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Malaysian Government Prefers Open Code
Suresh Gnasegarah writes "All Malaysian government technology procurement will now have a preference for open source software (OSS), under the Malaysian Public Sector Open Source Software Masterplan. The masterplan's near-term targets includes: 60% of all new servers able to run OSS operating systems, 30% of office infrastructure -- like e-mail, DNS, proxy servers -- on OSS, and 20% of school computer labs to have OSS applications such as productivity suites installed. Looks like old Bill's scare tactic that OSS software kills jobs didn't quite work. Another victory for the open source software movement!"
Victory? While it's a step in the right direction, I think the matter is far from "victory" as the OP surmises.
harmonious design
It's no wonder Bill's warning that OSS kills jobs didn't work on Malaysia. How can OSS kill sweatshop jobs from American clothing manufacturers?
The only surefire protection against Microsoft infections is abstinence. - The Onion
With all these governments considering OpenSource software, is there any talk of them donating money to some of the more important projects -- e.g. KDE and other Desktop and Office oriented software that will be critical for corporate adoption. Do any of the major distros (besides this one) help fund many OSS projects? Just curious.
As far as making a real dent in software sales there... well, let's just say that I went to four or five different malls in Malaysia when I was there and not once did I see any legit software offered.
----- Wtcher Dragon, UDIC
You are stupid AC. Why should 60% of all new servers have any relation to 30% of office infrastructure ? x% of A and y% of B. Get it ? why MUST x+y be equal to 100 ?
All one has to do is consider the risks involved in running Windows... Anything from the macro viruses in Word, attachments in Outbreak, exploits-a-plenty in IE... the 20% is actually a very conservative figure for the amount of programs that will be OSS related. Sounds to me that they just want to provide an incentive (you'd have to, otherwise you'd be breaking the law, for example) to make sure that more secure or more recent applications are used. The fact that most of this stuff is free can only help this sort of country... probably not having the resources to afford a fully-fledged Microsoft setup anyhow. I am, of course, speaking strictly along the lines of lab computers for everybody/everyday use and not the actual infrastructure.
can we get them to use firefox?
Join Team Mozilla #38050 Folding@home
No doubt about that but slack will taken up by new businesses to creat applicationgs for these operating systems like bsd or linux.
Could cause wealth to be redistributed in proper way in this country because of protected monopoly status by pro-microsoft republican administrations. Correcting for the 'errors' of the past.
I've travelled much of the far east, and my experience has been that Microsoft has primarly dominated the markets. Microsoft donates huge amounts of money (relative to there economy) to forign university's which basically provides them with free Microsoft products.
I'm suprised to see a government in a developing nation pass up on the potentially huge amount of money that Microsoft would willing pump into there universities.
xoduszero
Gamblers Forum
Only it's the jobs of the Microsoft people who can't code software which doesn't require a reboot before you're allowed to save.
I like muppets.
You're probaby a pussy. Or at least a dirty neo-con.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Today's top story... Marxist governments around the
world embrace GPL based open-source. In other news,
his Eminance, the Pope, says he believes in God.
Cost is not the only criterion here. It is a sad truth that countries which suspect/fear that the US will cut off their access to technology by issuing a Department of Commerce export notification are increasingly turning to Open Source as a viable option that circumvents real or prophesized export controls.
Does that make Open Source unpatriotic? If it is, who is culpable? Is Joe Coder a traitor because he fixed a header file macro in an Open Source project which helps to bypass US laws? Will Ashkroft send his goons to nab Joe? What if Joe lives in Switzerland or New Zealand? Will Ashkroft still send his goons anyway?
See that long UID - that's what you get for lurking too long
This will probably be marked as a troll, but here we go:
;)
You say it's all about choice, and that the best product will win, and then celebrate when that choice is taken away, and it's in your favor. Governments should choose the best software for the job, period. Not because one is open source, vs. closed source, that shouldn't matter, if the people of the government are paying taxes, it should go to the best product that does the job, for the lowest TCO. But again, if a government said 100% of the machines have to be windows, you'd guys bitch that it's unfair that windows was just chosen without a competition.
If open source is accepted within govt, and that governemnt starts pouring cash into specific projects, how many programmers will work for free if they see that the leaders of those projects are making money and they aren't?...it might send ripples through what we know as open and free....
ItWasFree.com - Take the mystery
Less govenment money spent on paying companies to write custom software, which is nearly always over due and over budget, is less money wasted. That means less taxes. That means more money in the hands of consumers to spend. Which means more jobs.
You skipped basic economics in school, didn't you?
-- Will program for bandwidth
It is a sad truth that countries which suspect/fear that the US will cut off their access to technology by issuing a Department of Commerce export notification are increasingly turning to Open Source as a viable option that circumvents real or prophesized export controls.
The fact that countries suspect or fear the US may be sad. Their ability to do something to reduce their exposure isn't.
