Slashdot Mirror
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.
Microsoft will never give away valuable items. That's why they are giving away Windows.
Here is the letter itself...
--
In other news, linux gives nothing to Nambia.
Perhaps Microsoft got wind of the hundreds of millions in locked-up foreign exchange that I'm helping a Mr. Jomo Kenwatta get out of the country (for a modest few mill thrown my way for my trouble, of course.) If the Namibians have that kind of dough lying around, they shouldn't be grousing about a few bucks for licenses.
Namibia: I need a vehicle I could drive from home to work. Micorosft: I'll give you free floormats but you have to buy 6 cars.
Now, in addition to "jumbo shrimp," "military intelligence," and other legends, we have "Microsoft charity."
What is it with these guys? Are they crazy like a fox, arrogant, or just dumb? Is Microsoft really that worried about market share in impoverished Africa, and is it this inept at promoting itself?
Well, three cheers for Linux, which doesn't even have a promotional budget.
for Codeweavers' WINE and crossover office. Take the stuff from M$ amd use office in Linux or BSD.
In my ideal world, people throughout Africa, India, and Asia learn and become comfortable with open-source software. Then, US corporations get sick of dealing with Microsoft's heavy-handed business practices, and finally decide to switch to open-source alternatives. Where can they find qualified employees? Surprise, the "third world", where people have been using OSOSs (open-source OSs) since they were children. This, my friends, is globalization. I'm tempted to move to Africa to unionize their computer professionals.
On stereophonic equipment, the monaural sound obtained through multiple channels will enhance your listening pleasure.
Judging from this example it would appear that the obscenely rich Beast intends to use non-profit organizations in desperately poor countries to subsidize its promotional ambitions and its sales strategy.
This is preaching to the choir, and instantly earns the +5, Anti-M$ moderation. The word is Slashturbation. What good is this article on these geek media? Someone get this on mainstream news, puhleeze.
--
If you moderate this, then your children will be next.
NAMBLA Says "No Thanks" To Microsoft ....
National
Assoication of
Man
Boy
Love, of
America
Damn Southpark, I manage to learn something everytime.
http://www.nambla1.de/
This article mentioned something on the order of 20 *refurbished* PCs to 5 schools (100 used PCs + 5 new servers). Given that PC prices are so relatively low (I've recently put together an Athlon XP1800+ based PC for under $400) It's amazing that a billion dollar corporation is so insanely profit driven that they can't even do something out of *good will*. It must become a profit opportunity. I don't know what level of PCs these are, but the local computer show often has Pentium 233MMX machines, AMD K62/500s and similar for under $100 for the complete machine (memory, disk, cdr).
This is precisely the reason I don't use M$ products. I started using Linux for purely practical reasons, but now it's almost equally philosophical.
Microsoft recently offered to give me a free Xbox. My first response was "Sweet!" But I knew there had to be catch, so I asked the MS Rep what strings were attached. "None whatsoever," he replied, "all you have to do is pay for it."
This article made me want to send money to Nambia right now. How much would each slashdotter have to send to equal Microsoft's $2000 (if you ignore the $9000 debit for OS licenses)?
This space intentionally left blank.
The donation was for a usability aspect. The school couldn't afford what they were asking for. Rather than donate the OS, Microsoft chose to donate the office suite, meaning the school would have to buy the OS anyway. Yes, Microsoft didn't have to donate anything, but the fact that they were offering smething fundamentally useless to the school (they couldn't afford to run the software) shows something.
You see, they *could* have given the hardware and software. The cost to M$ would have been actually neglectable and they would still have achieved their real goals of locking down a poor country in their web for the future.
The scary part is that if they had done that, then, only us geeks would have been able to see the deception; the mass media would have played along (untwittingly or not) with the marketroids' plan and portrayed M$ as a savior of struggling countries whilst ignoring the dire long-term consequences.
Again, M$ stupitidy manages to cancel out M$ evil, and the world is a bit safer for it.
-- MG
Pssst! Hey, kid... c'mere!
Here, kid... have some of this...
No, I can't afford an MS habit.
Awww, c'mon kid, the first hits free!
Don't throw your computer out the window, throw the Windows out of your computer!
You know what would be a good thing to do, it would be to get the Slashdot community together and help get these people some laptops, without continued community support these guys might fall to Microsoft in the end or just fall period. Open Source is about everyone giving a little, so it would only take everyone who reads this article donating a quarter or a piece of hardware. Anyone with me on this?
This sounds like a good market for the
Solo computer
a neat ARM powered machine that used 8.5 watts all in (including monitor) and can be solar powered.
Instead of 500ish watts for a standard desktop.
No I don't work for ARM I just like their kit.
It looks like the ultimate silent pc - no noise even in the power generation.
Although RISC_OS isn't open source it is pretty solid and isn't part of the Evil Empire.
