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Interview with Dr. Villanueva
cigarky writes "I think many of us were very impressed by the recent letter of Peruvian Congressman Dr. Edgar David Villanueva Nuñez. Linux Today has a followup interview with more in-depth information."
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Any chance he'd be willing to run for President in the U.S. in 04?
You are not the customer.
When you hear people complaining that free (as in beer) software is going to cost programmers jobs or cut their salary, or that free software will send us into an economic tailspin, remember this: Both free (as in speech) and free (as in beer) software are making technological revolutions possible in places where it just couldn't happen otherwise. And you can bet that we're going to see good stuff (more software!) starting to flow back the other way.
Says the RIAA: When you EQ, you're stealing bass!
Today it was announced Stallman is boycotting linuxtoday.com until it changes its name to the "correct" gnulinuxtoday.com and now recoomends everyone use Windows in protest until this change is made across the GNU/Linux world!
If every Slashdot reader wrote him in on the ballot, he would end up with more votes than Ross Perot.
Oh yes, the Peruvian Congressman's letter, how could I forget?
It reminded me a lot of that recent Mexican treatice on excellent no-background slashdot subject descriptions.
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I think this recent post would reasure not only Dr. Edgar David Villanueva Nuñez position but the rest of the Open Source advocates that a secure OS is needed. Would you install a OS when it's creators tell you it is not secure?
If you could sum it up in a nutshell, maybe you should be writing O'Reily books. --- Domasi 2001
Is the text of the Bill proposed by Dr. Villanueva available on-line in English?
I'd like to see their definition of free software.
DNA is the ultimate spaghetti code.
More important point: I am glad he wrote the letter; I can now explain to all my friends in México why Linux is important by having them read the original Spanish version of his letter.
- Sam
The secret to enjoying Slashdot is to realize that it should not be taken too seriously.
What intrigues me about the entire software industry, is that they charge relatively different prices around the work. In Europe, a copy of XP is maybe 1 week of average pay. In inner Africa, a copy of XP runs well into the months. Asking companies there to pay full price is plain ridiculous. When I'm rich and famous at 35, I'll go to Africa to teach them how to unleash the then awe-inspiring power of the Penguin. Hopefully, I'll be many years too late.
Stop the brainwash
I didn't see an interview.
To ensure perfect aim, shoot first and call whatever you hit the target
> Would you install a OS when it's creators tell you it is not secure? It is precisely *because* people are willing to accept that Linux (and no software) is totally secure, that I use it. Would you install an OS when it's creators tell you it IS secure, but they keep releasing "critical updates"?
J'aime mieux les méchants que les imbéciles, parce qu'ils se reposent. -- Alexandre Dumas
I think he meant to mess up :P
What I'm concerned about, is why you think the error is that Hex isn't a month: I'd say the math error is far worse for a nerd than messing up something as trivial as the identifiers for 0..11
Be wary of any facts that confirm your opinion.
Since most of us don't vote in Peru, all of us in the OSS community should pay special attention to any requests for tech assistance from Peruvian sources.
Spread the word.
Let's hope that some day they will get rid of the .asp bit, and implement PHP instead ! :)
More coverage on this entire topic here
You rush a Miracle Man, you get rotten miracles - Miracle Max, TPB
of it's original bang. Seriously, I hope someday we can look back on this as a defining moment in the history of the open source movement... wouldn't that be cool? Even cooler, to be able to tell your grandkids, "Yep, I was there and here's what I did..."
/. never mind), every time I read the letter I get the urge to shout "Viva la revolucion!" ;)
Okay, and at the risk of offending any tender PC sensitivities out there (whoops, this is
This is all a real blow to my cynicism.
People say "the internet will change the way the world works!" and I say "yeah, right", because people who say that sort of thing (often involving the non-word "paradigm") don't even know what a packet is. "It's shifted the whole paradigm for the sex movie industry", I say derisively.
Well, this, and by this I mean the whole imbroglio where Dr. Villanueva is now the cause celebre of the open source movement, could never have happened without all that international packet switching, and the culture that has grown up around it, and this is very significant.
