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Brazilian Government Continues Push For Free Software
rmello writes "The 'Legislative Free Software Week' in Brazil ended last week, drawing 2,000 people, including 3 ministers and presidents of congress and senate. Computerworld reports (in Portuguese, translation by submitter), among other things, that 1) House of Representatives will NOT renew MS-Office licenses, but is looking at free software alternatives, 2) The free software parliamentary front was announced in congress, 3) The e-mail system of the house of representatives is being replaced by a free software one, 4) The federal government is looking at concrete measures to stimulate free software as means of saving money and stimulating the national software industry.
Looks like free software is here to stay in Brazil. Kudos to the many Brazilian free software groups working to make such victories a reality."
Its interesting that it says "not renewing" in regards to the MS office licenses.. does that mean that until they decide to go with open source alternatives (or not), that they will be illegally using the software? Or maybe they will continue using MS products, and just not renew licenses, etc..
This is the break the Brazillian economy has been needing! Finally, prosperity, untold riches for all it's citizens!
Any country which architecture is build on a foundation which can not be reinforced by private developers, will crumble until, and if, the contractor who built that foundation "patches" that foundation up.
And why did you staple the trout to the RAM?
I'm be interested to see how Microsoft react to this. E.g. Counter offers, as per the City of Munich decision to go with Linux desktops: Munich spurns Ballmer's rebates
You always have interest groups pushing for one solution or another. In the case of free software, it's tens of thousands of people who will have jobs they wouldn't have otherwise.
Switching systems like this requires more people (more jobs) for training and support. And even though the cost for the governament doesn't dramatically shrink, the money, not only stays in Brazil, but also creates thousands of new jobs.
It's about time the politicians of the world understand that important part of using free software!
echo '[q]sa[ln0=aln80~Psnlbx]16isb572CCB9AE9DB03273snlbxq' |dc
> The most important is changing the deviant
> desires of rob malda for young boys, not only
> approving pro-free software laws
C'mon, can't you even READ it before moderating?
*sigh*
See you, space cowboy...
OK heres about brazil:
Rich and poor, very defined. Kids huffing gas, and police squads killing kids.
Big celebrations and they are fun.
Free software supporting.
Hospitals going defunct, and leaving medical equipment that is radioactive on the streets up for grabs. No one knowing any better putting stuff in thier mouths cause it looks cool.
Free software supporting.
Hmm. I hope it saves them some money, then I hope they help thier people.
Anyone from Brazil please weigh in on this.
Actually it is allowed. They can use 2000/XP indefinately.
The unofficial
This is the start of a changing of how third world countries will act.
Seriously, lets see "PAY LICENSES" or "FEED PEOPLE"
Ok the argument is not always about feeding the people. Paying license fees is not what third world countries want to do. I mention this as a start because it will shift to other things other than software, eg Drugs Patents, Copyrights, etc. The West better be paying attention, because people like the RIAA say, "Why do you need bread when you can eat cake!"
"You can't make a race horse of a pig"
"No," said Samuel, "but you can make very fast pig"
So German government stated they were making the switch in 2001, China is making a switch, who's next. Could spell big trouble for MS' revenue considering China, and Brazil are just HUGE. This could be a break for Sun Microsystems though if they would do something with Solaris under x86 ala Linux or BSD. (freely downloadable I meant to say).
3) The e-mail system of the house of representatives is being replaced by a free software one,
Damnit, with the mention of another hole found in Sendmail I hope it wasn't that.
4) The federal government is looking at concrete measures to stimulate free software as means of saving money and stimulating the national software industry.
rants page): Let's say that OS #1 costs a small company $499.99 for about 10 licenses, we'll call this company Foobar Incorporated. Foobar incorporated is now getting pounded with about 20 virii per year, and it takes their administrators about 20 minutes per machine to update the operating system every time something new causes chaos on the network.
Either way you decide to do the math, it is going to be costly. Place 2 administrators in Foobar Inc., and have them patch up the system at a total cost of 100 minutes per person for the update. 20 minutes per machine multiplied by 10 machines divided by two administrators, we'll now give these administrators $10.00 per hour and the cost for this one instance is $33.33 for this one instance. $666.66 per year, for this one company. So how many small companies are there? Should we be generous and say 10 million? $6,666,660,000.00 in lost revenue.