Now lets hope the money they saved from not having to buy windows licenses goes to help starving african children. In poor countries, every penny counts, and using linux could actually save enough money to feed a village for a year.
GoatPigSheep, the 3 most important food groups
If they were to donate an OS and Office suite to every single school PC in the world, truly donate, no $trings attached...just give it away...even if it's Win95/98....Wow...imagine what the anti MS crowd would have to say then! This is not to say that such a move would be a cure all for Redmond..not by a long shot...but as a PR statement..."Sure, we're closed source, and yeah, we've kinda strong armed some folks in the past, but...we have GIVEN $XX BILLION dollars worth of OS licenses to schools and 3rd worlds. Sue me now US Government!!" Bill Gates should decide that $40 billion is enough, and that it's now time to give, truly give, away some of what they has been earned. Did they think the check from Nambia would actually be cashable? :)*SPROING!!*
Of course, I may be living in a dream world!
The irony of this article is that no one seems to understand what's actually going on here. Do you really think a non-profit manager would actually write such an insulting letter to a potential benefactor in response to getting turned down? OF Course not... He's simply trying to make MS look bad to increase their offer, pure and simple. Microsoft will quietly donate EVERYTHING he asks for to make this go away. And no more linux in the schools, while everyone on slashdot snorts at their own clever MS bashing comments. Bravo...
Actually the office software HAD to be worth more than $2,000. Most people don't realize that Microsoft makes A LOT more money selling Office than their OSes. One copy of Office Professional costs $560 (office max). (Yes I know that you get discounts when you buy in volumes)
50 laptops =
$28,000 for Office Pro
$15,000 for XP Pro OS
So actually, they were getting a better than getting the OS for free and having to buy Office.
"A plan fiendishly clever in its intricacies"- Homer Simpson
It says you give porn to charity?
sulli
RTFJ.
Greatly disliking Microsoft is one thing, but posting blatant propaganda that looks like it was written by a 12 year old on a 'news' site is not helping anything. The best they can do is make the entire anti-Microsoft cause look like it's run by a bunch of snivelling brats addicted to counterstrike.
This is an actual line from the article: "Now imagine the disappointment of learning that accepting the 'gift' would entail outlays of money in the range of fifteen times the value of the M$ Trojan horse."
Slashdot editors: In the interest of maintaining the integrity of the slashdot community (if there's any left...) please don't post propaganda as 'news.' It erodes the value of the community. It makes us no better than Microsoft and in the end. It is counterproductive. The Register should be spanked badly for this.
>>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!
It's offtopic but I can't help myself...
Meanwhile, that $9000 that Microsoft hopes to gain will pay the annual salaries of 2 of their programmers in India.
No wonder Bill is so frigging rich.
Huh?
communist thieves who could care less about open source
First off, "communist thieves" is an oxymoron, and communists would likely strongly support open source.
A more accurate assessment of the Namibian government would be "thugs giving land and money to their cronies and starving the rest".
Dear Mr. Jomen,
I am an officer at a large American software company, in charge of shipping software to our customers overseas. Unfortunately, one of these customers, a US Special Forces Commando, paid a large sum for our Office 2000 product, but passed away without naming an heir to receive this valuable software. According to company regulations, I cannot keep this software for myself, but if a suitable foreign customer (such as yourself) is found, I will be able to transfer the sale to you with no cost, in order to meet our company's stringent quarterly profit goals. If you are willing to receive this software confidentially, we will both benefit, but we must act quickly to meet our sales deadline.
All that I need from you to accomplish this sale is the presentation of your Windows 2000 licenses, as the original contract requires. If you do not possess these, I can assist you in acquiring them for a modest sum.
Yours Truly,
Mr. Ferreira
Chief Ethics Officer
Foreign Floppy Disk Desk
Microsoft Corporation
---- "If we have to go on with these damned quantum jumps, then I'm sorry that I ever got involved" - Erwin Schrodinger
I guess you only read the first half of the article. I quote: "But the Herero and Nama peoples from the arid central and southern regions mounted a rebellion against the colonial authorities in 1904. Tens of thousands of the rebels were massacred and stripped of their lands. Those who were left were rounded up into native reserves and used as pools of cheap labour for German colonial farmers. About 3,500 white commercial farmers own around 30 million hectares of farmland, most of which is semi-arid and used for cattle ranching and trophy hunting for wealthy European and American tourists." I can imagine they want to get rid of those so called white farmers. Oh, and nowhere can be read they are genocidal, i.e. killing the white farmers. They just take their land and don't pay enough money (not enough for those white supremists anyway). [damn, I hate it when Opera doesn't interpret my CR/LF's]
Just think what will happen when MS responds to the Nigerian Scam Letter asking to transfer out US152MIL!!! They'll do it, but only after Nigeria buys US200MIL in software.
Brilliant I tell you!