This isn't a fake economic event - like stock quotes. This isn't a manufactured cultural event with no social or political relevance - like the pop music we're swapping. This isn't the sophistry of most modern political news which is nothing more than the latest lies to promote your own self interest.
This is real and genuine and the internet has made it possible.
The good and new comes from no quarter where it is looked for, and is always something different from what is expected.
When this story broke. A lot of people made comments like: ' I wish we had government officials who were as clueful.' I took that as a clue to write to my elected reps and fill them in on the scoop and also mandate that free software be used over proprietary here in the U.S. You should consider doing the same. Let us make our reps accountable for the IT infrastructure used to do governement business.
While this AC uses florid, if correct, English, (s)he speaks as though (s)he is Peruvian. Is this correct? Perhaps AC hasn't read the Congressman's letter? If AC is referring to the same Dr. Villanueva, would AC like to cite specifics, and perhaps links to news stories that explain his/her seemingly bizzare comments? Who, specifically, are the persons of "impeccable character" who were "smear[ed]" by his comments? I missed the "invectives," and the "gnosticism." Is it a "conflation of reckless psychics" to say that a nation state should not trust a 'black box' system for national security? Particularly if the 'black box' is produced by a massive, foreign corporation with a track record of criminal behavior and negligence with regards to security? Perhaps AC would like to explain the reference to "the most vulnerable in our society"? I think that it is far more likely that AC is an employee or stockholder of MS than Michael Moore.
Its been a long while, so it might not be so, but isn't Villanueva Pippi Longstockings house?
There isn't much like the scent of a fresh harddisk
I wish this guy was an element in the US government. Instead, we're stuck with Fritz "Freling" Hollings' caricature of how technology can / should be used to serve his supposed constituents. Which is laughable at best, since it seems to be more focused on eviscerating digital rights /privacy and handing them out to corporations wholesale.
Good to see digital democracy is alive and well in Peru. Sorry I can't say the same about things back home, though........
The Doctor's letter is more than impressive. His point by point rebuttal of Microsoft's falacies was both thorough and consise. He clearly called out the internal contradictions that are so common in Microsoft's arguments. I was stunned by how well he made his points. For anyone who hasn't read it, regardless of your position on the issue, you should.
Lets see......posted as AC....hummmm! Either M$ employee or M$ investor. I recommend you dump your M$ interests and get over it.
Villanueva was once invited to an event in Columbia where he was to meet with the Free Software Foundation's Richard Stallman, and to his great disappointment this event had to be cancelled.
They refused to re-name the country GNU/Columbia.
Karma: Professionally Doomed (mostly affected by inability to keep opinions to self)
How about a Slashdot interview with this guy? I haven't know many politicians to shy from another couple million eyeballs regarding their pet project, even if it comes from non-constituents.
--
$tar -xvf
Peru is far from a paradise, I'm afraid:
Kidnappings, murders, armed robberies, and drug-related crime remain serious problems, especially in Lima. Corruption is deep-seated in the police and security forces. Despite the near-destruction of the left-wing Sendero Luminoso guerrillas, main cities frequently have curfews and those who can afford it protect themselves with high-security homes and armed guards.
'cos I'll be jiggered if I can figure out how to get any international characters out of my Linux box w/ a US 101-key.
Villanueva's bill
Would make the state use Linux
Hooray for Peru
If you are oversensitive, then it's because you obviously have some sort of vested interest in posting difamatory material as you do. I won't say you work for Microsoft but I will ask you where on earth you get your claim that Villanueva doesn't value human life and believes it to be expendable? I will also ask you on what you base your claim that he is spreading hatred and malice when it seems that that is more what you are doing? In addition to this I would ask you on what you base your claim that he is making the lives of the sick, old, disabled and unemployed miserable, since, judging from everything I've read about this man and looking at his origions and his work in improving the computing access in a region with extremely limited financial means, this is exactly the opposite of what he is trying to do.
Finally, i would ask you who you are?
If you're so desperate to throw a vote to some foreign guy based on only one of his stances, you might want to look up politicians who have similar agendas at home, like Ralph Nader. He has been keeping up with the issue.
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Bleah! Heh heh heh... BLEAH BLEAH!!! Ha ha ha ha...