These figures are only on viruses, not program crashes, not system downtime, strictly salary. Sure I know some geek wizard is going to scrutinize this be my guest... There are pros and cons to free software being you won't necessarily receive great tech support for it as opposed to some (note I said some*) companies tech support.
Now before someone unloads the holy grail of follow ups, I said *some* tech support. We all know that certain unnamed companies blow when it comes to tech support, but remember not everyone is going to browse through sites like kernel.org, nor jump on IRC for support. Many endusers still prefer pretty to geek.
</rant>
MoFscker
Brazilian Government Continues Push For Free Software
So... all M$ would have to do would be to distribute free copies of their software to the Brazilian government in order to solve this, correct?
If I were Ballmer and Co., I would take this as opportunity to nip this in the bud. But I'm not evil. [sarcasm] And I hope that M$ doesn't read this and steal my idea... because you just know that they've never done this before. [/sarcasm]
I mean what advantages does this development give to Linux users? Its not that the Brazilian govt will channel money that they used to pay MS to the FSF. They just want to cut costs.
The only direct advantage of this is that the knowledge that open source hobbyist learnt on his spare time can now be implemented in the department... Wait, I take back that statement... The poor bastard will then have to support all the other ignorant users.
"Mauricio, how do I install this flash plugin on Mozilla?"
"Mauricio, What is OOo's equivalent for MS Access? What? There is none?!"
"Mauricio, what does RTFM mean?"
Man... I don't want to be in Mauricio's shoes.
Welley Corporation - SLM Scammers
Here is how I think it may stimulate the economy a bit. Brazil's population was 155.82 million in 1995 according to their Embassy's stats, so for argument's sake let's say it still is 155 million. Let's take one percent and say that they buy software. This would be 1,550,000 buying say MS at a very low price of 50.00 (US). That would equal $77,500,000.00
Now what if instead of spending that money on MS bs, they took that money and opened up research labs to develop products of their own. Wouldn't you say somewhere down the line, they would be better off if they could make revenue by saving on software as opposed to throwing it out the window. So how does it stimulate the economy? Well money could be shifted elsewhere that's how, it doesn't necessarily have to be using some notion that free software itself is going to generate revenue now. It sure does however make sense to make the switch. Maybe your sense of perception isn't on a business level who knows.
MoFscker
"Microsoft gives Brazil upgrades to latest releases for pennies on the dollar."
Will Brazil truly pull a Munich, or are they just playing the game Thailand thinks it won with Microsoft.
Some pics from the event:
http://www.gulms.org/fotos/SL_congresso/.
They can use the money they planned on licensing from Microsoft to support their own IT-staff, including programmers. They can afford to build and extend on Free Software where necessary. It's all about mindshare, thousands of people surrounding the government will also install Free Software, and contribute when they get educated about FSF/Open Source and have an itch to scratch. This means fewer people locked into the abusive monopoly behemoth that is Microsoft.
You should rather ask yourself: Why am I so negative?
http://www.debunkingskeptics.com/
Someone asked "Why so happy?". Well now there will be many people working in parallel to use open source software in a large enterprise environment, and don't tell me you have to speak English to be a (good) hacker. People will solve problems, submit patches and improvements (if welcomed), and develop new software which we can use and leverage too.
Also it should divert money that would have gone to the richest man in the world, to pay programmers, and to encourage young people to study programming, starting with open source as a given not as an eccentricism. It is entirely possible that you will get an environment in Brazil in which Windows becomes a minority. Could you imagine what kind of things would be possible when the magnifying power of open source is combined with even a small budget? I'm looking forward to hearing stories about Brazil in the future where it becomes famous for a "can-do" attitude (and they actually do it!), when solutions are shared by many and developers are able to enjoy exponential successes.
If this can be documented and nurtured it just might suggest that there is another path for human development in general - capitalism is great but for some sociological or economic reason it hasn't done well in Brazil. Maybe open source can be used in programming and many other fields to codify knowledge and give Brazilians a boost so the money they do spend is most effectively disposed.
I think this goes beyond the general idea that the network is stronger the more nodes it has. We are talking about people who are going to be getting tools put in their hands, the equivalent of an investment of millions or billions of dollars worth of software, and they are going to attack problems and solve them by both tapping into support from the world at an individual level and by recognizing that problems can indeed be solved. The only things I would like to add are that food, sanitation, safety, machines, and free telecom are prerequisites for this. If the government has anybody with a clue (sounds like they do!) they will figure out a way to provide free highspeed internet connectivity. Conceivably this could be done around libraries or community centers, perhaps someone from Brazil or other countries with such experiences can provide some ideas. I am very interested in hearing what the result of this would be if started from Brazilian values, perhaps it could be refreshing.