Does that make Open Source unpatriotic?
If countries are preferring open source software as a way of securing themselves from manipulation from other countries they see as potentially hostile then that would make open source either patriotic or (more accurately) neutral but able to be used in a patriotic way. How could that possibly be "unpatriotic"?
They use Metric measuring units, you Imperial insensitive clod!
I don't see how governments "wasting" money on paying people to write software or do any other job is a bad thing. The government should be more than happy to spend money on commercial software if it suits their needs. Or pay people to write it for them.
It's nice that they're using OSS but pretending it's not going to result in less jobs is silly.
I pay my government to pay you for the software you write. Since the government works for me[0], why in the hell should they be allowed to pay people to write something I can't have access to?
This is a rather short-sighted argument. There's still a need for specialty software, but there is *NO NEED* to continuously reproduce the same stuff in order to preserve your job or to keep it from the people who paid for it.
Write something that doesn't already exist, let the rest of us (and other departments) benefit from it, and move on. Don't pretend like you can't work unless you're reproducing perfectly good software every day.
I mean, honestly, I can't believe you're justifying having the government *not* use OSS because it means you don't get to produce a clone of some OSS project and make money off of it. It's this mentality that keeps our government slow and expensive.
-- The world is watching America, and America is watching TV.
This is definately a shot in the arm for Open Source Software. This announcement alone can only help to galvanize the creditability of nation-wide deployment of OSS. With the success of the Multimedia Super Cooridor the country will finally benefit from free and open software to provide services for a much lower price. Oh and btw: this is mainly a Muslim country, and IMHO there isnt any doubt that the other Muslim countries will follow given the current trend of discrimination against Muslims in countries such as the US of A which could affect commerce. Not to be vague, but the Muslim counties see that Western corporations (M$) only want to take their money.
There will be a segment of the population who will pirate software no matter what the prices may be. But let's look at the other segment of the population who are reasonable people and will buy original software if it doesn't cost them a leg and a foot.
For one thing, I put it to you that it is actually more expensive for a Malaysian to live in Malaysia, than an American to live in the U.S.
(well, okay, not universally true, but let's take the midwest as an example)
The average starting salary for an *US-trained* Malaysian engineer in Malaysia is about RM18,000 before deductions (US$4,736). In the U.S., an engineer starts at around US$35,000.
Basic necessities cost about the same, ringgit-to-dollar.
Cost of a Pontiac Sunfire is $10,000 (28% of U.S. Salary)
Cost of the cheapest brand-new car in Malaysia is RM32,000 (170% of Malaysian salary).
Cost of average U.S. house (this is really variable though) is US$200,000 (570% of U.S. Salary)
Cost of Malaysian house is RM180,000 (1000% of Malaysian Salary)
With all this in mind, the price of Microsoft Office Standard is US$348 (1% of U.S. Salary).
In Malaysia, it is RM1300 (7% of Malaysian Salary).
As you can see, it is understandable that a large portion of the Malaysian population cannot afford to buy original software. They're too busy paying their loans etc.
Selling software in Malaysia is mostly a corporate affair -- businesses and government are huge clients. (They have to buy original, otherwise the BSA swoops down on them). Going open-source will definitely make an impact.... the government is one of the biggest buyers of software.
End-users don't buy that much original software to start with. So they don't really figure in the equation.
It is good for OS users because, as even smaller governments start catching on, citizens *may* see that their country is using such products for such a low...."free"....cost, cafes and whatnot will switch.
Basically a chain-reaction.
I guess it's time for Microsoft to start winding down operations. Once the Malaysian government has spoken, there's really no point in contesting it anymore. OSS has finally won the battle..
OSS Software? Is that anything like Homer's BBBQ, where the extra B is for BYOBB? (the other 'B' is a typo...)
iRooster, the Mac OS X a
It's nice that they're using OSS but pretending it's not going to result in less jobs is silly.
You're wrong. We're talking basic economics wrong.
Let's assume that your job isn't make-work (like, oh, re-coding an old VMS system to use Visual Basic just because.)
If you're writing software that can be done with OSS software--which isn't by any means everything--then you might be out of a job if the government uses the OSS instead. But you would be in the same boat if some off-the-shelf software was used instead.
(My mother works writing custom software for the gov't--and even if they went all-OSS instsead of just partly-OSS, the job that they do wouldn't go away because it's so specific.)
Let's say that your job CAN be replaced. What this means is that the money that was going to pay your salary & support expenses will go to do something else. Either the government will take on a new project, or they'll cut taxes. Let's assume a tax break, for argument's sake.
When the government cuts taxes, a good portion of the business sector finds that they have more money in their budget. They might use this money to lower their prices, but odds are that among the million-odd businesses in this country, a couple dozen will use the money to start new projects. Which means hiring new people.
