a globe. It doesn't sound like it fits with free sofware but it does! I created my own pattern in QGIS (open source geographic software) using depth of the ocean translated into different shades of blue. Then I exported each of the 20 spherical triangular pieces into Inkscape to add some registration lines and print out. It took so long that I feel kind of lost what to work on next.
Karen: How does software freedom enrich your daily life?
Tracy: The few proprietary systems I still have to use are intensely frustrating. I feel like it's a game of cat and mouse trying to figure out how to use a "new and better!" interface with no documentation and no way to revert changes feels very disheartening. Any searching for error messages just brings up a long thread of other users with the same issue and maybe a rote answer from the company, typically unhelpful.
That maybe doesn't answer the question, because I went the other way with it. But so most of my life is using open software and hardware that it's really become a non issue. I have a problem with something; I fix it. I can switch to something different if I really don't like it - I can even change up my whole computer system if I find it doesn't suit my needs. I don't get ads and other popups thrown in my face every where I turn, and I know my data and art belongs to only me.
Karen: You've been at SFC for over 3 years! And, as Operations Manager, you take care of some of the least glamous work that we have. What do you enjoy about your job? (hopefully it's something!)
Tracy: Working here has been great - everyone at SFC is lovely and I think we make a great team.
I really enjoy meeting other people in the FOSS world, so I like tabling at conferences. And seeing everyone at FOSSY too.
Weirdly, I enjoy the accounting aspects, because it feels like a puzzle to put together. All the numbers have to fit somewhere and they all have to sum up perfectly in the end so tracking down the missing pieces is a fun challenge.
Karen: What do you hope to accomplish in software freedom, either personally or professionally in the coming months or years?
Tracy: I've only done the most minor contributions to projects, and someday I'd like to develop the skills to do more.
I'd also like to focus on adding more to my city in OpenStreetMap - it's pretty sparse in places.
I think with SFC I'd like to help focus on on advocacy and how software freedom benefits many different aspects of life, especially in the creative space.
[permalink]
Tags:
conservancy
Some Unfortunate Delays in our Struggle for Copyleft Justice
byBradley M. Kühn
on January 26, 2026
We at Software Freedom Conservancy are disappointed at some surprising
news. Two weeks ago (THU 2026-01-08), we had our original pretrial motions hearing
scheduled in our historic impact litigation against
Vizio. Just about an hour before the hearing's start-time, Judge Sandy
Leal issued a minute order that rescheduled the hearing and (effectively)
removed the trial (which was set to start on Monday 12 January 2025) from
her calendar.
The rescheduled hearing date was Monday 2026-01-26 at 09:00. At 08:15 that morning, our attorneys were contacted from the Court Clerk that the hearing was again postponed..
We have been in this litigation against Vizio since October 2021. Vizio
violated both the General Public License (GPL) and Lesser GPL
Agreements. Vizio's “Smart” TV products include more than a
dozen packages under these copyleft licenses, yet Vizio has continually
failed to comply with these agreements in various ways — most notably (and including but not limited to)
by (a) not providing complete, corresponding source code, (b) not providing
“the scripts used to control compilation and installation of the
executable[s]”, and (c) not providing object code necessary for
relinking the LGPLv2.1'd works. We were looking forward to our days in
Court that week to show the world all the details of Vizio's non-compliance,
and to ask the Court to acknowledge (among other things) our right as a
third-party beneficiary under the GPL Agreements to receive all the materials
that those Agreements require Vizio to give to all consumers who purchase
their devices. These devices, BTW, are called “Smart”
TVs because what's inside is actually a small (but powerful) computer
attached to the giant video display — driven and controlled largely by copylefted
FOSS.
Notwithstanding our frustration, our trial was delayed for good reason.
Another case — even older than ours — needed more time for their jury
trial (and thus had priority over ours). While some criticize the USA for
being “too litigious”, we at SFC believe firmly that the civil
Courts are the best place where ordinary citizens and small, scrappy
non-profit charities like SFC
can seek justice when our rights are violated.
We also know that there is more injustice in our country these days than
anyone would like, and this delay occurred because
there are other folks out there seeking justice on other important
issues and rights, too.
We understand that we've been waiting for a long time in a very long queue
in the California Courts, and while we (like everyone) get frustrated when
the line is taking much longer than expected, we also appreciate that Judge
Leal is carefully managing her docket to grant all parties an
impartial opportunity for justice.
Attorneys for both SFC and Vizio are now negotiating with the Court for rescheduling. We hope the pretrial hearing will be scheduled fairly soon. We will update here and on the Fediverse as we know more.
We'll spend the next few weeks posting the various recent motions and
filings in the case, and publishing some retrospective summaries of the
last four and a half years of the case for you all to read.
Be sure subscribe to our feed in your RSS readers/aggregators and follow us on the
Fediverse (via
Mastodon or your preferred ActivityPub software). to receive updates!
