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Namibia Says "No Thanks" To Microsoft Donation With Strings
The Register posted an update about Namibia's SchoolNet, Microsoft "donations", and what looks like Namibia final decision. Apparently, MS's "donated" contributions would have been so small (and would have required such a large investment in OS licenses), that SchoolNet Namibia found it wasn't even worth bothering with. A very interesting article.
Did you actually read the article?
MS was giving them $2000 worth of copies of Office, but they would have been required to spend $9000 in order to buy Windows to use it!
The ability to monopolize a planet is insignificant next to the power of the source.
in south park i believe it was the North American Man Boy Love Association
"I don't need a compass to tell me which way the wind shines." - Mr. Furious, Mystery Men
"In south park"? NAMBLA is real! And yes, it is North American Man/Boy Love Association.
Mod down posts with a "Free Mac Mini/iPod" sig, they're spam!
Funny, ha ha.
Being from Tanzania, I can assure you there are more than a few computer professionals in Africa. Believe it or not, most offices actually have PCs and many have internet access, hence "computer guys" are required to maintain them.
The only reason all cover-ups appear to fail is that you never hear about the ones that succeed.
Per capita income of 96% of Nambia: $85.
No, it's naive for MS (and you) to think the country could afford the software -- after all things like feeding your kids and education are a little more important than a shiny new wordprocessor with an oh-so-happy clippy piece of doodoo, wouldn't you say?
24% urban unemployment; 14% in rural areas.
$1755 per capita income; however 96% of the population earn $85.
That means each copy of office would only take as long for a Nambian to pay for as a Westerner would pay for house.
They could pay for it sooner, but CDs aren't quite as sustaning as food.
See more stats here
No one is saying that only free software is good -- but dammit think!
A small update for you then:
At college bookstores, Office XP can be had for 20 bucks, in some places. Right now, MSFT has an initiative to sell student/teacher versions of Office XP (with PowerPoint added, it's not in the Standard versions) for US$149.97. I think the "burden of proof" is set on the buyer to verify that they are actually a student or teacher, but anyone can pick up the software off the shelf and buy it.
It's ARM. Install linux. (ok, hardware drivers may be an issue, but that's just a small matter of coding:)
Bill - aka taniwha
--
Leave others their otherness. -- Aratak
Silly me, I thought I read that they're using diskless Linux Terminals. I must have read a different article to you.
At my school, you can obtain WinXP Professional, Office XP Professional, and FrontPage 2002 each for $5, and Visual Studio.NET for $10. That's almost $2000 worth of software (full, licensed versions) for about $25. Not bad, even for students.
While I know there is a separation between the actions of Microsoft and the actions of Bill Gates, Bill Gates himself has done plenty of things purely out of good will. His charity donations are interesting to me, in that he donates to causes like disease research -- rather than following the tradition of many philanthropists of yesteryear, donating mostly to public works which are subsequently named after them (I'm sure he does this too, but I believe the main focus is on international health). Note that I'm not saying there's anything wrong or selfish about that--I'd rather study in the Kelvin Smith Library than study in my dorm room, but the selflessness Gates has shown with his riches is one thing I do admire (granted, it doesn't make up for Windows ME, but nobody's perfect). Here's a pretty good cache of stories about his charitable donations.
"I may be quite wrong." - Socrates
yup then how much does your monitor use? 150 watts?
150+350 = 500 n'est pas?
Also the rating of 350 watts is meant to be the output of the supply - not what it draws, and I think pc power supplies are less than 70% efficient, so your 350 watt power supply might actually draw 400 watts and give out 350watts supply and a fair bit of heat. (Ok it probably isn't on full load most of the time..)
Yes I know you could get a
C3 based
machine with an LCD screen, but even this would tend to use 200-300watts. (But I still want one, if anyone wants to do one for me in a 1:12 blue mini-cooper body)
These Solo machiness use 8.5 watts all in including monitor.
i am a grad student at cal state northridge, working on an MA in education. the ed dept. has a deal with m$ where by we can get office for $15-20 once per year. we must show our schedule to the bookstore manager, then we have to sign a sheet, they record the item number or something, then we get a cheap cd.
.ppt or .doc format.
what is most disgusting about this is that not only do they sell it for the mac, the professors require that we submit docs in
trying to promote open source software is so hard when "office is 20 bucks". let me tell you, it sucks. it should be so obvious what m$ is doing.
My problem? I was perfectly gruntled, until some numbnuts came by and dissed me.
The Namibian dollar (pegged to the South African rand) can buy very little.
You can have a full meal for 3 (including drinks, loads of meat, etc) for the equivalent of 4 US$.
Houses in the rich area of Windhoek, the capital city, sell for around 150000 US$. We are talking mansions with 10 or more bedrooms, two or three floors and 24 hour security. Is where embassies are mostly located.
2000 US$ may be little for US standards, for Namibian standards is a huge amount of money.
Nevertheless the Namibian goverment got this one right: they saw what most people here have understood from the start, that MS donations are not such.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
CODA work with another UK charity, Computer Aid, who refubished the machines sent to Namibia. They're looking for donations of money but they're also looking for donations of old computers, and for volunteers to help refurbish computers (in London, England).
I'm old enough to remember when discussions on Slashdot were well informed.