You know you're a geek if you've ever replied to a tagline.
Unfortunatly Microsoft have already beaten you to the punch: some distros of the .NET framework had an (albeight inactive) infection of the Nimda worm.
After it was discovered on the CD Microsoft went into damage control and had to convince a whole bunch of people that it wasn't dangerous.
Guess Microsoft got a taste of it's own medicine when its own servers were compromised.
"And then I visited Wikipedia
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!
to me there's a Big Important Difference between free and Free.
I understand that difference. I find software under the the GNU General Public License to be Free because
Restrictions are restrictions, as far as I'm concerned.
Do you disapprove of a "restriction" on cold-blooded murder? I sure do.
Will I retire or break 10K?
It says you're too cheap or just unable to give them a donation. You're giving them something, but in order to use it they have to buy your product anyway. Basically you're giving them nothing. Says the same thing.
It's not just about that.
Microsoft wants it's foot in the door by donating Office. These people are working on a small budget, and absolutely cannot afford the infrastructure needed to even USE that software. It's hardly a "gift".
Given the amounts of money MS rolls out, if MS wanted a foot in the door in Nambibia, they could easily afford to network & outfit the entire country's school system.. THEN they would surely listen.
Maybe.
Posting anonymously, because I tend to troll here on Slashdot, and I have a reputation to maintain.
I work, code, and spend some of free my time using MS products. Our work is pretty much a MS-only shop. I really like Win2K, ISA Server, IIS, and SQL Server. I do have a background in writing DOS apps with Borland Pascal under OS/2, so I like to think I haven't been a blind MS zealot all my life.
I just finished reading the article at the Register and am just overcome with a sinking feeling in my stomach. What the f*ck is Microsoft thinking? Ripping off a poor African nation with sneaky charges and motives?
I understand that every corporation is out to make money. But what the hell does MS want to do with Namibia's education money that they couldn't do with Exxon's, Toyota's, or any large multi-national? Rip off somebody who can afford it.
I think I'm going to start looking a bit differently at MS from now. And let my new outlook inspire my recommendations to my director at work.
I can see why the guys in Namibia would be pissed off -- it sounds like they got jerked around.
It doesn't change the fact that the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation does an enormous amount of good in Africa and the rest of the world. Look it up if you don't believe me.
Bill Gates is the biggest philanthropist in the history of the world, and while critics can talk about soft donations of things like software licenses, in reality he does a lot of stuff like vaccinations and grants to develop basic infrastructure in the developing world.
He's done far more than anyone else, certainly more than me or anyone slamming him here.
i find it very funny indeed that countries who have in a way been "behind" technologically have had the unique opportunity to see how the market played out before they were able to enter it.
:)
:)
it seems they were watching closely, and made some very good decisions
this sort of factual and witty approach to eroding M$'s façade of being a people-oriented company (to use the politest terms i know of to describe the lecherous and filthy backstabbing techniques that have become the hallmark of their business practice) could very well pursuade governments all over the globe, even those that have, due to misfortune, been into the technology game the whole time - and playing happily by M$'s rules.
and as a side note, did any of you check out Math Boxing? great little game
I have to contest that - 500ish watts for a 'standard' desktop? I don't think so. My desktop (before I got my mac) uses a 350W power supply (enermax). Most computers ship with at most a 350W, most though are 300W. Considering most actual computers are older, they could be 145W to 250W easily. That is a big difference from 500ish.
What we see depends on mainly what we look for. -- John Lubbock Now search for that bug slave!
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
Deserved to be insulted because he didn't give the beggar as much as the beggar felt he "deserved"?
Mmmm.. Donuts
These aren't beggars.
Anyway, bait-and-switch tactics are reprehensible, even when, especially when, the recepient is monetarily poor.
The Register should be spanked badly for this.
Is it so bad that The Register makes their takes on stories so obvious, and makes fun of things they believe are amazingly stupid? That's what I've always liked about them; they don't pretend not to have a viewpoint, and it's quite obvious what their views are. It's really easy to read past that, and it's often funny even when I don't agree with them.
Seems to me The Register wouldn't be who they are without ripping on people once in a while (every day), so I'd say you should choose to read them or not, and not worry about things like that.
then their locked into the MS Office monopoly. Plus when Office whatever comes out and won't run via wine they'll go to back to windows.
Much better to stick to native software like OpenOffice. Wine is a crutch that keeps you locked in a windows world. The more you use wine, the less incentive companies have to build native apps.
If you wanna get rich, you know that payback is a bitch
No, but if you offer to give the begger a dollar as long as he first pays you 10, the begger is free to tell you where to stuff that dollar--and probably WILL tell you to.
Good for Namibia. Poorer people can sometimes be taken advantage of, but often they are very frugal and logical when it comes to making good financial decisions because they don't have money to flush down the toilet on mistakes.