One thing I can tell you is that one mature person educated in the world can make a difference. A journalist friend of mine has been able to build a hospital, orphanage, newspaper, and a hundred schools in Cambodia from donations around the world. I would guess that Brazil is far, far ahead of Cambodia, at least they have still got their brainpower among the living! Let's help them!
Using and promoting free software stimulates local know-how and will generate many jobs.
This is just one more sign that by electing their president Lula, the Brazilian people got the government they deserve (in a positive sense).
Let's see on september 1 (the vote on the Software Patents Directive) if we Europeans can we be equally happy with our Parliament...
Suppose that a small office spends $50 on Linux rather than $500 on Microsoft. The other $450 does not disappear! The bueiness will spend $450 on other business expenses, or it will make the owners $450 richer -- which is better than making Bill Gates $450 richer.
At the end of the day, lower prices for software may or may not help the software industry. But they definitely help every other industry that purchases software.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but how is this going to stimulate the industry if there is no money to be made for the software "companies"? Surely this will damage the software industry?
Unless by "software industry" you mean only "on the shelf" software companies (which, in Brazil, are mostly companies from other countries), no way, but even if you do...
Brazil has already some companies on the open source paradigm of software industry (support, local solutions, etc). A big example is Conectiva, which even ships its own distro.
Also, checking some brazillian tech news you'll find lots of small consulting companies that work off putting computers on small businesses where things are still on the "age of paper". For these companies, they'll be able to provide more hand-tailored solutions for their clients at a lesser cost.
Claus
You are thinking too narrow -- you only see the wealth created by the sale of the license to use the software, not the wealth created from the users of the software.
I know several companies in the Seattle area (still suffering high unemployment and economic recession) that are successful *because* they use free software. They are able to adopt a piece of software, extend it to incorporate the features they need in their particular situation, and then add enough value to their company that they are turning healthy profits while all their competitors are flailing.
Let's take one piece of software -- the Apache web server. Even though acquiring the software requires little or no capital expenditure, deploying the software is pretty easy, and extending the software is only slightly more difficult, it is the foundation for several companies. Without that particular piece of software, they could not have built their business. Just having the software available to people creates wealth and value.
When Brazil unleashes a couple of million dollars from its IT spending and turns it into the pockets of Brazilian developers, testers, and documentators, it is going to begin the process of adding value to Free Software in Brazil. The companies and businesses will be able to utilize this software in their organizations, and add a bit of their own as well. The increased value of having the whole country united behind free software will bring such wealth that the previous revenue that licensing would've created would be seen as a drop in the bucket.
You have to view software from a holistic economic approach.
The radical sect of Islam would either see you dead or "reverted" to Islam.
Yeah, that is definately one thing that people in the states never think about when they mindlessly bash MS and people like the MPAA and RIAA.
Whether or not you realize it the software industry, and music and movie industry, contribute huge amounts of money to the US economy - i'm too lazy to look up the links - but without those industrys the US' trade deficit would be much higher than it already is, and it's already too high.
The Brazilian government, and all those who switch to linux and other free alternatives, are that many less customers that MS gets and that less tax we americans get. Especially considering that most do not buy products like Red Hat or other US based compaines distros but instead focus on local distro's. Great for their country, crappy for the US. While it is preferable on slashdot to think of congress critters as being bought and paid for by the industry in reality some think exactly along the lines I laid out, more piracy and more switching to free software equals less taxes and less jobs for americans.
Note, I do not necassarily agree with the above statements but it is something to think about.
John Gilmore pointed out once that the telecom industry in the US contributes 1-2 orders of magnitude more money to the economy. The extra use of bandwidth if everything the RIAA and MPAA ever made was made free would, if properly priced by the telecom companies, most likely make up for the loss.
--Joakim Ziegler
No one would be happy, but the tone sounds as if you would like to have something of a monopoly on a product. Let's change this to cars for a second. We all like cars and some of us depend on it for livelihood. You see car A that does everything you want, has been loyal to you for years, etc. You stick with it. Even if car B suddenly comes out touting the same trustworthiness would you be quick to dump car A for car B? I would hope not. Now supposing car B is better, it's cheaper, more efficient, would you keep throwing your money away? I would hope not.