It will not solve the problems you talk of but consider this:
Having access to the internet enables those people to exchange information, a process invaluable in terms of solving problems and sharing experiences.
It enables people to find cheaper practical ideas to the problems of getting clean water, roofing, medical aid etc which they might not have known about earlier.
It enables people to gather and process statistics, one of the oldest computing tasks, which is invaluble in helping them to see their problems as a whole.
It helps them to learn, and enables them to get access to learning materials which they possibly could not otherwise do.
I am not a republican, but I AM conservative. Similar, but very different. I am a proponenet of patriotism. American Citizens first. Anti-GLOBALIST companies. Anything that goes against the true meaning of America. I've always said a liberal is a person who's never been robbed :) Democrats should support the Green party (nader) and republicans should support Buchanan.
If you're not a Liberal in your 20's, then you have no heart.If you're still a Liberal in your 30's you have no brain.
Just move to any US inner city. You'll feel right at home.
If you're not a Liberal in your 20's, then you have no heart.If you're still a Liberal in your 30's you have no brain.
I don't know if I'm imagining it but everytime Villanueva's name turns up here on /. the anti-OSS trolling increases to a fevered pitch.
It seems as if opponents of this bill are very, very scared of the snowball effect that it could have. Peru is a poor country and is one of many on this earth. While I doubt that many of those countries have leaders that are as interrested in the wellbeing of their populace or as well articulated, I think there would be enough to see the benefits of a law such as this one, especially if it makes a notable difference in the IT landscape in Peru. Certain companies will certainly try to use dubious methods to try to silence efforts such as this, because it leaves them out in the cold, or did anyone think that poor countries had any possibility of expending their IT knowhow in any other manner?
Could you perhaps be the same person who posted that other diffamatory note with the title "Why I don't like Villanueva"? In any case you are doing yourself an extreme disservice. Almost everybody believes that you are from Microsoft and asks why you are posting such stuff here? I would also belive that most people here see this kind of post as Fear on the part of Microsoft.
dude you need a better job.
You was in Peru before?? I think you only see a lot of stupid movies, Peru has the same problems of any country around the world, tell me... no murders in your country???
:P
We has a big problem in the past with terrorism, but not anymore, terrorist movements like Sendero Luminoso and MRTA dont exist anymore.
I live in Lima and Im so happy, I dont have to pay to any guard
We are making a lot of activism here (http://www.linux.org.pe)
:)
Saludos
- Slayer_X
http://www.slayerx.org/
Lima
u can check it at here
regards
Again, just to reply to a few points here:
Read up on Public Finance and derived benefit from public goods. Then come talk. -- actually I'd suggest you read some more serious economic texts than you appear to have received in your undergraduate education. Read some Milton Friedman, some Arthur Laffer, and so forth, and you'll see that most serious economists agree that reducing taxes is a very effective way to stimulate growth. And growth means a better standard of living at all levels of society.
my father makes around 900k to 1200k per year -- so perhaps it is you who are not acquainted with the huge tax burden placed on the rich and the upper middle class in this country. In actual fact, as documented here and elsewhere, the upper middle class and rich in America pay an amount in taxes that is completely disproportionate to what they earn or have.
The way to help is to bring those needing help to the level of those not. -- unfortunately, the effect of all attempts at doing so over the last 200+ years has been to bring everyone down into poverty. In contrast, one thing capitalism has done really well is to raise everyone's level. As a perfect example, the bottom 20% of American society currently earns, has, and consumes as much as the middle 20% did in the 1950's, an era generally remembered for it's prosperity. No other system has ever provided growth like that.
The US government, fustrated with vendor-lock-in and the national-security fact that they 'didn't know what was in their software' specifically stipulated that all future programs written for the state by contractors will be written in "human comprehendable COBOL". This was in the late 1950s. . .
.anyone wish to comment on it? It seems to have the same pretense as the Peruvian Bill but was enacted all wrong (aka forcing a language). . .
I was reading this in a computer history book recently. .
...follow suit.
MS South Africa has just
(http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.jsp?a=11 and about being able to compete in the global market.