Flawed analogy. You don't stand to make any money in the future by hooking the beggar. Now, if you were a liquor store owner, then it might behoove you to pass out free booze. If someone complains that it's practically vinegar, do you look down on them for rejecting your charity? NO! You give them the good stuff. Once they're addicted, they'll take anything you have to offer.
MS is not doing this out of the goodness of their heart. MS is giving them their first hit for free (metaphorically).
It went more like this:
MS: hey bum, heres a dollar. Go buy me a hot dog.
Bum: but those cost $1.50!
MS: Well spot me the rest and Ill let you watch me eat it.
Bum: Keep your dollar asshole!
I think it is important to at least consider the % of one's icome or worth to figure how charitable one is being. Bill can give away a billion dollars as easily as one of us pays for a weekend out of town. Would it change his life in the slightest? Also, many of us question the way he came into those riches -- that monopoly thing.
Considering how much more he has than he could possibly use, and the PR problems he faces, I view his charity with some skepticism, as much as I welcome it. (Yes, he could do nothing, but we don't have to flatter him for merely being more than a complete Scrooge.)
Maybe there are too measures of charity -- how much good it does for others, and how much good it does your soul.
All that aside, what MS did in the present discussion sounds like just plain old bad attitude, not parsimony.
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.
Joris Komen
Founding Executive Director, SchoolNet Namibia and NetDay Namibia
Why doesn't the US school system have REAL leaders like Joris?
When struggling countries like Namibia are motivated to avoid Microsoft, the same motivations are coming soon to a computer near you.
We all know it is possible to use Linux as an alternative to Microsoft. Most of us are accustomed to tolerating the Microsoft OS in order to get the functionality of their office apps. As time goes by, Linux has narrowed the gap to the point where the most cost-conscious users (schools and government) are ready to jump ship. The next wave will be home users, then small business, ultimately big business.
Ironically, conquering the piracy problem is what got the ball rolling. If Microsoft turned a blind eye toward piracy in certain key markets, they could have prevented Linux from establishing market share. Sure, they need to collect money from those who have money, but they also need to give away product to anyone who can't or won't pay. If you can't get the customer's money, you have to at least stop them from using the competitor's product.
Microsoft talks a good game about dealing with Linux as a competitor, but look at their actions. Higher prices, "software assurance", increasingly obnoxious EULA's, all the things they might be expected to do if there was no competition. The handwriting is on the wall -- time for Bill to cash in his chips and retire.
>First off, "communist thieves" is an oxymoron
Nope. Communist thieves steal from businesses, and steal from the intelligent by ensuring they don't make enough money.
>and communists would likely strongly support open source.
Nope -- at least if you're talking about the GPL as in open source. The GPL was specifically made business friendly -- it's just that a lot of stupid businesses can't wrap their minds around just how easy it is to make money using the GPL.
Even open source in general isn't a communist idea. Few open source licenses reuiqre you to redistribute your patches (including the GPL). This would be a basic requirement for a communist development model.
I think the word you want to use is "socialism". The difference is quite a lot...
If you could be told what you can see or read, then it follows that you could be told what to say or think - BoC
This is just an example of how Microsoft is ignoring all morals and what is right just to earn some money. Although this is an isolated case, their "Office XP for students" is a much more broad case of how M$ manages to ignore morals to earn money. Sure, it's cheaper than regular Office, but that's not saying much, as regular Office is already ludicrously expensive. The student edition costs well over 100 US dollars. Let me get this straight - something THIS expensive was intended for students? And this is considered amnesty? I find it disgusting.
Sure, there are other packages out there for students that cost a lot, like Mathematica, which has a student edition that costs the same as Office for students, but the regular edition is well over several thousand dollars. Consider that in a ratio. Moreover, while the essential features of Office have been claimed by other word processors, Mathematica is unparalleled in functionality by any other calculation package in existance.
In conclusion, this is predictable old Microsoft behavior - overlooking almost all morals, disguising it as an act of charity, while earning massive amounts of profit.
The article you posted does not support your assertion.
What is being proposed is forcible redistribution of land from white farmers to black farmers with compensation being paid to the white farmers.
Granted, this may or may not be a bad idea, but it hardly amounts to "ethnic cleansing" and "genocide."
Neither does it amount to communism, as in that system all the land would be owned collectively. They are proposing to settle individual families onto this land. Hence: not communism.
Lastly, you are trying to ignore the historical context of how this land was obtained. Do you really expect the native black farmers to ignore how all the fertile land was monopolized by Europeans at the beginning of the last century?
I'd say they are being a lot nicer than the Germans were when they were taking the land.
Your post is inflammatory and just plain wrong.
The only reason all cover-ups appear to fail is that you never hear about the ones that succeed.
Umm, There are two ways of looking at this.
One is, you go to a begger on the street and say "Here's a tin of food, worth 20 cents, that I'll give you, but you need a can opener to be able to use it. I'll sell you a can opener for $1".
