 Okay, technical team, ready to go? Excellent, so hello everybody and thank you for being here today, Sunday, the end of the day, so I'm very happy that you made it. And although I think we are a little bit tired, although we have a party ahead of us, I certainly, I can't promise you that you're gonna learn some very interesting information about device neutrality today. So, yes, for those who are watching that are visually impaired, I'm a white man, beard, bald, wearing a blue sweater and jeans, and we are in an university room behind me, there are some blackboard and the presentation board. So, my name is Lucas Lassotta, I'm PhD in law and I'm a senior project manager at the Free Software Foundation Europe. And device neutrality is an initiative that we are being conducting in order to retain control over digital devices. And here at the Bit and Boil Me, and a big thanks for the Bit and Boil Me's organizers for allowing us to present this concept this year, we wanted to achieve a sustainable way to safeguard control over digital devices. So, first we needed to contextualize the talk asking a question to ourselves, are we losing control over devices and how device neutrality helps to re-empower and use of control over technology and in order to not make things very theoretical, I wanted to present a case study where we contributed, the FSFE contributed to the European Telecom Regulator on a study on sustainability in order to show them that it's impossible, in fact it's possible to regain control over devices in a sustainable way. So, what do we see here in this picture? Well, I think everybody has some digital device at home, we see some people already working with digital device here, we are using it for communication, for work, for internet access and they are becoming more and more common in our life. But there is some, have you already realized that although we are using more and more digital devices, our ability to install the software that we want is diminishing. Although this computer, this smartphone, we call it a general-purpose computer, we are not allowed to install software that we want. For example, if you're using an Android phone, perhaps it's hard to install a different app store, if you're using iOS, perhaps it's even harder to install a third-party app to sideload an app, right? So, I think what is happening today in the smartphone market is paradigmatic. What we are seeing here is some data from 2018 and well, four years ago. What we see here is that, well, yeah, Android is by far the most used operating system in the smartphone market and surprise the second player that iOS and what we are seeing here, well, this is explaining one important piece for us to understand what is happening on the digital markets. Both of these operating systems are proprietary, right? So, although we are using, more and more people are using smartphones today and we use, even for example, our relation not only of other people, but with the state and we need the smartphone to do everything, well, the main operating system on those devices are proprietary, so it's not free software. So, this is, I think it's a problem. If we see what is happening also in the browse market and browser, it's a very important program to access the internet, right? So, what we see right now is that 10 years ago, we had some different players. We had, for example, the internet explorer, Mozilla file fox and Google Chrome, but in this year, what we see is the complete dominant position from Google Chrome, the entire world, right? So, and again, through the browser, we access the internet. So, browser has add-ons and has other functionalities that shape our experience when we enter the internet. And I have some bad news for you because those companies, they have very strong commercial interests that sometimes they sell this interest to end users saying, oh, this is a security concern, this is a privacy concern, but in fact, when we start analyzing, these are just commercial interests. But, well, so those companies that they dominate some very specific niches of the digital markets, for example, the operating system, the browser, the app stores, we call them gatekeepers because they have control of very important noddles, very important bottlenecks in the internet value chain. And when they control this kind of noddles, they can control the experience of end users when they are accessing the internet, right? So, and how they exercise this control of end users? Basically, they restrict software freedom, as I said, right? Limiting users to install different operating system, browsers, app stores, and drivers. However, they also lock devices down by controlling pre-installed apps, hindering interoperability, and applying proprietary standards on those devices. And last but not least, they also control end users in a so-called wallet garden by increasing switching costs, restricting end users on these ecosystems, right? To tie devices to online accounts and services, hampering control over personal data. So all these sources of power of these big companies exercising what we call a gatekeeper control. Well, and this is obviously, obviously a huge problem for end users' freedom, right? Because when they hamper all those rights and the users' rights over devices, we are losing individual autonomy, we are losing digital sovereignty, and this has, of course, a backslash, a great negative impact on digital sustainability. And how to empower users to control technology in a sustainable way? This is a major question. This is the subject that we have been working on the last few years, and we wanted to share our concerns here with you today so we can think on some solutions together. So Corey Doctorov, I like this author very much, and he has a very interesting saying on this book, How to Destroy Surveillance and Capitalism. And he says, the impact of dominance far exceeds the impact of manipulation and should be central to our analysis of any remedies we seek. So if we want to talk about sustainable way to regain control over device, we need to talk about the size of these big techs, right? And we need to start thinking on ways to disentrench those big techs on these positions of dominance they have on digital markets. So we have been thinking together with academia and we've been pushing forward this concept of device neutrality forward in a way to provide access to free software and devices and