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LinuxFest Northwest is an annual technology conference and expo held in Bellingham, Washington. It is a Saturday and Sunday weekend event held in late April or early May. The event is dedicated to discussion and development of the Linux operating system and other free and open-source software projects.

Event description

LinuxFest Northwest is a free event, focused on generating interest in Linux and other open source software projects. The 2015 edition has 80 presentations and 45 exhibits from vendors and organizations, as well as demonstrations.^[1] The event raises money through a raffle and by charging commercial vendors a donation fee for their booths. This allows the festival to stay free for all who wish to come while raising enough money to fly in popular speakers.

Location

Linuxfest Northwest is held in Bellingham, Washington, about 80 miles (128.75 km) north of Seattle and 50 mi (80 km) south of Vancouver, B.C. The location is primarily chosen because the facilities are donated by Bellingham Technical College. There have been discussions in the past to move the festival south to Seattle, however no local groups have taken on the task.

History

LinuxFest Northwest originated as "Linuxfest", held by the Bellingham Linux Users Group (BLUG). The first 'fest' was held in 2000, but was mainly advertised as a local Bellingham event. In 2003, the fest was expanded to a regional event, advertising as far south as Seattle and Tacoma, Washington, and north to Vancouver, British Columbia. Until 2006, it was a full day on Saturday. In 2007 it was expanded into a 2-day weekend event. In 2019 the logo was changed from a totem pole to a Pacific Northwest landscape.^[2] The 2020,^[3] 2021,^[4] and 2022^[5] conferences were either cancelled or moved online in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and the 2023^[6] conference was cancelled due to an unplanned closure of the venue.

Previous featured speakers

2010

Brian "Krow" Aker — Drizzle
Jesse Keating — Fedora Developers conference
Brian Alseth — ACLU Technology and Freedom

2009

Joe Brockmeier — Building Packages, Distros, and More
Jon "maddog" Hall — How Free and Open Source Software will have World Domination
Jesse Keating — What's under the hat? A sneak peek at Fedora 11!
Seth Schoen — Information security discovers physics
"Monty" Widenius — AskMonty & Black Vodka