[permalink]
Tags:
conservancy,
GPL,
law
Seven Diabetes Patients Die Due to Undisclosed Bug in Abbott's Continuous Glucose Monitors
byBradley M. Kühn
on December 23, 2025
Iwrote
last month about my diabetes diagnosis this year and my
difficult choice to wear a proprietary device (called a
CGM) on my arm 24/7
to continuously monitor my glucose levels. Like my friend and colleague,
Karen M. Sandler — who previously made a much higher-stakes choice to
receive a proprietary implanted defibrillator to keep her safe given her
genetic heart condition — I reluctantly chose to attach proprietary
hardware and software to my body.
The device itself is quite proprietary, but fortunately
the FOSS
community has reverse engineered its activation and data collection
protocols — creating an Android application that does a better job
than the manufacturers' proprietary ones0.
Here in the USA, we strangely use capitalism as the center of our health care system. Two major for-profit competing brands of CGM are
available here. My diabetes specialist prefers the (ironically named)
Freestyle Libre Plus from Abbott. I (also rather strangely) bring a prescription
for electronics to a pharmacy every month. On 2025-12-03, that pharmacy sent me an alarming text message (shown here).
Abbott Killed Seven Patients
After reading that text, I
found the
USA FDA announcement. My spouse cross-referenced the lot numbers while I read them off from all my Freestyle boxes1. I had indeed recently worn an
impacted device!
Only because my diabetes is so early of a stage was I relatively safe. The FDA
reports that Freestyle injured over 700 people and killed seven
people with this bug. Specifically, the bug caused the device to falsely report an
extremely low glucose level. Advanced stage diabetics use low
reading information to inform them that they may have too much insulin
currently. The usual remedy is to eat something sugary to raise glucose in the blood.
Such should be done only with great care, as a false low reading can harm and even kill the patient (who eats a high-sugar-content item while glucose in the blood is, in fact, not low).
Proprietary software in medical devices harming patients is not new. In
1985,
the Therac-25
killed three people. In 2020, hundreds of patients who relied on a financially troubled tech startup found their occular implants suddenly unsupported. Some patients went blind as the devices powered down without updates. There are more examples that I could include here, but rereading these horrific stories is frankly more than I can take right now when I think of fellow diabetes sufferers who were “killed by code” recently..
Would FOSS Have Saved Patients' Lives?
It's hubris for activists to guarantee that harm would be prevented if Freestyle had publicly released the
hardware specifications and the complete, corresponding source code
(CCS).
FOSS isn't immune to bugs —
even dangerous ones. However, in the centuries since the Enlightenment, we
know that the scientific method depends on public disclosure about
data and wide-reaching peer review of past work. FOSS (plus a publicly disclosed
hardware design) wouid allow the millions of hardware and software engineers to
peer-review the integrity, security, and safety of the devices to which
patients entrust their lives. We achieve the promise of humanity when we
each entrust our safety and health to our entire community — not
merely a single for-profit entity.
We also will probably never know whether this issue was in hardware or
software. The bug disclosure is incredibly vague, and it remains unclear
how much investigation was done (if any) by government regulators into this
problem. As a public policy and public health matter, the
public deserves to know the technical details (software and
hardware) of both the functioning device and the failed devices. NGOs should be permitted to perform
their own investigations and confirmations of public safety.
What's Next?
Given that the hardware, software, and medical for-profit industries
refuse to put the rights, safety and security of patients first, wrongful
death lawsuits are typically the only way to hold these companies
accountable. Yet, there are very few people who have not agreed
Abbott's toxic terms of their
proprietary companion application — I guestimate
that fewer than 1% of
Freestyle-using patients have used Juggluco from their very start (and
thus never agreed to Abbott's terms). This is significant because Abbott includes a
comprehensive one-way indemnity for themselves in the terms. I hope that a
class action suit begins soon on this matter, but I wonder and worry that
so much of the class may have signed this indemnity (which may make the road to justice
bumpier).
Finally, I want to offer that if there is anyone out there who does
tear-downs of extremely tiny electronic devices, I would be thrilled to
find a volunteer who would like to see if we can either extract any
software components from the device, or reverse-engineer the hardware. I
have saved and sanitized all of my prior CGMs.
I'd gladly send one along
to anyone who wants to give a try at taking them apart. (Contact SFC or contact me on the Fediverse (via Mastodon) if you're available to do this work.)
For my part, I look forward (after the Vizio trial) to
sending some patches to
Juggluco and also getting Juggluco available in F-Droid. Our best option in the face of
these powerful medical device companies curtailing our rights is to invest
our volunteer time into the edges where
FOSS has
resiliently worked around the constant roadblocks erected by bad
actors.
Myprior post about CGMs discussed the GPLv3'd Juggluco in more detail.
In a fascinating turn of events, at least one of my past monitors (of which I fortitously saved all the boxes with the lot/serial number on them) is listed in the FDA's spreadsheet as recalled lot, yet the serial number is listed as “ safe to use”onAbbott's webform 🤔 … I'm left wondering how I can trust Abbott to write reliable software stuck into my arm if they can't even write a web form that cross-references serial numbers to lots correctly 😬.