then regaining control over these devices. Device neutrality prevents discrimination of services and apps by platforms or hardware providers, as we said gatekeepers. And the main objective of this concept, the concept of device neutrality is to resolve the monopoly on devices by safeguarding users with alternatives. So we wanted to safeguard alternatives to reach software services and content with their devices. So people can in fact use their devices as general purpose computers, not in the way just the big tech want us to use the devices. And in order to achieve that, we think that any device provider should abide under these three principles, the software freedom, no vendor lock-in and end user control over data. Let's talk a little bit about more of which one of these principles. By software freedom, we understand that users should have the ability to install and uninstall any software, including operating systems and app stores. This is a very strong statement and I reassure you that sometimes big tech they don't allow user to do this with their own devices. But gatekeepers should also provide to 30-party software the same access privilege as the pre-installed ones. So basically what we are saying is this, okay, so providers, device providers, they are selling a device on the market, but sometimes they come already with pre-installed apps. And what we say, software freedom is this, we wanted to install 30-party apps and we must have the same privilege and access as the pre-installed ones. Well, and what do we mean by no vendor lock-in? Basically, gatekeepers, this big tech company should provide interoperability based on open standards, right, for people that are involved with the free and open source software community, this sounds common knowledge, but when you go to the reality of digital markets this is far from being a best practice if you will. So the second thing that we think that's important for keeping devices open and away from vendor lock-in is providers of operating systems should make available specifications for APIs and functionality invoked by 30-party apps and devices should not be bundled with app stores and online accounts. I think it's paradigmatic when you buy a smartphone, the first thing that appears on your screens is that you need to open an online account with this big tech. I like more this very old smartphones that we don't need any kind of online accounts whatsoever, but yeah, so I think that one way to disentrench dispositions is also to forbid this kind of practice. And let but not least, well, we need to reassure that end users have control over their own data, right, and end users should easily transfer personal data from apps and operating systems and devices, and gatekeepers should be bound to open standards and common interface for data transfer. Right, so by now I think this is a little bit too vague and perhaps a little bit too theoretical, and but I would like to say to you that we are very happy that we have been pushing those concepts already on the legislative level in the European Union and the latest law, the Digital Markets Act, there's a lot of positions and provisions on device neutrality and we are very happy with that, but today I would like to present to you a case study from the telecom sector, and I would like to talk a little bit about router freedom. From the audience here, who has internet at home? I think, yeah, great, almost everybody. The second question is, who use the router, this equipment here, provided by the internet service provider? So, yeah, okay, so you just ordered the internet and you are using the, so who bought your own router? Oh man, this is really cool. This is cool from this audience and from bits and voids that, yeah, the rest of us from, I already talked in other venues and the result is the opposite, so everybody was using the router from the ISP. So, in the FSFE, the Free Software Foundation Europe would have been monitoring. This is the link to the monitoring map. Since 2013, the ability of end users, consumers to use their own routers, right? This is very important. Perhaps people may just think this is a useless device that you just used to connect to the internet. It's covering on dust, it's hidden there in our home, but ladies and gentlemen, these devices, they gateway to the internet, right? So, this is very important. This is where your home network is concentrated. So, we think that it's very important for end users, for consumers to have the ability to buy their own routers and to install their own operating system on their routers, right? But this is not the reality in the European Union. So, in our monitoring map, as you can see here, we have the red icons and we have the green icons. And the green icons are the countries where we have the possibility to buy our own routers. In other countries, it's not allowed. You must use the routers from the ISPs. And this is a problem for sustainability, right? Because if we think about using our devices for longer, the right to repair and extending the lifespan of our devices and all those elements that are important for digital sustainability, if we are not able to use our own devices, this is a big problem, right? And this is exactly the case study that I would like to propose. And to say, look, the BEREC is the European regulator for telecommunication. And this organization proposed a study on sustainability asking for stakeholders to provide some solutions and feedback on the sustainability of the telecom sector. And we said, look, you need to do your homework because what we have been seeing is that in the telecom sector, it's not, today it's not sustainable because people are not having the possibility to use their own devices for internet access. So, and what we said first, that in order to fix this, in order to provide solutions for a more sustainable telecom sector, first of all, we said that free software licensing is key to enabling repelability and extending usage lifetime of electronic devices. The second principle that we identified and pinpoint to the regulator is that the universal right to install any software or any device and the publication of source code of drivers, tools and interfaces are fundamental for extending device lifespan. And now, connected to our presentation, device neutrality is necessary for a non-discriminatory environment for digital services and software application in devices. Right, so