Karen Sandler

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Karen Sandler
Karen Sandler - Swathanthra 2017 - DSC 9737.jpg
Karen Sandler at Swathanthra 2017 in Thiruvananthapuram.
Occupation(s)Executive Director, Software Freedom Conservancy
Website punkrocklawyer.com

Karen Sandler is the executive director of the Software Freedom Conservancy, former executive director of the GNOME Foundation, an attorney, and former general counsel of the Software Freedom Law Center. She holds an honorary doctorate from KU Leuven.

Contents

Work in Free Software

As of March 2014, Sandler is executive director of the Software Freedom Conservancy. [1]

From June 2011 [2] to March 2014, [3] Sandler served as executive director of the GNOME Foundation. Under her leadership, GNOME embarked on an ambitious project to draw more women into Free and Open Source software, the Outreach Program for Women. [4]

Between October 31, 2005 [5] and June 21, 2011, she worked at the Software Freedom Law Center (SFLC), first as counsel, and then as the organization's General Counsel after January 6, 2010. [6]

Karen Sandler at FISL 16 Karen Sandler - FISL 16.jpg
Karen Sandler at FISL 16

While at the SFLC, Sandler advised a wide range of free and open source software organizations such as the Free Software Foundation, the Apache Software Foundation, the X.Org Foundation, Software in the Public Interest and the Software Freedom Conservancy. With SFLC, she became a public speaker about issues of Free and Open Source software at conferences such as OSCON, [7] [8] SCaLE, [9] and LinuxCon. [10] In 2010, she led an initiative advocating for free software on implantable medical devices [11] after exploring the issues surrounding the software on her own implanted medical device (a defibrillator), which regulates hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM), an inherited heart condition. [12] [13]

In addition to her work with the Software Freedom Conservancy, Sandler also served as general counsel (pro bono) of the non-profit Question Copyright. [14] She is also co-host of the "Software Freedom Law Show" (2008-2010) [15] and "Free as in Freedom" (2010-) podcasts. [16]

Sandler received the 2017 Free Software Award for her work promoting software freedom. [17]

In 2023 she received an honorary doctorate from KU Leuven for her exceptional dedication to open source applications within medicine, for her relentless drive to make technology better and safer, and her exemplary role within the technology world as a woman and lawyer. [18] [19]

An interview with Sandler at linux.conf.au 2014, when she worked at the GNOME Foundation.

Before working with the SFLC, Sandler worked as an associate in the corporate departments of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP in New York and Clifford Chance in New York and London.

Education

Sandler received her law degree from Columbia Law School in 2000, where she was a James Kent Scholar and co-founder of the Columbia Science and Technology Law Review. She received her bachelor's degree in engineering from The Cooper Union. [5]

Personal life

As of May 21, 2011, [20] she is married to Mike Tarantino, a Grammy nominated music engineer. [21] Their wedding invitation, a working paper record player and playable record, was covered by a number of internet publications. [22] [23] [24] The record contained a song Here's the Invitation! that Sandler and Tarantino made together. [25]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Free software</span> Software licensed to be freely used, modified and distributed

Free software, libre software, or libreware is computer software distributed under terms that allow users to run the software for any purpose as well as to study, change, and distribute it and any adapted versions. Free software is a matter of liberty, not price; all users are legally free to do what they want with their copies of a free software regardless of how much is paid to obtain the program. Computer programs are deemed "free" if they give end-users ultimate control over the software and, subsequently, over their devices.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eben Moglen</span> American law professor and free software advocate

Eben Moglen is an American legal scholar who is professor of law and legal history at Columbia University, and is the founder, Director-Counsel and Chairman of Software Freedom Law Center.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">X.Org Foundation</span> Nonprofit organization

The X.Org Foundation is a non-profit corporation chartered to research, develop, support, organize, administrate, standardize, promote, and defend a free and open accelerated graphics stack. This includes, but is not limited to, the following projects: DRM, Mesa 3D, Wayland, and the X Window System and its primary implementation, the X.Org Server.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">FSF Free Software Awards</span>

The Free Software Foundation (FSF) grants two annual awards. Since 1998, FSF has granted the award for Advancement of Free Software and since 2005, also the Free Software Award for Projects of Social Benefit.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">FOSDEM</span> Annual event in Brussels centered on free and open source software development

Free and Open source Software Developers' European Meeting (FOSDEM) is a non-commercial, volunteer-organized European event centered on free and open-source software development. It is aimed at developers and anyone interested in the free and open-source software movement. It aims to enable developers to meet and to promote the awareness and use of free and open-source software.