...weaned, as it were, on the webs of ritual... (Mervyn Peake)
Is there a Nobel Prize for Open Source yet? This guy should get the first one.
Height: 38U, Weight: 0 Newtons, Eyes: #0000FF, OS: Gray Matter 1.0 (Alpha)
Well you spent enough time on other right-wing rubbish so you might as well have given us your skewed view on economics.
It's comments like this that leave one with the impression that leftism is much less a reasoned system of beliefs than it is a religious movement. The fact that many on the left are willing to dismiss and insult opposing viewpoints rather than disagree with them civilly does not bode well for the future of civil discourse in this country and the world.
In Europe they generally use taxes to support such things as the health service - which helps ALL members of society...
Except that it doesn't. Instead it results in things like France's 12% (!) unemployment rate, or the crime waves which have made Paris in London each significantly more dangerous than New York for the last half decade or so.
To pick an example, were Sweden, which is often praised by the left for it's high tax rates and massive social welfare programs, to become the 51st state of the US, it would not only be the state with the poorest standard of living in the US, but Swedes as an ethnic group would be the group with the poorest standard of living -- see here for details.
You could use HTML mode and type in the ASCII markup: Núñez (Núñez).
Digital Citizen
Not only is the kernal important, the whole GNU/Linux system is important too, since we're talking about naming in this thread (and since the letter we're referring to correctly refers to the name for the system).
Digital Citizen
In your nightmare, presumably OBL is still at large?
The current administration has completely eliminated the supposed Republican superiority in foreign policy. W was a draft dodger like Quayle, only he didn't fulfill his National Guard committment. He's a nitwit. Powell is pretty weak - remember, he opposed the Gulf War and was instrumental in prematurely ending it. Rice is not up on the Middle East, which is a leeeeetle bit important now. Top to bottom, poseurs.
An interesting assessment. I agree, mostly, with your take on Powell, though I have to say that he's miles beyond Albright (who has made several speeches during the course of this war suggesting that the government is doing too much, not too little).
On the other hand, I've been quite happy with Rice's performance, and with that of Rumsfeld (whom you didn't find anything to say about).
As to OBL, I'm much more concerned with the job we've done on the infrastructure which made 9/11 possible than I am with any particular individual who's out there. Find only Bin Laden, and someone will take his place. Crush the al Qaeda infrastructure, and with or without Bin Laden the world will be a lot safer.
BTW, I assume by your slam on Bush's NG service that you have done more? Or would that not be a safe assumption?
what does this mean? yeah i know i'm another ignoarant yank.
-- john
The problem with "free" is a problem in English, not other languages where the difference between price and liberty are clear. The FSF offers a list of translations to use for Free Software when speaking other languages so people understand you're not talking about price (yes, I know the link points to a term on "Freeware", that's where they put it because the list answers another question relating to the term "Freeware").
Digital Citizen
they want to save us from, how could they not come leaping to save us?
this link was posted by someone, below the interview at LinuxToday,
http://www.vialibre.org.ar/lessdeveloped.html
it details some of the penalties being threatened by the BSA down south. Apparently some of the BSA's advertising is using the thought of prison rape as deterrent.
how can they possibly know if you're not guilty if you don't have a receipt?
-- it's ridiculous how many people misspell ridiculous... (damn, damn, damn...)
We _really_ need to make sure that when this bill passes, the OSS/FS communities make sure that the project gets all the help it needs!! We can't let this project even hit a small snag, let alone fail.
Face it, with the attention that this is getting, if anything goes wrong, M$ is going to jump down our throats about it. This is the poster child project for the whole movement. It's going to be looked at by the whole world as an example of what happens when you go the Free software route, therefore we can't let it fail.
Please help make sure that the project goes as smoothly as is possible. Thanks in advance.
Here you can read the text of the bill (in Spanish):
Bill 1609
Rather small doc I must add. Quick and to the point I suppose.
Stop being such an ugly american, fer cryin' out loud. You find it surprising/disappointing that there are some smart people in the world that don't come from your particular country? Gawd. Do some reading. Travel. Listening.