The bottom line? Use of OSS might cut YOUR job, or it might cut MS's profits, or it might cut someone else's job--but the total net number and dollar value of jobs likely won't go down.
Arguing "my job will get taken away" makes as little sense now as when it was robots doing assembly work.
people will have jobs coding open source software... what will be hurt is its ability to compete with closed source if it becomes big business in asia...
All the torrents you could want.
If the work is useful, it is unique and/or custom. And open source offers more opportunities for customization than closed-source anyway.
It seems like you are arguing in favor of specialized welfare programs for computer programmers who don't otherwise offer any value to the market.
Otherwise there's no possible reason to write the same things over and over and over again. It's like having every agency in the government outsource their own national census.
"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." -- GBS
I love that typo, it's so trollish. It is aided by the fact that it can be said in a troll-like voice "teh".
Every fine and upstanding BSD fan loaths the sound of "teh GPL" but I love it.
Let's let the industries based on re-coding the same old proprietary systems die so that new industries that can push the frontiers of computer science may be born. So long as the majority of the competent computer scientists and engineers in the world are working on new versions of Oracle, Windows, Solaris, Office, proprietary government procurement software, etc.., those new frontiers are just a dream!
Personally, I say good riddance.
The reason that it can be true that 1+1 > 2 is that very peculiar nonzero value of the + operator
"How many people who worked on those OSS projects the government is using are getting paid by the government or at all for their involvement with the project?"
The govt is just another user of the OSS project. Did you pay to use mozilla? Chances are the govt will probably contribute some money towards continued development for the software they use which is better then 99% of the other users who don't pay anything at all.
"How many people would the government have hired to build the projects if OSS alternatives didn't exist?"
None. They would have bought something.
"The US government pays businesses a ton of money to write software. I currently work with such a company. If the US government decided to use all Open Source a lot of people would be out of work."
Are you writing a web browser? An office suite? A general purpose operating system? An email client?. Probably not. The software the govt pays to write is very specific to their needs.
BTW. Last I checked nobody was entitled to a job. If your customer can get a product thats equal to or better then yours for less money they owe it to taxpayers to do so.
"The Malaysian government choosing to use Open Source has just reduced the amount of money that will go to businesses and therefore employees. Which means lost jobs and/or fewer people being hired on"
Nah. It just means more money will stay malasia rather then go to redmond. Every cent spent on MS software is one less cent circulating in your own country helping your own economy.
"I don't see how governments "wasting" money on paying people to write software or do any other job is a bad thing. "
That's because you are suckling on the momma sows teat. All that taxpayer money pouring into your company and your pocket is wonderful for you but it sucks for me and every other tax payer.
"The government should be more than happy to spend money on commercial software if it suits their needs."
Not if there is a lower cost or free alternative.
"It's nice that they're using OSS but pretending it's not going to result in less jobs is silly."
Your analytic skills need some fine tuning. Unless the govt was actually paying for development of office software and web browsers nobody is going to lose their jobs.
evil is as evil does
The US government pays businesses a ton of money to write software. I currently work with such a company. If the US government decided to use all Open Source a lot of people would be out of work.
And therefore would be free to work on other, non-governmental things. It would allow more intelligent people to do more intelligent things.
If the only thing you're capable of is porting the bureaucratic red tape to computer, then you have no future. Why waste society's resources on creating useless jobs, when these people could actually be doing beneficial things, and yet still make a living?
I perscribe the following to clear this up:
Review (or learn) basic macroeconomics; and read the works of both John Maynard Keynes and Milton Friedman, or of those inspiring other schools of economics, as you see fit.
Oh, and by the way, get your syntax right: "fewer jobs," not "less jobs." "Fewer" takes a countable noun, and "less" takes an uncountable noun.
How is parent off topic? Don't forget to metamoderate these retarded moderators so they never moderate again.
3dinfo@maficstudios.com
I still have dictionary.com open to that page...
The US government pays businesses a ton of money to write software. I currently work with such a company. If the US government decided to use all Open Source a lot of people would be out of work.
If you seriously think this is a valid argument then a solution would be for the US govenrment to pay half those people to dig holes in the ground and the other half to fill them in again. This would be neither more nor less productive than your current plan that they hire people to write software that they could otherwise have got for free.
(Before soemeone buts in with the real world that the government would need to pay people to write, amend, support open source software, please note that this would in itself contradict the premises of the post to which I was replying).
The masterplan's near-term targets includes: 60% of all new servers able to run OSS operating systems...
What does this mean exactly? Haven't seen many servers that aren't capable of running OSS operating systems. Hope they're going for something more applicable to the job than a Sony Vaio laptop.
It would be cool if it didn't suck.
It's not about being pro or anti US; even US puppets can benefit from not being dependant on US/foreign companies for their software. Duh.
Treehugger? Treehugger... Treehugger!