The other way is "If you buy $9000 worth of software, we'll throw in another $2000 worth of free stuff. Oh yeah, we get to tell people how nice we are for giving you an 18% discount."
If I were in business I might jump at at the 18% off, but when you have very little money to begin with, well, would you rather get the MS software, or use linux and gice computers to a few more villages?
THe other thing people have said that sounds fair to me is priorities. With the problems in most of africa, what good is Net access? I partly agree, but I think that giving Web and email to schools is a good thing. A poor subsistance farmer isn't going to improve his life if he can access the latest stock prices, suft slashdot, or download porn. If he can access long range weather forcasts, find out where he can sell his produce, and teach his children.....
Democracy isn't about no one telling you what to do. It's about everyone telling you what to do.
If a guy drops a dollar in a beggars plate and goes to remove ten dollars as change, the beggar has every right to throw the dollar back in their face.
These people are NOT beggars. MICROSOFT APPROACHED THEM WITH SPONSORSHIP of a school program. They alrady have a functioning system running superior products.
They were giving Microsoft a chance to SHOWCASE MS technology in the hopes of demonstrating that Microsoft had a viable alternative, and as it turned out, Microsofts alternative was a con. There's a surprise!
No warranty of any kind is offered as to the quality of this post.
Here is their website. I told them that people in the Slashdot community would be willing to help, especially if it meant another grassroots anti-microsoft type situtaion, I also asked how we could help, money, equipment whatever. So hopefully we will hear something back. I will keep ya guys posted, hope something good comes of this.
Except that this donation doesn't cost Microsoft a penny more than the trivial cost of media. Schools in Namibia could never afford to buy Microsoft software anyway so it's not like Microsoft is losing anything by giving them this "gift". Even if Microsoft gave them a complete suite of Windows-equipped software including the OS for every one of those computers Microsoft would still come out ahead because of the gains in PR and goodwill for the company, and the exposure of all those kids to Microsoft's brand and products. So everyone would win because MS is getting good publicity and exposure by doing something that doesn't cost them anything but greatly benefits the public of Namibia. That's what corporate philantropy should be like.
But, Microsoft wanted more. They wanted to turn this into a sales opportunity as well and grab a chance to lock even some of the world's poorest into their exploitative upgrade cycles. Make no mistake, if these people had taken this deal, all that money would be pure profit for MS.
So, really, MS has no interest in making actual donations - they really just want to milk everyone while making it look like they are making a meaningful contribution. This "gift" was nothing more than a sleazy sales tactic and I'm glad that Nambia isn't "buying" into it.
Nobody said they had to buy the software. How much money is in the country is completely irrelevant. Most people do not sell their products on a sliding scale. Either you can afford it or you can't. What MS did was go out of their way to say that they could shave $2000 off of a $11000 package. Pretty fucking generous if you ask me. If someone walks into my shop and says that they can't afford something, but would really like it, I'd say tough shit. I've got bills to pay.
> Given the amounts of money MS rolls out, if MS wanted a foot in the door in Nambibia, they could easily afford to network & outfit the entire country's school system.. THEN they would surely listen.
I don't know, I'm not sure I'd want to do business with a pusher who wouldn't give me my first fix for free.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Moreover isn't there any such thing as morality? You're comment makes schools look like your common beggar. If computers are donated, they're not going to just go out and buy a forty of Old English. Is there a good reason that Microsoft can't just donate the hardware?
MS does this all the time, and it is a truly singular stance. Your argument states what the CAN do. But isn't it the DUTY of the rest of us to play watchdog, to call out the corporations for such heinous actions.
It shames me as an American that my countrymen go to the poor of this world, hand them a dollar and then steal their clothes. That is what MS is doing here.
Fortuantely I can find consolation in the works of others. I work at an elementary school in seattle and we recently needed to surplus some old macs that we have and can't use (too expensive for us to fix, we don't have the manpower to do it ourselves). Yet, we are donating many of them and a local group is going to harvest parts and fix them up and then ship them off to Africa. There are no strings attached. Oh, and as for software, they can download Mac OS 7.5.5 free and then install the free Nisus Writer or install mkLinux.
I would just love to hear an explanation of that one.
Assuming the best case scenario where the school system asked for a donation and Microsoft offered a $2000 discount on what would be a $11,000 package, whoever was in charge of drafting that deal should have known that the offer was going to be refused. A nation that poor can't afford usual Microsoft prices.
In short, Microsoft made a very dumb decision making that sort of offer. As someone else said, it's like giving a homeless person asking for a meal a fifty cent coupon off a five dollar meal. Yes, you owe the homeless person absolutely nothing but making that sort of offer is verging on an insult, and at the very least is showing incredible stupidity.