Would you jump up and down in sheer happiness for them before that trip to the umnemployment office? Or would the grim reality of just losing a customer set in? Then how would you feel when Brazil starting importing THEIR products here?
Before I answer this let me just snip this out of your comments: products are just that, products. Capitalism is the selling of products for financial gain. Financial gain is what pays employees You've managed to answer your own thread without even realizing it did you know that. Capitalism sometimes keeps companies on their toes, and searching for the next big thing. Would you rather have innovations spawned or the same old boring deck of cards? Refer to my car example since I think it's as plain as black and white. Now if you want my thoughts on another subject oh say... Buy American? I'll take the bait on that too. It is my money and I will spend it on what works for me. Whether or not people agree with this statement it is my hard earned money, so jumping into the car theme again, if a Japanese car works better than an American one, then I'm all for it.
MoFscker
Just wait until MS comes along and offers deep deep discount with lots of tech support.
Rus
Cheap UK and US VPS
By stimulating people to write software for free, the government doesn't have to worry about creating jobs that require monetary payment. Whoever came up with this plan is a fucking genius!!!!
Contrary to poplular opinion, it costs money to create, distribute, and train people to use free software. The obvious benefit for Brazilians is that the money earned from writing it stays in Brazil rather than fattening the already bulging coffers of a certain U.S. monopoly.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
t is. However I wonder how much of OSS uptake is due to the poor state a lot of world economies are in because of the World Bank?
Possibly, but more likely it is due to the fact that when a government spends money on Microsoft software the money goes to Microsoft which does nothing to stimulate the local economy. Even if it costs them twice as much to switch to free software they still come out ahead in the end because the money spent can be spent paying people who are far more likely than Microsoft to buy other Brazillian products and services.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
Chances are though that Brazillian officials are much more likely to spend their embezzled money in Brazil than Microsoft programmers are.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
Perhaps, they might start looking in their own backyard and have their National Institute for Space Research (a goverment backed organization) open source the excellant SPRING GIS package from what is already a free download, but no source. Works on Linux/Solaris and Windows, and is rather easier to use than GRASS.
http://www.dpi.inpe.br/spring/english/In portuguese, we have TWO words to mean FREE. Simply the translation doesn't help. The "software livre" and "software gratis".
That's the catch: the original article has "livre" which means "freedom", as in speech.
eliphas
Well, with open source software, the playing field is wide open.
... other opportunities which sprung up.
... smaller, lighter, faster groups able to compete much more aggressively with each other, producing better code.
If the Brazilian gov't wants customized/tailored software, it can get it now - cheap, because *anyone* can bid on the contract to do the source modification and release things back into the public domain.
It may not be millions of dollar-contracts and beef barrels any more (thank god), more likely it'll be small, fast, light development companies that spring up (new industry forming) to take on the role of 'custom software development' using the OSS methodologies.
This has proven successful many times. I made a living off of customizing/tailoring OSS solutions for businesses - in Los Angeles - for 8 years. Would still be doing it, too, if it weren't for
I can't see how 'proprietary' software will survive in this environment, and I'm glad its happening. Brazil, and other nations (Thailand) like it will lead the way in a new era of computer software industry
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
The software will be written by others. You are naive to think that Brazil will now hire more programmers. In fact the opposite will hapen, it will FIRE more programmers. Brazil will use the FREE software that others write, i.e. you. Didn't you read the fucking article?
They will need to programmers and administrators to maintain and run the systems. But, even if they didn't it still money that stays in Brazil and out of Bill Gate's pockets.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
However, the shrinkwrap applications that are in common use account for a disproportionate amount of software spending, and by encouraging the use of open source one would free up huge amounts of money otherwise spent on license fees that could be spent on hiring people to adapt various software packages to your specific conditions.
For Brazil that would be hugely beneficial, as most money for shrinkwrap software end up in the US, while software engineers hired to add features to open source software would be more likely to be local.
But even though the US stand to lose short term, it too stand to lose longer term as open source over time reduce the cost to develop software (because of the increasing amount of software that can be used as building blocks free of charge). Looking at the history of software development, this is unlikely to reduce the number of available jobs for software engineers overall - in fact it is likely to make more jobs available, as cheaper software development means significantly more projects become cost effective.