Poor MS. Why if this continues they may actually have to concentrate on selling a good product rather then scare the customer into staying with them. I am crying for all the MS coders who will loose their jobs, ignore the hysterical laughter that is just my way of showing grief. Really.
Anyone know the travelling plans of IBM or Novell or Sun or HP?
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
I guess they're just that enthusiastic about the whole OSS thing.
As media solutions fall into the hands of the general populace, we can expect the "fundamental" notion of individual countries to continue to erode. There will be a strong fight against this trend, but the fact of the matter remains: the governed will always outnumber the governors. The trick is that the governed must be educated. This is the difficulty.
harmonious design
Obviously free software benefits those economies more that import software, and harms more those that export it. At least at first.
However this might later lead to them chosing the "wrong" tool, when a more appropriate non-OSS tool exists.
In the long run restrictions tend to hurt more than they help, and often achieve the opposite (like rent control or job protection).
Simple economics really.
linuxmyths.org = a Last Measure mirror. If you don't know what that is, think feces on face, browser going haywire with the words "HEY EVERYONE, I'M LOOKING AT GAY PORNO" blaring on your speakers. I'm certain most of us would rather do without such a thing. Other new ones to watch for are technewslive.com and hardwaredigest.com. If you see them in a post, don't click the link.
Part of the free market is the ability to choose, but it is also the ability to show preference. When I go to buy a bag of licorice, I'm going to travel ten miles to Custom Candies and buy a bag of Panda. Nothingelse will do. For whatever personal reason, that's what I choose and will choose: again and again. No amount of advertising or reformulation or patriotism will change my choice: Panda or nothing.
Software is no different in a market-based economy. And a government is merely a large customer expressing a preference. Bully for Malaysia for expressing their choice and codifying it for all to see. If one wishes to sell software to Malaysia, one had best be superior and open source.
Just as if one wishes to sell licorice to me, one had best be Panda.
4 years. Modify date on the document's head request reads "Tuesday, July 11, 2000 6:52:30 PM"
You like splinters in your crotch? -Jon Caldara
The Malaysian gov't is happy to use OSS software if it saves them money. But any IT work done under a gov't of Malaysia contract cannot be released to anyone as it is protected by the Official Secrets Act (OSA).
Even if this OSA restriction didn't exist, the local IT vendors in Malaysia would never want the code they wrote to be under any form of scrutiny as their projects are usually failures that still result in big payouts for them.
Don't count on seeing a single contribution from Malaysia to the opensource community in the next couple of years.
This is exactly what drives me toward OSS. I want to see the change because, as it stands now, we can plot our futures on the corporate roadmaps and that sucks.
Personally, I strongly agree with you.
Blogging because I can...
That means less taxes
No, that means they find a new way to waste.. err.. spend the public's money. Governments are real good at wasting.. err.. spending.. money..
more money in the hands of consumers to spend
Not for the software developers who lose their jobs.
I am the maverick of Slashdot
Bill Gates tried to tell a soveriegn government what to do on their own soil. That's a faux pas everywhere.
Seeing as though Malaysian Virus Writers Prefer Sleeping Code.
Live in superfear.
Click here for a free picture of an iPod!
Whoa!!!
You do not BUY software, and it is not actually SOLD, at least in MS flavours - well thats my understanding anyway, if so called licences are to be believed, and you can read fine print.
That makes it very easy to direct goverment expenditure to products of substance.
It's always a laugh to make the MS sales rep sqirm by asking what is being 'bought'.
Syria held two open source forums a few months ago:
http://www.syrialive.net/computer/computer.htm
In light of this announcement by Malaysia, it's clear why Microsoft is soiling it's pants. As the IT sector grows to developing countries, they are going to be left out in the cold. So much for their billion windows computers projection. Since these markets haven't gotten used to Windows, as developed countries have, they will take up Open Source OS's (i.e. GNU/Linux) and learn it's conventions. Windows will seem foreign to them.
If two products do the same thing, you cannot compete with the one which is open source. In my opinion GNU/Linux, FreeBSD and other open source operating systems do a lot more than MS Windows.
in the Soviet Union, the Imperials measure YOU!
Join Team Mozilla #38050 Folding@home
OK, I'm actually just supposing that they might,
;-) they'd very likely
:-/
in this post's title...
But if they had one (like they hope to have with
Australia... any day now...
be able to force replacement of that preference
with one that "frees" (in Bill's eyes, at least)
their market for proprietary software players...
Just you wait... See it first in Australis, then
see what happens in Asia...
Probably none. The article talks about pretty standard software: office apps, DNS servers, operating systems, etc. If they didn't go Open Source, they'd have just bought it from Microsoft.
That's not really "hiring programmers" because the people who wrote Word and Windows XP have already been paid. They don't get paid more if a government buys a copy.
I'm sure they'll spend the money on something else. They're not going to just put all the money they save into a big pile and light it on fire.
