Name: Vysakh Premkumar
Bio: I’m a DevOps Engineer by profession, and a Free / Libre Software Evangelist, I’ve been active in the FOSS Circles for the past 4 years, primarily from the NITC / FOSSCell as well as FOSSMeet related activities, Currently working with Open Healthcare Network in making Healthcare Accessible for all.
Location: Kochi
Personal site/ Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vysakh-premkumar/ , Vysakh Sheeja Premkumar (@_Y___h@mastodon.social) - Mastodon
Home community: Open Healthcare Network
Years of association with Free Software: Open Healthcare Network ( 2 years ), FOSSCell NIT Calicut (5 years )
My FOSS/digital commons journey: Started off my FOSS Journey by conducting an online seminar on topic sustainability of software development with Free Software back in 2021, Volunteered for FOSSMeet within and outside Campus and help organise/ popularize Free Software in general, collaborated with multiple Digital Commons communities including but not limited to, OSM Kerala, Wikimedians Kerala, Kochi FOSS, Debian India etc. Currently working on DPG / CARE a Free and Open Source Kernel for Healthcare. Had multiple sessions taken on different topics for events including India FOSS, FOSSMeet, COSCUP Taiwan, Open SUSE asia Summit 2024 ( Tokyo ) etc.
How and when I came across the FOSS United community: Participated for IndiaFOSS 2023 and was a speaker during IndiaFOSS 2024.
Why I am running for the Governing Board: I work better in at the gateway level of Free Software, providing first exposure to absolute beginners who are confused in a manner that inspires and spark curiosity is what I do best, and I feel FOSSUnited is one of the places in which I can use my skills and help grow the adoption and sustenance of Free Software by ensuring new and new people grow interest into FOSS.
Why would I be a good fit: I now help volunteer to maintain Communties including GLUG NIT Calicut, WIKINITC and have in the past helped manage Communities surrounding Free Software, I believe I possess the skill-set required to do the same hand in hand with FOSSUnited as well.
Things I would like to focus on as a GB member: I’m a big fan of Open Knowledge, I still Believe that bringing about transparency to all the places it can be is the first step in building stronger communities,
- I’d like to better use my expertise to inspire and support students primarily from colleges to setup sovereign cloud infrastructure that they can manage by themselves, out of maybe old unused hardware to start off with and to reduce financial burden, deploy essential software that they as a community can collaboratively use including mediawiki, apache answer, inventory, and other management utility programs that benifits them as a whole. The same can later be migrated to better infra upon completion of POC.
- Help Students initiate GLUG within their campuses, as well as other Libre / Digital Commons communities with respective indian / state / international communities, increase exposure to events / conferences, encourage more speaker submissions as well