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Japan Subsidizes Linux Development, Considers Switch

Posted by michael on from the know-which-way-the-wind-is-blowing dept.

TheAB writes "Japan is betting 50 million yen ($450k US) that the next-generation of high-tech products and computer networks will rely on open-source software. The money is to develop an 'operating system for consumer electronics goods'."

14 of 248 comments (clear)

  1. Math by 1984 · · Score: 2, Insightful
    From the article:

    Japan plans to spend about 1 billion yen (US$8.3 million)... working on the open-source Linux operating system for consumer electronics goods...

    That might be a useful amount. Separately:

    Tokyo has already budgeted 50 million yen (US$416,000) for next fiscal year to study the possibility of switching government computers to an open-source operating system.

    So that's $8.3M for working on embedded Linux, and $416K for a study into looking at moving government computers to using Linux. "Government computers" is kind of a broad brush. Anyone know if that's servers, desktops, or really is just a general look?

  2. The Japanese government, not Japan by palfreman · · Score: 4, Insightful

    It is the Japaese government that is spending the money, not "Japan". This may seem off-topic, but a country is different from its government. The amount Japan spends on Linux would be all the money all Japanese people and companies spend on Linux and Linux related things, not what the government did there. Governments are just another organisation and for most countries the main source of their problems.

    1. Re:The Japanese government, not Japan by palfreman · · Score: 4, Insightful
      It takes its money from people who live there by force. So what if the government where you live is elected - I didn't vote for them, I hate almost everything they do (they in my case being the "British" government and the warmongering fool who runs it), and if I don't pay up they really would arrest me and send me to jail.

      Just as I wouldn't want to be lumped in with a bunch of techno-illiterate nutcases in London, I'm sure there are plenty of people in Japan who wouldn't like to be associated with what their government does.

    2. Re:The Japanese government, not Japan by firewrought · · Score: 5, Insightful
      Its the human mind's way of dealing I suppose...

      And people do the same thing with the concept of "God"... even though the details vary drastically, most cultures have a mythology that posits a source of universal intention: something or someone that controls natural events (weather, harvest, childbirth, astronomical bodies, etc.) and interacts with individual human lives (by providing comfort, discipline, special powers, spirtual growth, second chances, forgiveness, condemation, tests and trials, equalizing opportunities, purpose and meaning, spouse and family, absolute morality, eternal security, etc.). The fact that these things are (or will be) explainable through the lenses of natural and cognitive science hasn't done much to convince people that there's no God mediating their reality. It's as if we have to attribute agency (in the AI sense of the term) to events that are personally significant. All these uncontrolled externals are wrapped up into "God".

      But, to reply to the parent post, there are more practical reasons for making the "complex entity"==>"person" simplification. When we say "France opposses war with Iraq", it's pretty accurate, because we get the impression that (1) the official government posture and (2) the general sentiment of the French population do not want to see a war. We have no way of characterizing it in a finer manner than that... we don't have a list of x million French who oppose war and the y million French who endorse it, so we use the label "France" to tag the relevant input (in this case, the relevant input is "political pressure", but if we were watching a news broadcast about organized protest against the rapid expansion of metropolitan Paris, than we might categorize the input as "environmentalist").

      I'm sure there are a thousand interesting AI and cogsci theories for explaining or expressing this... the human brain is truly incredible, but it make broad, obvious machine-like mistakes too.

      --
      -1, Too Many Layers Of Abstraction
  3. Re:I don't know about this by awa · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Err... putting Japan and China in the same bag is akin to saying the U.S., Mexico and surrounding areas are all alike.

    Besides, if you read the story, the entities mentioned are Ministries and two _very_ big corporations (Sony and Matsushita) - highly unlikely to be pirating software.

    --
    --Moo
  4. Oh boy! $450k! by occamboy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    At the risk of being obvious...

    Linux is a stupendous 'operating system for consumer electronics goods' -- as an engineer who's developed embedded systems, I think that Linux is great for this purpose. For example, Tivo, which is Linux-based, is the greatest consumer electronic item of all time.

    But $450k? Gee, what a commitment! That's like 2-3 full time people if you include overhead.