I don't think Microsoft is going to fire anyone because of this. (Maybe someone in marketing or PR will be fired for allowing this to happen, but that's different.)
-- . . ramblin' . . .
...did you see Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam?
I cam't see how the common man can have a problem exporting technology (OSS) before an export ban is issued. Now if there IS an export ban in place already, AND you're aware that yout ptoducts are being used in banned countries, it MAY start to become an issue.
However, since a country already on that list probably won't care much about piracy anyway, you have to look at the reality of it. I understand export bans on supercomputers, weapon guidance and control systems, advanced communication systems etc. for technological reasons and a whole host of other things for economical reasons (though playing chess is a stretch, sigh), but I seriously doubt the Department of Commerce will bother if their PCs are running Linux or a pirated Windows. Seriously.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
At least in Malaysia and Thailand, most of the pirated software and music CD's I saw were pressed silvers. The same titles appear in both countries as identical copies - there must be a bigger pirate organization behind all that.
I'm not sure about that particular concern. But you're entirely right to be worried.
When Linux and other Free (and Open Source) software becomes mainstream, it will be swamped by capitalists using and abusing it. The people who understand and believe in Free Software will be a minority. Even the majority of people contributing code to the Linux kernel will have different motivations from what we're used to.
Eventually, this will lead to code forks. The mainstream folks will be disatisfied that their wiz-bang DRM etc didn't make it into the software, so they'll all agree to make their own version. And they'll have the marketing to sell it. Sure, it will still be Open Source. And it will still be popular. But it won't be Free.
That's precisely why RMS is worried about the term Open Source subverting the term Free Software: the fundamental point is lost. And, hence, Open Source is destined to be nothing more than a brief break between this Microsoft, and the next one.
Havent seen much IBM Power4 and Power5 boxes, have you?
Linux on POWER
$ strings FTP.EXE | grep Copyright
@(#) Copyright (c) 1983 The Regents of the University of California.
Even good Americans don't use Internet Explorer!
the Imperials measure YOU...in Japan!
A "closed source" government adopting open source. It's absolutely outrageous that slashdot should give positive publicity to the tyranny of the Maylasian National Front, which has "won" every election since Malaysian independence. On hearing they are adopting open source. My reaction is "big deal". Let them show some respect to their non-Muslim minorities. http://www.economist.com/printedition/displayStory .cfm?Story_ID=2540181
http://www.economist.com/printedition/displayStory .cfm?Story_ID=2540181
There is one item on the opposition's agenda, however, that Mr Badawi seems likely to neglect. So far, he has barely mentioned, let alone dismantled, the various repressive measures that Dr Mahathir employed to dampen dissent. The government still controls the airwaves, potential critics have difficulty obtaining newspaper licences, opposition politicians are jailed without trial, protest rallies are banned. As one activist points out, when the government's critics are cowed, the corruption and inefficiency Mr Badawi says he is battling are sure to thrive.
I just heard some sad news on talk radio - Japan was found dead this morning. There weren't any more details yet. I'm sure we'll all miss Japan, even if you weren't a fan of his work there's no denying his contribution to popular culture.
Join Team Mozilla #38050 Folding@home
... in the Islamic countries to try and create their own economies not based on pure interaction with the west. The World Islamic Trading Organisation is partly behind these trends in a way. They are seeking to develop sustainable economies not so directly tied to non Islamic nations and concepts, such as fiat(phoney) currency and usury based banking. Free software would naturally fit into this goal, as it can be "theirs" without a single legal hassle and it's just as good and freer to use, along with eventually replacing the US dollar as the worlds reserve currency,and especially in the Islamic nations as "the" currency. They created and are starting to use the Islamic gold Dinar and the silver Dirham for this purpose. They need software, and wanting to just divest themselves from the necessity of shipping cash to redmond and other closed source places in the west, plus to encourage local production and identity, it just makes sense for them to discourage (eventually) even the use of pirated software and just go open source. It follows their goals exactly in other words. There is a transition period that will occur,of course, but eventually it will happen almost completely. MS= USA in their minds, so they know it's not in their best interests to fund them. they will take what they will take, but they have no overwhelming desitre to keep paying the west for all the "things" they need, now that they can see the non western nations are really where all the "stuff" comes from, and that they the Islamics own the bulk of the worlds recoverable energy in the form of oil reserves. You are watching what in essence is a huge divorce in progress, that is occurring in many nations. It's just now really starting to take off, I expect it to increase exponentially in the coming years.
quote "That's not really "hiring programmers" because the people who wrote Word and Windows XP have already been paid."