I have not served. Nor have I belittled Clinton for not serving, as the Republicans have done. Notable dodgers include Phil Graham, Pat Buchanan (former repub) and Newt Gingrich, all of whom argued that Clinton was unfit to serve as CIC.
If a draft dodger is unfit to serve as CIC (as I've heard argued), W and Quayle are not fit. I understand that Quayle at least served out his term, honorably defending our nation's golf courses. They both pulled strings to stay out of harms way and let others do the fighting (and dying). Gore served. Clinton opposed the war in Vietnam - so I find his actions morally consistent. I also find his assessment of American policy at the time correct.
I think that OBL is important. Simple principles of justice say we nail his hide to a pig stye. His charisma appears to have a galvanizing effect on his followers, and the fact that he may still be at large makes him heroic and the US look bad.
9/11 vindicated the notion of nation building, to some extent. Without a chaotic non-country to sit in, the terrorist infrastructure wouldn't have been built there. The places OBL may have gone (or his successors) include Somalia, the Sudan, Pakistan, and Yemen. All have ineffective or non-existent central government control over territory.
I'm not sure about your choice of Laffer as a 'serious economist'. He was the one whispering in Reagans ear about supply-side economics, arguing that a reduction in taxes would actually increase tax revenues. This did not happen when it was tried in the US. This is not to say that there isn't a point at which increased taxes lead to declining tax revenues, but it is debatable just where the crest of the Laffer curve lies.
This troll floats effortly from science to religion to ethics and the law. I can't remember the last time I saw someone criticised as a heritic (gnostic here). There is no story behind the troll.
This is the funniest thread I have read in awhile. I think sometimes people take things too seriousl. This is an obvious attempt at humor. If I only had mod points...
Hmm, GNU/Peru. Has a nice ring to it and it even rhymes.
The third LinuxToday response links this native Argentine article (in English) which is less professional but in its own way even more telling than Villaneuva's response.
Read some of the explanations of the motivation behind much software `piracy' in `less developed' countries and weep. Imagine, for example, paying more for a base copy of your OS than you did for your new hardware!
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
It means whatever you want it to mean. I seem to remember it being some sort of bastardization of "Jinkies" from Scooby-Doo, but it could just as easily be a real word with a real definition that I heard once that slipped into my vocabulary.
Typing the keystroke sequences you listed does different things in different programs. For example, Alt-A is the standard keystroke for "select all" and does exactly that if you try it in Netscape. In emacs, alt-A does something completely different.
There is no keystroke standardization in X. I don't even think X itself does anything to trap keystrokes whatsoever - just windowmanagers and any other programs you have running. 's one of the most *ahem* beautiful *ahem* things about GNU/Linux - absolutely NO user interface standardization, and no way for a user to create it without modifying the source code to every piece of program he or she has.
No, it doesn't (and your point is not well served by pointing out how the letter starts off by correcting the use of that term). The Open Source movement is primarily targetting businesses. The Free Software movement speaks to all computer users. The Peruvian bill speaks to all Peruvian computer users, not just businesses. This is one way in which the wording in the letter is correct.
The bill is concerned with user's freedoms. The Open Source movement takes pains to avoid talking about software freedom because they believe their development methodology message will go over easier with businesses if they stop the freedom talk (in their FAQ they refer to freedom talk as "ideological tub-thumping" with no further analysis of the Free Software movement's motives). This is another way in which the wording in the letter is correct.
I see now where your misunderstanding lies: There is no obligation to redistribute programs in the Free Software movement. The Free Software movement is geared around freedoms you need in "the system of free expression in a technological society" (from the FSF's Amicus brief for Eldred v. Ashcroft). Nowhere in the Free Software definition is there a requirement to distribute Free Software. Quite to the contrary:
Software licenses requiring publication or notification are non-free (such as the APSL, the Apple Public Source License, which requires any modified version of APSL-covered software "deployed" in an organization must be published).
Exactly—users must have the right to do so. That's freedom talk which is totally synonymous with the Free Software movement, not the Open Source movement.
I think any reasonable person has to conclude that Dr. Villanueva knew what he was talking about and he meant what he said throughout the letter, including his repeated support for Free Software.
Digital Citizen