It's like car manufacturing - Ford massively automated the process, but that didn't put people making cars out of work, it massively grew the industry since the lower cost lead to lower prices, which led to a huge increase in demand.
Anyway, if the software did the job in the first place, why would it need "upgrading"? Obviously it is lacking, so why not look at a different provider?
I think in countries like Brazil, India and China where labour is cheap it's even cheaper to move to another software system than in the 'Western' countries because the migration process takes a lot of effort (and thus man-hours).
-- Cheers!
Thus, a healthy European software industrie based on OSS is needed in order to be independent of the US.
I truly hope that our parliaments will realize this before it is too late.
Not different from US, UK, Spain...
Didn't look up what "huffing gas" means, but it has being some time now since last killing squads (rogue police groups) made a hit on minors here.
This, like the last one, happened in the 1980's. More care is being taken, now.
I seriously doubt this would be different in any USian or EUian ghetto and, believe me, I know some pretty hard EU ghettos.
Someone else in this thread pointed out: renew licenses Vs. feed people is an easy decision to make, right?
And it is about feeding the people, cause we are in a deep recession; if you start developing free software, knowledge is formed and stays in the country, the money goes to people that has the knowledge here and pumps the economy up.
I didn't get quite what you mean, yuri82. What exactly the CC does, that hinders the country growth?
It's better to be the foot on the boot than the face on the pavement. ~~ tkx Kadin2048
I agree. It's a complete waste of money to send license-money to the USA for programs that could be better and cheaper made at home.
Take Germany as an example. There's around 80 million people, and around 50 million computers. The average cost for Windows and Office alone is something like 400.
If you assume the average user buys a new version of software from MS every 3 years on the average, then this works out as 6.6 billion a year.
For this money you could hire about 130.000 full time programmers permanently. Read that again.
It gets worse: Even if you *did* need 130.000 programmers permanently to keep Linux and OpenOffice competitive for the tasks you need, it would *still* be preferable to hire them, rather than buy the software from MS.
You see, those programmers would pay taxes. They would also do most of their shopping in Germany, paying VAT. They'd hire german carpenters and electricians to build them houses etc etc.
In reality, it'd probably be cheaper and better for the local economy of Germany to hire a quarter million coders permanently instead of buying the software from MS.
Something to think about indeed.
Yeah, that's kindof what Microsoft and some members of the US government are afraid of. Obviously some US companies will adapt (like red hat and IBM) but people are afraid of a business model which allows for no one country to dominate the market and is, basically, free. The cost-of-entry barriers are virtually non existent for something like linux, compared to - say - car manufacturing, chip production, or heavy industry. Interesting times indeed.
It would be far better for just about any country to invest in a localized linux distro but, and this is a big but, Linux still isn't as good as either Windows or Mac OS X *all around* for everybody. Once this starts to change in a few years, as it has been, I'm sure we will see Microsoft dropping their prices.
BTW, I would guess your figure is off by a factor of at least 2 considering things like volume licensing and the fact that most sales of office/windows are via OEM sales from manufacturers, far cheaper than retail versions. I would say the total cost would be closer to something like $2-3 Billion - not an insignificant chunk of change by any means.
Most people, like me, work for a company doing inhouse development, modifying existing programs and writing new ones.
Open source is also good for "local" developers, since no program fits a company perfectly and there's always room for improvements. That's a few new jobs right there for those who want it.
Please don't try to scare the Americans with some old McCarthy'isms about socialism and communism. It's not fun and it's not doing anyone any good.
Also, if hospitals and other government agencies can pay less for software and have more money to heal people, I don't have a problem with that. The same goes for other companies, if they can cut prices by not paying license costs, I'm just happy about it.
You are not entitled to your opinion. You are entitled to your informed opinion. -- Harlan Ellison
As a supporter of capitalism, answer these:
How many profitable, wealth-creating, job-creating companies use software?
How many profitable, wealth-creating, job-creating companies sell software?
If software becomes much cheaper, because more software can work from public free code bases, how many companies do better and how many companies do worse?
As an application programmer for, say, a bank, what is the effect of cheaper infrastructure software on my job security? If the projects being considered for me to work on become cheaper does that make them more likely or less likely to be approved?
If you work for Microsoft, you have my sympathy, but there are more of us than there are of you. Capitalism isn't about producing products, it's about producing products for customers, and when something else comes along that's better for the customer, his benefit outweighs the loss to the producer whose product no longer meets the need.