That's it in a nutshell. Closed source efforts like from MS are exactly like the music industry wanting to charge full price for extremely cheap to almost free (to them) copies, forever and ever, and to mandate it by law and coercion. It is unsustainable foolishness. People in the rest of the world and in the rest of the jobs out there get paid by producing new work, not by re selling the old work over and over and over again. The handwriting is *indeed* on the wall when it comes to this. That's one of the main reasons open source even exists now, because it was such a ripoff to try and even get and use closed source in the first place. Look at what a brain like Linus had to do just to even be allowed to program in the direction he wanted to go! that's the lame closed source industry's fault right there, they were so greedy they couldn't even see it. Open source allows people to be creative, and to share their creativity with others, to use as they see fit, for pleasure or in their other "real" business. Closed source pricing (leasing, no sales allowed mostly) guidelines have been the industrys attempts to fleece the market place for decades now, and not only that, they managed to wiggle in universal acceptance of no warranties on top of ridiculous prices that occur over and over again as new "forced upgrades" have occurred. That entire nutso attitude and business model is changing,and those who cling to the past will be hurt the most.
They're percentages of three different quantities - new servers, office infrastructure, and school computer labs. Of course they don't add up to 100%.
Isn't the same exact thing, the shifting tech trends, happening in the various US super technology "corridors" like silicon valley, route 128 in massachusetts, and elsewhere? Why would Malaysia be any different?
The biggest problem is that economic "trends" are not just "reported" in the media and by the big global skimmers and stock shills, but they *induce* it, so they can keep on with their massive skimming. As soon as they have milked one sector almost dry, they go on to another one, and what they do is always at least one step ahead of what they want and encourage the investors to do in public, that's the only way they can keep people faked out into turning over their cash to them by the boatload for generations.
60% of all new servers
30% of office infrastructure
20% of school computer labs
You're assuming, whether you know it or not, that the "new servers" are entirely distinct from and do not overlap with "office infrastructure" and so forth.
In reality, those three categories can and do overlap -- thus, they do not have to add up to 100%.
Example:
We want to start training the people in our company on a new application. The first month goal is to train:
20% of new employees
50% of the helpdesk staff
10% of all people eligible for promotion
That doesn't add up to 100%. It doesn't have to, because they are not entirely distinct categories.
Some of the new employees may be helpdesk staff and some may not be. Some of the new employees may be eligible for promotion (suckups?) and some may not. Some of the people eligible for promotion may be helpdesk staff, although most won't be, etc.
-- I could tell right away that she was impressed with my HUGE Slashdot Karma.
Cost is not the only criterion here. It is a sad truth that countries which suspect/fear that the US will cut off their access to technology by issuing a Department of Commerce export notification are increasingly turning to Open Source as a viable option that circumvents real or prophesized export controls.
I have an other possible way of looking at it.
Many developing countries in Asia tried during the 70's and 80's to reach more independance on the world market through restricting imports and putting their own people at work in industries to produce what they didn't import. For most countries, this strategy was replaced with the more IMF, WB and US-friendly approach of the "Washington Consensus", which involves a high (and often considered excessive) degree of free trade and commercialisation (is this the right word here?) of public services.
Malaysia, being in South East Asia, isn't one of the countries I've studied, so I'm not sure if this is applies the way it applies to South Asia. Anyhow, there are still strong traces of this development strategy in South and South East Asia.
Good for Open-source, bad for the world at large and for mainstream US industry in particular.
I disagree on one point. It isn't bad for the world at large, since they gain in level of economic independence, and in the long run also in intellectual independence (if braindrain isn't too big). If something is bad for the US industry, it doesn't always mean it's bad for the whole world. Here, I don't think that is the case.
As for Open Source being unpatriotic, I sure hope it is. Here in Scandinavia, and in many countries in the european continent, patriotism is considered disguised racism. (Heck, you'll even get strange looks from people if you sing the Swedish anthem without being: A) in church with school at the beginning of summer holidays B) playing hockey or C) having the king somewhere nearby.)
The poster asks:
Does that make Open Source unpatriotic?
In large part, that depends on your definition of patrriotism.
The US was born from and originally dedicated to rebellion against undue authority. Now, on a global basis, the US government attempts (somewhat successfully) to BE the undue authority. This course of action is not in the interests of the typical American, so there's a compelling case that anything frustrating those aims of the US government is, in fact, far more profoundly and genuinely patriotic than the mindless drive for Empire.
-- I could tell right away that she was impressed with my HUGE Slashdot Karma.
Take for example Brazil, even the translation of Windows to brazilian portuguese is made on redmond, why should our government care if those jobs are closed? Then microsoft talks about the local reseller of windows, well, replace windows for another SO and the local retailers will be... THERE, just selling something different.
There is a LOT of jobs emerging around here that won't exist if everthing was Microsoft.
I honestly, hopefully, truthfully, can't wait for there to be a significant market share of Linux systems out in the world...Then all the virus and worm and trojan writers will all start writing stuff against it and you will all see...
I think he's using "unpatriotic" in the sense that anything not helpful to current US policy is "unpatriotic".
Member of Orkut? Annoyed with spam?
Since no one else seems to be saying this...