The Common Development and Distribution License (CDDL) is a free and open-source software license, produced by Sun Microsystems, based on the Mozilla Public License (MPL). Files licensed under the CDDL can be combined with files licensed under other licenses, whether open source or proprietary. In 2005 the Open Source Initiative approved the license. The Free Software Foundation (FSF) considers it a free software license, but one which is incompatible with the GNU General Public License (GPL).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Software Freedom Law Center</span>

The Software Freedom Law Center (SFLC) is an organization that provides pro bono legal representation and related services to not-for-profit developers of free software/open source software. It was launched in February 2005 with Eben Moglen as chairman. Initial funding of US$4 million was pledged by Open Source Development Labs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bradley M. Kuhn</span> American free software activist

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GNOME Foundation is a non-profit organization based in Orinda, California, United States, which works to coordinate the efforts in the GNOME project.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Martin Michlmayr</span>

Martin Michlmayr is a free and open-source software advocate and Debian developer, formerly president of Software in the Public Interest.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard Fontana</span>

Richard Fontana is a lawyer in the United States who is particularly known for his work in the area of open source and free software. Fontana works at Red Hat. Before Red Hat he was counsel at the Software Freedom Law Center (SFLC). In 2012 Fontana began drafting copyleft-next, a modification of the GNU General Public License, version 3 (GPLv3). While at SFLC, Fontana was one of the three principal authors, along with Richard Stallman and Eben Moglen, of the GPLv3, the GNU Lesser General Public License, version 3 (LGPLv3), and the GNU Affero General Public License. He is currently a member-elected director of the Open Source Initiative.

The Free Software Foundation (FSF) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization founded by Richard Stallman on October 4, 1985, to support the free software movement, with the organization's preference for software being distributed under copyleft terms, such as with its own GNU General Public License. The FSF was incorporated in Boston, Massachusetts, United States, where it is also based.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Software Freedom Conservancy</span> Non-profit organization

Software Freedom Conservancy, Inc. is an organization that provides a non-profit home and infrastructure support for free and open source software projects. The organization was established in 2006, and as of June 2022, had over 40 member projects.

Igalia is a private, worker-owned, employee-run cooperative model consultancy focused on open source software. Based in A Coruña, Galicia (Spain), Igalia is known for its contributions and commitments to both open-source and open standards. Igalia's primary focus is on open source solutions for a large set of hardware and software platforms centering on browsers, graphics, multimedia, compilers, virtualization, embedded Linux, and device drivers.

The O'Reilly Open Source Award is presented to individuals for dedication, innovation, leadership and outstanding contribution to open source. From 2005 to 2009 the award was known as the Google–O'Reilly Open Source Award but since 2010 the awards have only carried the O'Reilly name.

GNOME Project is a community behind the GNOME desktop environment and the software platform upon which it is based. It consists of all the software developers, artists, writers, translators, other contributors, and active users of GNOME. It is no longer part of the GNU Project.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Outreachy</span> Open source software internship program for marginalized people

Outreachy (previously the Free and Open Source Software Outreach Program for Women) is a program that organizes three-month paid internships with free and open-source software projects for people who are typically underrepresented in those projects. The program is organized by the Software Freedom Conservancy and was formerly organized by the GNOME Project and the GNOME Foundation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mishi Choudhary</span> American lawyer

Mishi Choudhary is a technology lawyer and online civil liberties activist working in the United States and India. She is the senior vice president and general counsel of Virtru, a role she started in 2022. Prior to that role, Mishi was the Legal Director of the Software Freedom Law Center as well as the Founder of SFLC.in. SFLC.in brings together lawyers, policy analysts and technologists to fight for digital rights, produces reports, and studies on the state of the Indian internet, also has a productive legal arm. Under her leadership, SFLC.in has conducted landmark litigation cases, petitioned the government of India on freedom of expression and internet issues, and campaigned for WhatsApp and Facebook to fix a feature of their platform that has been used to harass women in India.