If Microsoft had to give $2000 in free software, why not make it a smaller number of Office/Window packages? Instead of offering just Office or just Windows offer a smaller combination of both. Of course that still skips support costs and so likely would have been tossed out but hey...
In any case, it's not hard to see why Linux is becoming increasingly popular in third world nations. In those places you practically expect Microsoft to start promoting piracy of its software just to keep Linux from becoming more entrenched.
i am a grad student at cal state northridge, working on an MA in education. the ed dept. has a deal with m$ 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.
Looks like Microsoft has invented a new scam, coming soon to an email box near you!
GStreamer - The only way to stream!
Sometimes people are attracted to acts of trollisms like bugs to light, so here goes...
You might want to read this paragraph from the webpage:
"I should, however, stress that SchoolNet has no desire to FUND Microsoft in such an endeavour, to the tune of US$22,500 for pilot [Microsoft-driven] school hardware + US$ 9,300 for laptop MS OS, in exchange for a paltry US$2,000 worth of proprietary OFFICE PRO application software!"
Microsoft's offer does not add up to be a gift or a donation. This is not like giving a dollar or 10 to a beggar.
narbey
-- "The evil stops here" -Petr
Somewhat offtopic, I know. . . but I think you've confused "oxymoron" with "redundant."
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
So why don't you talk about the story instead of launching into yet another tiresome soapbox rant about Microsoft vs Slashdot. You're as much to blame for the "decline of Slashdot" as are all the knee-jerk Microsoft haters.
Really? I just thought it was redundant.
"Great men are not always wise: neither do the aged understand judgement." Job 32:9
It would have been interesting if they accepted the donation, and then just sold the copies of Office XP on ebay or something. They could have really outsmarted MS, if even just out of spite, rather than an intention of making a decent profit.
so no communist could ever steal?
interesting.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Is this one of those countries that refuses any form of help from anyone, even if say the EU were to donate several tonnes of wheat to help it's starving citizens? Basically taliban/N.Korean style. Or is it about money? I think if anything, RedHat should get off there arses and spread the word to 3rd world countries on open source initiatives.
Analytic & algebraic topology of locally Euclidean meterization of infinitely differentiable Riemmanian manifold
Well, so far I haven't seen any advantage to using the GPL from a free software prespective.
No problem - we don't have to worry about somebody coopting a gpl program and selling as a proprietary package. Some people like that kind of thing.
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"
A year or two ago, we stuck in Cables artificial reef at Leighton beach (webcam, requires Java) to improve the surf there. I can't remember how many million dollars that cost (maybe $6 million?), on a coastline not exactly stuck for surfing spots, but if we'd put it to Namibia instead they'd be swimming in computers.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
Thanks to allll yyyyyyou sllllashturbators I have to buyyyyy a new keyboard! This one's allllll stickyyyy! :(
What did he expect them to get out of it, a warm fuzzy feeling?
Hmm. Let me think on this one... An orginization that works hard to scrape together resources to put computers into impovrished schools in east Africa. I don't know, sounds like a kick back job with a fat paycheck to me. I can't see why they wouldn't appreciate a US$2000 discount on a US$11,000 purchase they don't need.
By viable I'm assuming he means "continually effective" which leads up to the question: If OSS was so viable to them why did they contact MS in the first place.
Because it was brought to their attention that MicroSoft may be a potential source for resources they badly need. They looked into it.
That really isn't the problem for them. The problem is that they *appear* to have no morals. The ideal thing is to act evilly and appear good. The problem is that you can't always pull this off, so sometimes it's best to actually be good, since the trust/relationship built from the otherwise difficult to produce appearance of being good is worth more than you would get from acting evilly this one time.
May we never see th
Actually, for developing countries, tech work is a pretty reasonable field. It doesn't take a tremendous amount of experience to become a tech at the skill level that can command a salary these days. The market for IT workers in all these countries is just going to grow. As for software development, you don't need a huge amount of capital to develop software (well, I suppose it depends on your target market, but I can sit down with xemacs and gcc and and old computer and write marketable Windows or Linux software). You can also work remotely very easily, doing contract work for a company in another country.
It's pretty well recognized that India is heading to bypass the US in software development.
May we never see th
This is a lot more reasonable.
Older computers that are just sitting around your house could be used by them. I doubt many people here are going to write checks, but if we could ship away our older computers, I think people would do that to a lot of their boxes.
May we never see th
How long has it been since MS had to rely on loyalty? My best guess is just before IBM became the last major holdout to license Win95 under their 'secret' terms that forbade selling non-MS operating systems on pc hardware. When even IBM would(could?) only sell OS/2 shipped in the box but not installed, MS no longer had to worry about petty issues like loyalty. They had all of the major pc players tied together and played against each other.
Nambia now knows that MS plays an expensive game of poker; if you can't afford to loose your money, then don't sit down at the table.