I don't like what the US government is doing, and I see OSS as a way to reduce your government's power. Spending $1 on a blank CD and 1 hour of my time can worsen your country's trade balance by a few hundred dollars, and that looks like an effective way of raising the costs to the Empire. (The worse the balance of trade, the more dicey it is to keep borrowing from countries that may not approve of your policies).
This is good for Open source, good for the world, and bad for the US elites in government and big business. I don't think it is bad for the US as a whole, no more than your current policies have been good for you. Your government has managed to make the world a much dangerous place, and its cold war peons are now revolting. Ignoring the reasons why you are in such a mess, your elites keep peddling war and profligate waste as remedies to your security and economic woes.
OSS has the merit of reducing the money flowing your (governments') way while building a more co-operative model of wealth creation that can also benefit you (people, rather than the corporation that finance parties and dictate policy). This is in any case inevitable- why not try to make it work for you too?
Information: "I want to be anthropomorphized"
From the article:
And this is why this switch will probably not last long. The open source movement does not champion software freedom, and authors of the Malaysian Public Sector Open Source Software Masterplan have apparently learned this. The Free Software Foundation warns against this kind of thinking:
These users will undoubtedly discover that there are some "open source" programs are better than their proprietary alternatives. But they will also discover the opposite. As people are willing to allow more proprietary software into their lives, the move to anything else will be unpleasant and less likely to occur. When people learn to value the freedom of sharing and modifying programs they will look at proprietary software differently, as a real let-down.
The key is:
1. Americans are LIKED all around the world.
2. The American government is distrusted and feared all around the world.
Both for very good reasons. As individuals we are loud, friendly, happy, giving. As a government we are arrogant, money-grubbing, manipulative, murderous, two-faced, scary and powerful.
I love America, but I don't trust governments any more than our founders did (hint:they DIDN'T).
"Oh, and by the way, get your syntax right: "fewer jobs," not "less jobs." "Fewer" takes a countable noun, and "less" takes an uncountable noun."
Fewer jobs, but less work.
Fewer pails of water, but less water.
Fewer dollars, but less money.
Fewer species, but less life.
Fewer laughs, but less joy.
why in the hell should they be allowed to pay people to write something I can't have access to?
Talk about a weak argument. Are you equally pissed that the government purchases tanks and jets and you can't use either?
... themselves-and others, under orders, and under the influence of societal and religious and governmental brainwashing. Hmm, Seems like I have seen that before... hmm, did they speak arabic?? Lemme see if I can remember... oh ya, I do!
Nope. They spoke 'merkin near as I recall.
What you are implying is over simplistic and not exactly what I was saying. I will attempt clarification. They are adopting open source for all the same reasons anyone else is, PLUS, by adopting it, it helps them to get independent.
In-dependent, they are tired of being de-pendent.
What you said, is true of them to a certain degree in the past, but now they know there is no future in remaining dependent and as economic colony states of the west. Of course they will do their best to trade to their advantage now, who wouldn't?, because they have been taken advantage of for a long time. Most of the nations in the muslim world have had weird rulers foisted on them going back to the turn of the last century, they are just annoyed with the western influences on their culture and on their lands and in their economies. They see no need any longer to just sell their raw resources for piddling low profit, when they can trade it for a lot more, and develop domestic industries. And all their populations need real employment as well, you expect them to ignore that? They can also look at geopolitical reality, they just saw the US take over the second largest oil fields in the world, and the largest concentration of fresh water in the middle east(do NOT forget that part in the iraq war, even though hardly anyone ever mentions it), both critical for nation building and for advancing their own nations. And they can add the sums same as everyone (except for most lusers who depend on the 6 o clock news and their brokers for data),and they know the oil will run out soon for all practical purposes,within the next generation, they can see as oil drops below peak and as demand quadruples in the next 15 years they need to do something about that reality, so they are entering a crash program of modernization, all over. any nation that doesn't will either suffer greatly or be forced into becomeing a looter nation, same as the US has become. For most purposes, that's what the US is now, a looter nation, we are dropping any pretense of manufacturing anything except for war and police/paramilitary *things*. These other nations can clearly see what's coming for them.
Now they have the internet in all those nations now, and travel is common. Whether that will mitigate some of the more radical islamic tenets remains to be seen. You would hope so, but I think the US invading iraq set that back-completely borked it- for another generation, if it ever comes back at all. The young people in those nations were gradually becoming more secular and westernised, now they are returning to islamic fundamentalism, because they see no practical future for them with the anglo/us/israeli axis of maximum profits and command and control as their future-and who would? There's nothing in it for them other than what they have had for a long time, a 1-2% ultra rich transnational based series of puppet governments, or rule by nutjob fundies. The best they can do is to try something different, and that would revolve around developing their own economies, starting with more practical use and savvier trading of their oil and national labor pool, and developing their own currencies based on what they value-gold and silver instead of western bankers created out of thin air pieces of debt paper, and to use their oil better, which they are starting to do. For instance, saudi arabi is still the big dog with oil, but also is putting the most into solar energy and in advanced water desalinization. Malaysia is heavy into developing industry and manufacturing. Pakistan is developing a huge engineering base, and so on.