The US and Europe wrote the book on this sort of thing.
On the one hand they espouse free markets whilst subsidising inefficient industries and imposing massive import tarrifs. Farming and coal are a particularly good example.
It's a bit lame to complain when other countries do the same thing.
Microsoft really screwed the pooch on this one.
Whether this is an example of third world brilliance outthinking their arrogant American counterparts (getting Microsoft to effectively subsidize their move to free software by selling them such inexpensive, limited time licenses, thereby decreasing their costs of transition dramatically), or just countries getting incredibly lucky as a result of Redmond's panic, I don't know. Probably a combination (not to mention examples of outright corruption, with corrupt politicians being replaced by less corrupt ones who revive these initiatives, examples of short sighted politicans balking when it comes time to pay the piper and renew licenses, instead renewing the free software initiatives they tabled earlier, and who knows how many other variations on this theme).
In any event, the irony is delicious. We as a community lamented the short sightedness of so many third world countries selling out to Microsoft in exchange for cheap licenses that would expire in a few years, when in fact Microsoft was being far too clever for their own good, helping to underwrite all these nations' transition to freeer platforms. They squandered their last chance to get licensing fees from these nations, and effectively did nothing to prevent them from transitioning away from their product anyway.
Or at least some of these nations, like Thailand and Brazil. Who knows how it will play out elsewhere, but for now I'm chortling with delicious glee.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
Even if it costs them twice as much to switch to free software they still come out ahead in the end because the money spent can be spent paying people who are far more likely than Microsoft to buy other Brazillian products and services.
Moreso than that, they are investing in the education and development of the IT staff, who are part of Brazil's evolving economy.
They will most likely be boosting the local IT development by educating people to use and to contribute to the free software projects that benefit them. In the long run they will be saving millions of US dollars which can be better spent on Brazil. From a software perspective, the only money they'll be spending will be an investment on their staff and software that they have control over.
All the high TCO crap that comes out of bogus reports (slightly trollish, but true) has been seen through by the Brazilian politicians, who see this as an opportunity to invest Government money in Brazillian people and hence keep it in Brazil. No more upgrade fees. No more expensive support contracts but instead real computer admins and programmers on site who are part of Brazil's evolving economy.
Most of us here have long known the realities of TCO and Microsoft. The only big cost with free software is in retraining staff. And retraining can be done for free - give a hungry man a can of food and he'll find a way to open it.
I guess with all the economic trouble in South America of late, governments such as that of Brazil are being forced to recognise that reality. Microsoft can probably no longer buy their way into Government contracts with 'discounts' and whatever other tactics they might use.
When you're poor you gotta stop paying for convenience and doing things for yourself. Why have an automatic dishwasher when you can wash your dishes by hand.
Free Gamer - Free games list and commentary
On the one hand, the developed West becomes completely beholden to the Corporations: Microsoft, RIAA, MPAA, with Windows used in schools, universities, hospitals, governments... with innovation stiffled by patents and the DMCA, with lobbyists creating laws for purposes of business and not the civil state.
On the other hand, the rest of the world with an eye on the budget, choosing for free software and eventually developing their own. India, Brazil, China, and eventually Africa too. Countries where innovation continues because it's a matter of survival, and where the corporations can't impose their US laws because governments are incapable and unwilling to enforce them.
Why does the US still suffer from a fragmented and pathetically old-fashioned telephone system while even the most war-striken, bankrupt nations on earth already have one or two national GSM networks? Because where there is nothing, people can create.
Similarly, the IT industry in the West has moved to a phase of terminal stagnation, and will eventually be reduced to a simple service industry, with the innovation being done in those places that today choose open source.
No coincidence that another article today mentioned Microsoft's gradual takeover of the US's CompSci departments. Innovation through Windows? Now that's funny!
Ceci n'est pas une signature
" Yeah, exactly. Someone explain niave-me how this will stimulate the Brazilian economy."
u 52 564.shtml
The Brazilian government spend around US$1.000.000.000 (yeah, one billion... and yeah, dollars) with MS licensing. That amount will be spent somewhere else (health, education, training, etc) within Brazil and for Brazilian citizens.
One billion of dollars is an impressive amount here in Brazil that can make a difference.
By the way, the Brazilian government is the largest licensee of MS in Brazil.