Kindness is the language which the deaf can hear and the blind can see. - Mark Twain
Microsoft wants it's foot in the door by donating Office. These people are working on a small budget, and absolutely cannot afford the infrastructure needed to even USE that software. It's hardly a "gift".
It's where the term "white elephant" comes from. Someone would be offered a gift of an elephant by someone rich and powerful, but would be faced with either losing face by refusing or going bankrupt trying to feed the animal.
They wanted to turn this into a sales opportunity as well and grab a chance to lock even some of the world's poorest into their exploitative upgrade cycles. Make no mistake, if these people had taken this deal, all that money would be pure profit for MS.
Namibia is in considerably better shape than many other African countries.
The thing is that to poor countries even the lowest rung on Microsoft's upgrade ladder is out of reach so they never get started in the first place. Unlike in richer counties where people might have spent a lot getting used to Microsoft before they get hit by an upgrade they can't really afford.
If I were in business I might jump at at the 18% off, but when you have very little money to begin with, well, would you rather get the MS software, or use linux and gice computers to a few more villages?
Also in the latter case no need to learn American or get your feet wet if things don't work.
THe other thing people have said that sounds fair to me is priorities. With the problems in most of africa, what good is Net access?
Namibia is the size of the western United States, but with a considerably lower population density
I have to contest that - 500ish watts for a 'standard' desktop? I don't think so. My desktop (before I got my mac) uses a 350W power supply (enermax).
You omitted the monitor. Remember that a lot of this power winds up being pumped out as heat, the last thing you need in a tropical country is heating. Namibia's capital has a similar lattitude to Havana.
Maybye there is a niche market for Lindows after all!
Vaya con huevos, my darling.
This whole issue just p's me off. Namibia is just next door to my country, and M$ has tried this one on us too! (And got away with it). The problem, as I see it, is that embedding M$ software reliance is a double edged sword: firstly, (as a Linux & OS related solutions vendor) we have to use thier crappy software, and secondly, we have to pay in U$. For us in Southern Africa, that amounts to a fortune, as our exchange rates have been hammered in the past few years by greedy US bankers. The effect of M$ "donating$" their products to the South African government, though, has been that just as South Africa was ready to ditch them in favour of a Linux desktop, they pulled the government back from the brink and re-established themselves as the primary desktop vendor to the SA government. This has the knockon effect that everyone else follows suite: you cant submit a tender document in StarOffice format, no no, use must use a Word Document (emulators, blast em to hell, mission etc.) By M$ making strategic "donations" with strings attached, they wrap up the market tightly. Give it to schools? Why don't you give the little schoolchildren heroin instead? It's gonna work out cheaper for them in the end.
I think my brain is dribbling out down the back of my legs
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.
Namibia, being a much smaller country and more homgenous than South Africa, enable a single person to get his voice heard. His seems like a voice of reason. South Africa, whose politicians are known to not be above taking the occaisional "motivational sum of money" gladly accepted MS's similar offer ($150 Million for a country of 45 million people with about 5 million kids in school does not work out to all that much, given that Office or windows costs a bit more than $3 per copy).
Good on Namibia. Fuck the corrupt bastards in the ANC.
What exactly are you complaining about? That the Register pointed out that the schools would have to spend lots of money on Microsoft software (more than the value of the donated products) to even use the gift? How exactly is that propaganda?
And I think you'll find that this is the correct (or a correct) use of the phrase "trojan horse". IE, an offer disguised as a gift which results in substantial harm to the recipient.
Public Domain software is not really Free, because someone can stop its Freedom by putting a nasty license on it.
Ahhh... this is a strawman, the same that is used with the BSDL flamefests.
Even if I grab a piece of PD software, make a couple of changes and slap MY license on to it, the original is STILL PD! They have taken nothing from YOU except the ability to use their changes. Which when you think about it, makes since. They did the work, NOT you.
Just like when "Evil Empire"(R) grabs a piece of BSDL software, hacks the hell out of it and then sells it. The original is still BSDL and you still have access to it. Why should you care if someone wishes to release under a PD or BSDL license? The only reason why I release under the BSDL is that, one, I want credit, and two, I want the little protection of the disclaimer.
BTW, I've released software written by me, under both PD (early stuff) and BSDL (later stuff). I have also contributed patches to GPL'ed projects under the GPL. My choice... NO ONE elses!
BWP
How easy to forget that most schools in the US were there just a few short years ago (indeed, some still are!). The amount of $$$ MS receives from our public schools in completely astronomical compared to what it was just 5 years ago. Schools started with just a few here and there, then things grew. That was always the plan, and MS knew it.
Anyone who paid attention to the Universal Service Fund (it's that tax that's on every phone bill in the country to help schools get internet access) could predict how large technology in education would become, and MS did not miss that boat. A little simple math: 92,000 school districts in the US, x 20K each in software licenses (let's say for simplicity, that covers everything - servers, CALs, Office, Mail, kids stuff, etc.) Now keep in mind that some districts are very small and can be just one or two buildings, others like Las Vegas or Dallas can have between 200 to 500 schools in one district - so this is a very rough but fair number (We spend more than that and we are 12 buildings).
