Richard Stallman
| Gender | Male |
| Age | - |
| Region | North America |
| Nationality | USA |
| Residence | USA |
| Languages | English, French, Spanish (fluent); Indonesian (basic) |
| Nominated by | Lee McKnight |
| Endorsed by | Patents, Copyrights & Trademarks WG |
Endorsing statement
Richard Stallman founded the Free Software Movement in 1983 and launched the development of the GNU operating system in 1984. (Today's GNU/Linux system is based mainly on GNU.) He focuses today on the effects of overrestrictive patent and copyright laws on software development and software use.
As a user of the Arpanet since 1973, and an early developer of higher-level network protocols, Stallman can also provide a technical and historical perspective.
Stallman is a US citizen, self-employed, and president of the Free Software Foundation. He gives speeches in English, French, and Spanish, and can write somewhat flawed Indonesian.
Mr Stallman understands that the process will involve a handful of meetings, the precise location and timing of which is yet to be determined. If they are in New York, they will be easy to attend, presuming the dates are known soon in order to avoid conflicting commitments.