[permalink]
Managing Diabetes in Software Freedom
byBradley M. Kühn
on November 6, 2025
Our member project representatives and others who collaborate with
SFC on projects
know that I've been on part-time medical leave this year. As I recently announced publicly on the Fediverse, I was diagnosed in March 2025 with early-stage Type
2 Diabetes. I had no idea that that the diagnosis would become a
software freedom and users' rights endeavor.
After the diagnosis, my doctor suggested immediately that I see the diabetes nurse-practitioner
specialist in their practice. It took some time get an appointment with him,
so I saw him first in mid-April 2025.
I walked into the office, sat down, and within minutes the specialist
asked me to “take out your phone and install the Freestyle Libre app
from Abbott”. This is the first (but, will probably not be the only) time a medical practitioner
asked me to install proprietary software as the first step of
treatment.
The specialist told me that in his experience, even early-stage diabetics
like me should use a Continuous Glucose Monitor (CGM). CGM's
are an amazing (relatively) recent invention that allows diabetics to
sample their blood sugar level constantly. As we software developers and
engineers know: great things happen when your diagnostic readout is as low
latency as possible. CGMs lower the latency of readouts from 3–4
times a day to every five minutes. For example, diabetics can see
what foods are most likely to cause blood sugar spikes for them
personally. CGMs put patients on a path to manage this chronic condition
well.
But, the devices themselves, and the (default) apps that control them are
hopelessly proprietary. Fortunately, this was (obviously) not my first time
explaining
FOSS from first
principles. So, I read through the license and terms and conditions of the
ironically named “Freestyle Libre” app, and pointed out to the
specialist how patient-unfriendly the terms were. For example, Abbott (the
manufacturer of my CGM) reserves the right to collect your data
(anonymously of course, to “improve the product”). They also
require patients to agree that if they take any action to reverse engineer,
modify, or otherwise do the normal things our community does with
software, the patient must agree that such actions “constitute
immediate, irreparable harm to Abbott, its affiliates, and/or its
licensors”. I briefly explained to the specialist that I could not
possibly agree. I began in real-time (still sitting with the specialist) a
search for a FOSS solution.
As I was searching, the specialist said: “Oh, I don't use any of it
myself, but I think I've heard of this ‘open source’ thing
— there is a program called xDrip+ that is for insulin-dependent
diabetics that I've heard of and some patients report it is quite
good”.
While I'm (luckily) very far from insulin-dependency, I eventually found
the FOSS Android app called
Juggluco (a
portmanteau for “Juggle glucose”). I asked the specialist to
give me the prescription and I'd try Juggluco to see if it would work.
CGM (3.75cm Ø)
CGM's are very small
and their firmware is (by obvious necessity) quite simple. As such, their
interfaces are standard. CGM's are activated with Near Field Communication
(NFC) — available on even quite old Android devices.
The Android device sends a simple integer identifier via NFC that activates
the CGM. Once activated — and through the 15-day life of the device
— the device responds via Bluetooth with the patient's current
glucose reading to any device presenting that integer.
Fortunately, I quickly discovered that the FOSS community was already
“on this”. The NFC activation worked just fine, even on the
recently updated “Freestyle Libre 3+”. After
the sixty minute calibration period, I had a continuous readout in Juggluco.
Juggluco — 21-hour period
CGM's lower latency
feedback enables diabetics to have more control of their illness
management. one example among many: the patient can see (in real time)
what foods most often cause blood sugar spikes for
them personally. Diabetes hits everyone differently; data allows
everyone to manage their own chronic condition better.
Juggluco — long period
My personal story with Juggluco will continue — as I hope (although
not until after FOSDEM 2026 😆) to become an upstream contributor to
Juggluco. Most importantly, I hope to help the app appear in F-Droid. (I
must currently side-load or use Aurora Store to make it work on
LineageOS.)
Fitting with the history that many projects that interact with proprietary
technology must so often live through, Juggluco has
faced surreptitious
removal from Google's Play Store. Abbott even accused Juggluco of
using their proprietary libraries and encryption methods, but the so-called
“encryption method” is literally sending an single integer as
part of NFC activation.
Juggluco's summary stastics
While Abbott backed off, this is another example of why the movement of
patients taking control of the technology remains
essential. FOSS
fits perfectly with this goal. Software freedom gives control of
technology to those who actually rely on it — rather than for-profit
medical equipment manufacturers.
Juggluco's average graph
When I returned to my specialist for a follow-up, we reviewed the data and
graphs that I produced with Juggluco. I, of course, have never installed,
used, or even agreed to Abbott's licenses and terms, so I have never seen
what the Abbott app does. I was thus surprised when I showed my specialist
Juggluco's summary graphs. He excitedly told me “this is much better
reporting than the Abbott app gives you!”. We all know that
sometimes proprietary software has better and more features than the FOSS
equivalent, so it's a particularly great success when our community efforts
outdoes a wealthy 200 billion-dollar megacorp on software features!
Please do watch SFC's site in 2026 for more posts about my ongoing work
with Juggluco, and
please give generously as an
SFC Sustainer to help this and our other work continue in 2026!
[permalink]
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