In portuguese, an interview with the Science and Technology minister (favorable to adoption of open-source programs)
http://www1.folha.uol.com.br/folha/brasil/ult96
Many of the comments here see this as the start of something big in
Brazil. In many ways, it is perhaps better to see it as the culmination of
a process that has being going on a long time. There have already been free
software initiatives at many levels in this the fifth largest country in the
world. Most notable of these is in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, which
hosts each year a major free software event. I also know that in Brasilia itself they have been
funding free software development to support, for example, information
exchange between all the different legislatures in Brazil.
Moreover, the support for free software would seem to extend across
political parties. A workshop I attended in Sao Paulo last year, to
encourage cooperation between Latin America and the EU in the IT was
explicitly asked to be about free software by the administration preceding
that of Lula da Silva. This means the Brazilians already have a wealth of
experience in using free software and for finding mechanisms to fund its
development. It also means that there are already a lot of firms and
administrations that have committed to this process. Some of the comments
here have suggested that Microsoft must merely flash out its cheque book to
block the push for free software. I think it would have to flash out many
cheque books at many levels and would step on the toes of many local
interests.
Two other aspects of free software in Brazil do not seem to have received
much attention. The first is the wealth of good free software programmers
already in Brazil. Several key Zope developers come from Brazil and the
first language into which the popular content management system Plone was
localised was Brazilian Portuguese. A lot of good work is also going on in
free software GIS systems such as SPRING.
The second aspect is represented by the presence in the congress of the
Minister of Culture, Gilberto Gil. I note that the title of the congress
mentions "free software" and not "open source". The interest is not just in
economics or software engineering, it is also cultural and extends into
other areas, such as the support for creative commons
licenses.
Viva Brazil! Viva o software livre!
for-the-people.org
Friends Actually, Brazil does have some IT (and high tech) expertise: 1) Lua programming language was developed by PUC's (Catholic University) Rio de Janeiro staff. 2) Marcelo Tosati (programmer who works for Conectiva _ a Linux system based in Red Hat) is the maintainer of Linux kernel 2.4, I guess. 3) We are the first country to run elections in a computerized system. Flame bait: you americans do need some help in this issue? ;-)
4) Spring is a GIS software developed in Inpe (National Institute of Spacial Research - free translation).
5) Mac Donalds in Brazil (yes, it's right!) uses a management system developed by a native soft house. And have plans to export those to foreign countries.
6) Onca (Jaguar) network were the first to sequence a complete bacterium DNA (Xilela fastidiosa) and make it public (probe in Nature or Science magazine, I don't remember). This makes Brazil the first country to sequence completely a bacterium DNA.
This is part of Genoma Project developed in Sao Paulo Province.
And we are always open to foreign people that wants to develop high tech research in our country. Several of our universities phD researchers come from USA or Europe universities.
Best regards
(sorry about the poor english) :-(
That's just nonsense, there is no way Open Source software would force people to work for nothing.
You don't expect a Lawyer to work for you for free yet access to the Law is free for everyone.
Open Source is actually a great thing for developers, they have free access to the source code and can modify existing applications to suit there clients as they see fit. They will not have to pay for "developers licences", they will not have to spend money calling the Support lines of large faceless corporations to naviagte through the badly documented intricacies or hangups of a particular package.
Without all these overheads they will be able to charge lower prices to end customers and increase their profits.
The only situation which I can see that would involve Open Source putting us all out of a job is if at some point everything anybody ever needs from a computer has already been released as Open Source and needs no modification at all. I think is fairly similar to the dilemma faced by house builders - once they have built houses for everyone they will all be out of a job. Strangely this not an issue which gets much coverage in the media.
This is also ignoring the fact that there is nothing to say you can't charge people for Open Source packages in the first place.
About the hospitals, the public ones have really long lines but give %100 free service. If you have insurance, the better hospitals (fleury and einstein in sao paulo) are on par with anything I've experienced in the states. Extreme cases are just that, out of context.
As for the general issue of free software in brazil, well, java is huge here - open for a closed standard but not exactly free (as in speech). Another important point is that IBM has, if not all, most government contracts for development - I'm actually working for an IBM partner. On the positive side, tomcat/apache, eclipse, linux (even on the desktop) are all essential parts of the picture.
iksrazal
You're assuming the deal(s) done today won't come unravelled tomorrow. MS is hoping the following plays out: the target countries stay w/MS "for the time being" while (a) MS continues to campaign for them stay w/MS longer-term AND (b) MS continues to improve Windows. A year or two from now (ok, 2-4 years from now), things could be different, and MS is hoping that they can keep users until then and get another shot. Don't think the days of vaporware are past; even today, a sucker continues to be born every minute.