Unless you purchase volume licenses, you may not have noticed that during the Office 97 era, Publisher was a separate package and a lot of schools didn't buy it (we just used Word), then for 2000 when you licensed Pro it included Pub 2000 - Oh I thought that was very nice of them!!! Now comes Office 2002 (XP) - you got it, Publisher is back out and costs another $5 a desktop if you want to keep it. Major bait-and-switch game. We opted out and are back to Word only, even with a couple of angry classrooms who had integrated it into curriculum, which I'm sure MS was counting on. It may not seem like much, but $5 a desktop and 2000 computers = another 10K just for that.
MS planted seeds all right, and now the roots are starting to crush the foundations...
As far as I know, there is nowhere that MS Office only costs $20. Here at UNC-Chapel Hill, I can pay $20 for the "media duplication costs" at the Student Stores to get a copy of Office.
UNC, however, ponies up several hundred thousand dollars every year to pay for the site license that lets me do that. Sure, I don't pay for a license at the checkout counter: students pay for it in their tuition and departments see it paid for out of the university IT budget -- which I'd rather see spent on infrastructure than on pushing MS software!
Life is short: void the warranty.
Namibia has the beauty of many other African countries, but retains a heavy German influence, so things are generally much nicer, functional, and better maintained. When I visited the capital, Windhoek, I was impressed by its wide streets with actual street lights and working parking meaters (in stark contrast to many other African capitols such as Dar es Salaam and Kampala.) Maybe thats in part due to the sparse population. In character, Windhoek reminded me of Madison, Wisconsin, ploped down on the edge of the Kalahari desert.
There are many things to see in Namibia, including the rare desert elephants of the Skeleton Coast, the vast game park at the Etosha Pan, and reputedly the largest sand dunes in the world in the area of Sossusvlei park.
If you do go, I highly recommend a stay at the Swartfontein Guest Farm. They have great home cooked Italian food, and its the only place I've ever stayed where they let me ride along on a wildebeast culling.
SpyDock: Scientific Python in a Docker container
"Buying education version when you are not a student is exactly like pirating it."
Really? It sounds more like a EULA violation than a copyright violation.
I think the two are entirely separate.
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
Is this a type of namibian wildlife? :)
Well, and then there's the little bit of fraud required to make the purchase...
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
Microsoft can't afford to let Linux become the standard by default in developing nations. It gives Linux credibility that will find its way back to the markets M$ cares about. China is a perfect example of a market that won't support Microsoft prices, but is way too big to ignore. The Chinese were using Microsoft products as a de facto standard until piracy became a hot issue. As piracy diminished, so did the M$ market share. I think M$ was actually better off in China with the piracy. These days, Linux is on a rampage in China. Go ahead and write off Namibia if you like, but how about the rest of Africa?
Nobody buys Microsoft products for security or stability, and the price is no great bargain either. People buy Microsoft because "It's the standard -- everyone else uses it -- I need compatibility." This all falls apart pretty fast when the have-nots of the world use Linux and they manage to survive. The gods of corporate cost control will eventually focus on Microsoft licensing. When they do, the question will be, "Why do we pay for Microsoft products when a billion Chinese people have managed to avoid this $800 per seat expense?"
Kerberos
Otherwise known as embrace, extend, extinguish. There was no effective functionallity added, just prevents the open version from working with it.
When you take something, change it so that the open version does not work, and lock everyone that does not use your version out; that is wrong. This is why people have problems with BSDL and similiar licenses. Go Troll elsewhere.
Just a Tuna in the Sea of Life
Perhaps you mean "time and money spent gaining the EDUCATION to be more than a burger flipper."
In a communist system, having a non-menial position is its own reward. Given equal pay for all cases, would you rather flip burgers, dig ditches, or sit in a nice comfy chair and write programs?
This message brought to you by the Council of People Who Are Sick of Seeing More People.
What's the difference between MS's pricing, and the endlessly and upwardly-spiraling cost of a college education?
well, considering the Gates foundation bought Apples for the Maine school district- I don't what else you would call it--
Stupid maybe?
Creationists are a lot like zombies. Slow, but powerful and numerous. And they all want to eat our brains.
> If I can't afford it, I give 'em a 25% off coupon. Same thing. What does that "say"?
Hmmm... that you're selling porn to Namibian schoolkids at 75% of list?
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
It would appear as though at least 12% of the invention was funded by the tax payer?
If the univercity owns IP, it does so on behalf of its "share-holders" (for want of a better term), and that income should not be considered to be self-earned.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.Read more of this story at Slashdot.Read more of this story at Slashdot.