this is a very real life example of how device neutrality can regain, help us to regain control over devices in a sustainable way, right? And more on a more social level, this one institutional policy and legal level on a more social level, we have been putting forward also an open letter that has been already signed for more than 100 organizations on the universal right to install any software on any device, right? And we have proposed some principles. For an example, the universal right to install any software, free choice of online services providers, interoperable and compatible devices and publication of source code of drivers, tools and interfaces. So these are some of the concepts that we have been pushing forward in pro of device neutrality in order to help people to achieve, to regain their control over devices in a sustainable way. Well, basically, this is the presentation that I have for you today and thank you very much for the attention and looking forward for your feedback. What do you think about device neutrality? Any question, comments, or are you happy? Oh, yes. Just on question, perhaps we'll wait for the microphone. Great. Is it working? Can you try that? Hello? Yeah, it's working. Okay. I haven't seen the Firefox browser on your graphic in the beginning, but maybe you mentioned it earlier because I wasn't here in the start. You said Google Chrome is basically taking over the world, but there's also alternatives. I just think you should mention, at least, that there's another browser engine that's not Google Chrome, basically. Absolutely, absolutely. And then another thing that I find, I mean, you are, I think, basically right, but there are also other devices that are better now because there's, for example, the Steam Deck. You probably know this is kind of a gaming console that is using Linux, for example, as a base and that's something completely new and it's comparable to PS4 or Xbox and stuff like that. So in this regard, they can install all kinds of Linux software and so I think in some regards, the situation is also getting better. So maybe it's also an idea for the FSFE to promote cases in which the situation actually gets better. Okay. Yeah, thanks a lot for your comments. Yeah, I completely agree with you. This presentation of this data here, it's not so ever just the analogy meant off we are happy with the situation right now. On the contrary, I think this is a problem and yeah, but there is, of course, a lot of solutions and basically I'm not using Chrome and I think a lot of people are not using it, but the sad reality is that Chrome has a serious advantage on the digital market and in order to break that, we think that we need to talk about the size of Google company, Alphabet and in order to disentrench Google from this position, we need device neutrality. So this is the main argument today. Yeah, we have some questions here please. Thanks. I know this is a very big question but I wanted to ask how you think we, like what are the possibilities because I know that like you mentioned this EU policy developments but of course that's often very slow and there's a lot of implementational issues to it. So what are other ways in which we can like foster a change? Yeah, this is an excellent question and thanks for it. So yeah, our strategy, it's not to work only on the policy level but also on a social level, right? So we are working with a lot of organizations even so some, even device manufacturers, for example, Fairphone has, I think Fairphone has signed our open letter but I think that on an individual level, if an individual level, if you wanted to avoid this problem, perhaps it would be nice to starting seeking for alternatives on your smartphone, installing a different OS, for example, Calyx-OXL or even different alternatives. If you're using some notebook, perhaps it's trying to install a GNU Linux distribution, you know, there's a lot of them and sometimes they are very user friendly and I think on helping us to spread the word, right? We are working already with a huge number of stakeholders but we need still people to join the movement and to spread the word and say, look, this is not right. I wanted to regain control of my device, I bought it and I wanted to install third party apps. I wanted to install a different application and well, basically, if we will spread the word among our family, among our friends, I think this has a very good impact on society. Yes, please. Thank you for the great presentation. Mine is more just a comment. I find it very interesting. I wonder how this plays out in the foreign aid arena because it reminds me of Facebook, for example, and this campaign that they had about, let's connect everyone to the internet, right? And they go to developing countries where people are not connected and they give this Facebook field devices where they can only have Facebook Messenger and no other thing. And this is, of course, the incentives for the business so I wonder, like, how would that play out in this? Yeah, thanks. And this is a very serious question, I would say, because when we start seeing some data from developing countries and me myself, I come from developing countries, I'm a Brazilian and how people are shaped, the experience, and internet experience in Brazil is that when today this generation, people that are born in the 1990s onwards, when you ask about the internet, they only know internet by our Facebook, by WhatsApp, TikTok, or perhaps Instagram, right? So this is not the concept that we had on web two that we have indeed the concept of open internet, right? And people that, in fact, those big companies are using their power in order to shape the experience of end users with their devices. In order to change that, I think it takes some times because, well, Big Tech had almost 20 years to get the position that they got right now and that's why we think that we need some very specific actions on the social level, but we need also the regulatory. Although the regulatory sometimes may take time, sometimes we need to get the majorities on law parliaments and so on and so forth, but we need to regain the regulatory space for ourselves again because Big Tech had 20 years of non-regulatory spaces in order to achieve that, and we needed to regain those spaces in order to provide better experience for end users. Yeah, okay. So thank you very much for your attention and I wish you all the best.