John.
So now 90% of the current Brazilian tech support people won't be needed. As well as 100% of the programmers
I quite didnt get it. I am a brazillian programmer who writes solutions for *nix in Java. I thought that even not using M$ products I still had lots of work to do. Now theres no M$, and solutions must be open....
I mean what advantages does this development give to Linux users?
It makes Brazil one of those nice places where an individual can develop things independently and share their work, and are encouraged to, legally?
Unlike the USA, Japan and (as of next week) EU, where individuals and small businesses are selectively persecuted, and always under threat.
There they have a system called "patents on virtually every widely used idea", most of which are harmless but a few are selectively enforced. Much like bad laws - everyone ignores them but a few targetted folk are persecuted with severe and often unreasonable consequences.
The lie of the land at the moment suggests a minor brain drain, from Europe to Brazil, precisely because of their more enlightened approach to creativity and development.
-- Jamie
Microsoft does all translations in USA, this already made several problemas as placing as translation for indigeans things as "people wo don't like to work, no developed, etc" in spanish translation for Mexican Office.
Remember that a major part of mexicans are just descendents from indigeans...
But anyway I belive that even if no development is made here (I'm from brazil), at least we will have access to the sources to LEARN (that I as a computer science student think it the important thing about open source). :)
And never forget the stable linux kernel mantainer is a brazilian...
In this case a lot, the real issue for Brazil is the balance of payments. Software is a major part of their imports.
I went to the morning presentations in Brazillia last Wednesday, I think folk are reading far more into the situation than is there. This is not about the legislature buying into open source ideology, they are being very pragmatic. At present 100% of their software is Microsoft based. That gives them very little negotiating leverage with Microsoft. This is mainly a way to gain leverage.
The bill requires contracts to be based on features rather than a product. In the past a tender would go out to supply Microsoft Exchange, now it would have to be for a mail server.
Looking for an Information Security student project suggestion?
Try http://dotcrimeManifesto.com/
Yes, they can. they can offer their software for free. Wait, they still had to open the source. I guess this is what they mean with "freedom is priceless".
- Please, ignore everything written above.
A country that uses proprietary, closed-source software is a country that is not free. A country that uses proprietary, closed-source software is partly under control of the seller of the software and of government of the country in which the seller is located.
Why is it that the government of Brazil is quicker than the government of the United States to realize the necessity of running a government with open source software?
To understand this, it may help to understand other differences between Brazil and the United States. One country is more primitive in some ways and less developed than the other. For example:
The United States government has bombed 24 countries in the years since the second world war. The Brazilian government has bombed none.
The United States government supports culture. It has an organization called the National Endowment for the Arts. Apparently that is the group that puts on those unbelievably boring shows in the U.S. capitol. The Brazilian government supports culture. The culture minister, Gilberto Gil, is a musician and singer who is famous throughout the world.
Officials of a large city in one country visited the officials of another country to learn how to run a city in a more humanistic way: Officials of the city of New York visited the officials of Curitiba, Brazil, to learn the mayor's methods for making a city an enjoyable place to live.
Brazilians are generally slim and good-looking. Americans are the most overweight populace that has ever existed. This seems to be because the Brazilians are more skilled at making themselves happy than Americans. Definitely Americans eat when they are not hungry, and indication of unhappiness.
The city of Rio de Janeiro has a reputation for violence. The homicide rate is 43 per 100,000 people. The city of Washington, D.C, the capitol of the United States, does not have a reputation for violence. The homicide rate in Washington, D.C. is approximately 77 per 100,000 population, close to double that of Rio.
The United States government has powerful organizations that operate in an almost completely secret way as a world-wide police force, forcing U.S. government ideas and culture on other countries. For example, there is the NSA, CIA, and FBI, and some agencies whose existence is almost a secret from U.S. citizens. The Brazilian government is far from perfect, but it has nothing comparable.
The Brazilian culture is far from perfect. For example, Brazilians generally don't like to plan, so things that require planning are often done poorly. But in the areas above and in other areas, things are better in Brazil.