  5. Re:This should be good news, but... by amberspry · · Score: 3, Insightful
    It still is. People expected the Internet to be free forever, yet there are still many sites that cost money. Free is generally regarded as inferior compared to a similar product that costs money. As long as there are enough things that cost money or enough companies that agree something should cost money there will always be a segment of the population that sees a perceived value and will shell out the bucks.

    Just think you can download Linux for free, yet people still pay for the CD. Why? There is an additional value perceived or real that comes with the product. If enough people are willing to pay then companies may continue to charge for their product.

  6. Re:Actually... by That_Dan_Guy · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Yeah, the 450k would harldy hire 2 or 3 programmers and the office space for a year in Tokyo.

  7. Re:Press Release by pubjames · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Microsoft plans to spend about 1 billion dollars (120 billion Yen) funding Japan in its entirety, says Bill Gates, Wednesday.

    I know many Americans have a distorted view of the world, but this is streaching things a bit far.

    Japan is a massive economy, even though it's currently in recession. It is also the worlds largest creditor - more so than the USA, and is home to some of the worlds largest banks. So thankfully there are a few things in the world that Bill Gates can't buy!

  8. Re:I don't know about this by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I'd be surprised if there wasn't more piracy in the United States than Japan. I think one of the biggest problems in Japan is just getting the software. I recall reading an article about an American who started working in Japan and the huge headaches getting any software at all for the buisness he worked for, and how many hoops he had to jump through in order to even buy something direct from the US.

  9. Next Generation? by PetWolverine · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Japan is betting...that the next-generation of high-tech products and computer networks will rely on open-source software.

    The next generation?

    As far as networks: The Internet is the most important network that I can think of, and what does it run on? Apache is the main Web server; I run a mail server with Qpopper and sendmail, of which the former is open source and the latter is at least free (is it open source? I don't even know); for the FTP part of serving, you can choose from Pure-FTPd, Pro-FTPd, wu-ftpd, or whatever else. "High-tech computer networks" of this generation already run on OSS.

    As for products: There's a little more room for improvement here, but my PowerMac G4 is pretty damned high-tech, and while the GUI is closed, the core OS, Darwin, is open-source. And unlike Linux nerds who will say they have such-and-such a high tech system that's running OSS, mine came like this--right out of the box--and is a product targeted at, and sold mainly to, non-nerd consumers.

    It used to be that I used very little software I paid for because I pirated everything; now I use very little software I paid for because it's free anyway, and for a substantial part of that software the source is available if I want it. Open source isn't a bet pertaining to the next generation, it's here already.

    --
    I found the meaning of life the other day, but I had write-only access.
  10. Re:Makes perfect sense. by Pharmboy · · Score: 3, Insightful
    Many of the small devices that have any type of computing power run on Linux or proprietary software. Seeing as how open source software is already out there and developed to the point of using without as much modification, it is much cheaper that development from scratch. Since they do have such a high piracy rate they don't have to worry as much about licensing and other legal complications.

    Not to be picky, but Linux DOES have a license to deal with, the GNU/GPL. This means that their software would have to be open source as well.

    If they wanted to create a "*nix like" OS to power their gadgets, but didn't want to open up their software for others to look at (perhaps to hide really sloppy code), they may be looking more into BSD. There also remains the chance that some company (probably small) will end up using Linux in a device, and not releasing their code, resulting in a lawsuit from Linus. Odds are, this is more of a "when" than a "if".

    --
    Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
  11. $450k US? by vlad_petric · · Score: 2, Insightful
    ... enough to pay ~ 6 developers for a year ...

    Compared to the investment IBM made (they claim ~1B$), or even Redhat (50M$), this most likely won't have a real impact (except for PR, of course)

    --

    The Raven

  12. Re:Oh boy! $450k! by vandan · · Score: 2, Insightful

    If they spend the money directly then it wouldn't be that much. But since they are funding others who are developing open-source software, the effect is much greater.

    I would expect that each group that worked on open-source developments would receive about 5-10% of their funding from the government. Or in other words, the funding is affecting development costing $4.5M.

    This reduction in costs of 5-10% will give developers a great incentive to switch from other systems to Linux.

    Now say that of the total spend, 50% comes from people who just migrated to Linux. So that is $2.2M that was being spent on other systems that is now being spent on Linux.

    This $5M isn't being spent by government pen-pushers. It is $5M funding research and development by companies that are trying to be as cost-effective as possible. You can do a lot of programming for that much money.