Open source license litigation involves lawsuits surrounding open-source licensed software. Many of the legal rights of open source software licensors enforceable against users violating licensing agreements are untested by the U.S. legal system. Free and open source software (FOSS) is distributed under a variety of free-software licenses, which are unique among other software licenses. Legal action against open source licenses involves questions about their validity and enforceability.

References

  1. ↑ "Sandler becomes Conservancy's Executive Director; Kuhn transitions focus to new "Distinguished Technologist" role" (Press release). Software Freedom Conservancy. 2014-03-31. Retrieved 2014-03-31.
  2. ↑ "Karen Sandler Named New Executive Director of the GNOME Foundation" (Press release). GNOME Foundation. 2011-06-21. Retrieved 2011-06-21.
  3. ↑ "Karen Sandler Steps Down as GNOME Foundation Executive Director" (Press release). GNOME Foundation. 2014-03-31. Retrieved 2014-04-13.
  4. ↑ "Outreach Program for Women". GNOME Wiki. GNOME. Retrieved 14 July 2014.
  5. 1 2 "Software Freedom Law Center Appoints Two New Attorneys to Defend and Support Free and Open Source Software" (Press release). Software Freedom Law Center. 2005-10-31. Retrieved 2011-06-21.
  6. ↑ "The Software Freedom Law Center Promotes Karen Sandler to General Counsel" (Press release). Software Freedom Law Center. 2011-01-06. Retrieved 2011-06-21.
  7. ↑ "Karen Sandler 2009 Speaker Profile". O'Reilly Media. Retrieved 2011-06-21.
  8. ↑ "Karen Sandler 2010 Speaker Profile". O'Reilly Media. Retrieved 2011-06-21.
  9. ↑ "Karen Sandler 2009 Speaker page". Southern California Linux Expo. Retrieved 2011-06-21.
  10. ↑ "Open Development of Medical Devices". Linux Foundation. Archived from the original on 2011-10-09. Retrieved 2011-06-21.
  11. ↑ "Software Defects in Cardiac Medical Devices are a Life-or-Death Issue, says SFLC's new report" (Press release). Software Freedom Law Center. 2010-07-21. Retrieved 2011-06-21.
  12. ↑ "Today's DRM excuses can be tomorrow's DRM nightmares". Digital Citizen. 2010-06-02. Retrieved 2011-06-21.
  13. ↑ Mark Ward (2012-04-10). "Medical device hack attacks may kill, researchers warn". BBC News. Retrieved 2011-04-10.
  14. ↑ "Question Copyright about Karen page". Question Copyright. Retrieved 2016-08-16.
  15. ↑ Software Freedom Law Show Software Freedom Law Center
  16. ↑ "Free as in Freedom oggcast". Free as in Freedom. Retrieved 2011-06-21.
  17. ↑ "Public Lab and Karen Sandler are 2017 Free Software Awards winners" (Press release). Free Software Foundation. 2018-03-24. Retrieved 2019-05-17.
  18. ↑ "KU Leuven Patron Saint's Day 2023: Karen Sandler". KU Leuven. Retrieved 2023-02-03.
  19. ↑ "Executive Director Karen Sandler receives honorary doctorate from Katholieke Universiteit Leuven". Software Freedom Conservancy. Retrieved 2023-02-03.
  20. ↑ "Nice Design closeup picture". Mashable. 2011-04-13. Retrieved 2011-06-21.
  21. ↑ "Final Nominations List 49th Annual Grammy Awards". The National Academy Of Recording Arts & Sciences. Archived from the original on 2013-12-13. Retrieved 2011-06-21.
  22. ↑ "Paper Record Player Hides in Wedding Invitation". Wired. 2011-04-27. Retrieved 2011-06-21.
  23. ↑ "Couple Sends Record Player Wedding Invitations". Slashdot. 2011-04-15. Retrieved 2011-06-21.
  24. ↑ "Wedding Invitation Turns Into a Paper Record Player". Mashable. 2011-04-13. Retrieved 2011-06-21.
  25. ↑ Anderson, Kelli (2011-04-12). "A Paper Record Player" . Retrieved 2013-11-11.
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