The 1st of March 2007 the Free Knowledge Foundation (FKF) and four towns of the Madrid Sierra developed the First Public Consortium of Free Knowledge and Free Software of Spain (CONSOLE).

This is the first time that a public entity dedicated to Free Software has been created in the world. Among the main targets of this consortium are the promotion and implementation of free software in the local administration in order to carry out specific public management development projects under free license, specifically GPL license.

The consortium, named CONSOLE, is a national public entity that allows the incorporation of any new town in Spain who may wish to do so. Since many councils have already expressed their interest, their joining to the consortium is imminent. The FKF has prepared an information request form in http://www.libre.org/console/

During the first meeting of the consortium Pablo Machon, presidente of the FKF was elected as president of CONSOLE and José García Vela, major of El Vellón, was elected as vice-president.

Pablo Machón stated: «Free Software is a matter of freedom. The public administration oughts to look for the rights and freedom of citizens when exerting its powers. With this new public entity the FKF and the councils involved pretend to progress towards a more free society throughout the example of local administrations. We encourage all spanish councils to join our efforts to succeed in having a more equalitarian public administration that will motivate solidarity among people without depending on third parties».

Machón emphasized that «the Free Knowledge Foundation, FKF, does not promote nor support "open source", since that term refers merely to a development model. We talk about 'free software' and not to 'open source' because our aim is to defend the freedom of users: citizens and councils. In comparison to this, the practical matters of engineering are secondary; they should not distract us from the ethical level».

Moreover, Dr. Richard Stallman, father of Free Software, president of FSF and honour patron of the Foundation has declared: «Public agencies have the responsability to promote freedom and solidarity among citizens, therefore using free software and not propietary. I hope that other city council will join this project to promote the respect of citizens and public administrations.»

The consortium will be presented publicly during the event Libremeeting2007, on the 10th and 11th of May in Miraflores de la Sierra, Madrid. More information may be found at http://www.libre.org/