Don't expect them to live in the past any more than you do in other words, they may be different from you, but collectively they aren'
because it won't be malaysain jobs that get killed anyway...
Malaysia had (perhaps still has, too lazy to google) a white elephant project called the "Super Multimedia Corridor" that was suppossed to be a hub of High Tech development and innovation (with things like housing for higtech employess with broadband internet, nevermind Malaysia is a country with stringent censoship).
One of the advisors for this project was a certain Bill Gates. That they are turning around like this has a huge impact since they must be ignoring "advice" (i.e. FUD) from Gates whose opinions just 5 years ago were regarded as gospel.
This my friend, is BIG news in Malaysia for sure, one of the biggest exporters of computer related stuff in the world.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Everybody's right. The issue is that costs and benefits are distributed unevenly.
"[XYZ] will eliminate jobs."
Answer: "[XYZ] will eliminate your jobs, but will drastically reduce our costs and benefit society as a whole."
[XYZ] is:
That's not a multiple choice question. There are winners and losers in many technological trends. The Luddites were right, in a way: they were losing their jobs, and someone else -- not them -- benefitted. It was a simple win-lose scenario, resolved in the case of the Luddites by mass hangings and other forms of repression.
There is no simple "solution" for the losers of any such trend. Innovation is usually the answer, except that it is a long term solution to a short term problem, meaning losers will continue to lose for a while. Career change is not easy: financial barriers exist where class barriers did earlier. Have you priced a college education lately? I guess the real answer is to grin and bear it.
Open source can't possibly erode the concept of a nation as much as multi-national corporations have.
The multi-nationals are threatening to replace the sovereignty of nations within their own boundaries. This is something that FreeSoftware not only wouldn't, but couldn't do. FreeSoftware doesn't have the capability of corrupting the legislatures, and doesn't own any armies. Corporations do both.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
What is with you all. You are so into OSS you use Malaysia and China as proof that OSS is the way to go?
China, the largest communist country with a record of human rights abuses, is making its own Linux. Do you really want to be mentioned in the same breath as them (of course, the opne source movement and communism share the same ideals).
And Malaysia? Another bastion if human rights violations, where censorship and state-sponsored religion are the rule, not the exception? Nice people to be in bed with.
You all make me sick in how you pick your victoruies. OSS is a good movememnt, but quit aligning yourself with the evil in the world.
Compu-Communists. Everyone sharing... individual ownrship is bad.
Ya, Im sure the Malaysian government turning to OSS must really be a big dent in MS's wallet. Yeah... right...
In other breaking news, Bill Gates has contracted Derek Zoolander to model wearable computers at a fashion show to be attended by the Malaysian Prime Minister.
What is the inverse of the Matrix?
"Does that make Open Source unpatriotic?"
Spoken like a typical American..
I'll bite: Yes, Open Source is very patriotic, especially to Malaysia, Norway, Zimbabwe and Australia..
There's more than one country on this earth you know.. You truly sound narrow-minded by uttering such statements taken from CNN or some other "patriotic" source..
BAH!
Selling software in Malaysia is mostly a corporate affair -- businesses and government are huge clients. (They have to buy original, otherwise the BSA swoops down on them). Going open-source will definitely make an impact.... End-users don't buy that much original software to start with. So they don't really figure in the equation.
And there, my friend, is exactly the problem with the BSA! They aren't doing anything but driving the only legitimate users they have in these markets to open software! But, Microsoft, blinded by the lure of even greater profits, refuses to acknowledge this!
Opera is a proprietary program. They don't disclose the source code and they don't let you customize or redistribute the source code. Probably you are working on opera or somehow connected to them, but we can't use such proprietary programs. Either Opera should start supporting open source or face the inevitable. Eudora already faced it. Nobody uses it. The only solution is open source, embrace it or die. Period.
Our company is heavily adopting open source software as I believe many others are, we are using SAMBA 3.x as our PDC/File Server, FreeBSD as our Firewall/NAT/Router/Traffic Shaper, Another *nix machine in the DMZ as Tomcat/mail server, OpenOffice.org as the productivity suite for the Windows machine, Thunderbird as the mail client and so on.
As mentioned above piracy is predominant here, the main reason being cost, as a poster above explained the cost for many things here is higher than Europe or America (if you use economies of scale not a direct currency conversion). Cars are expensive, housing is reasonable, food is cheap, technology stuff is average, software is EXPENSIVE. Most SME's here don't have domains, they are still using workgroups as the cost of Win2k server is prohibitive (The salary per annum for an average employee). Pirated software is easy to get (within every decent sized housing area there is 2-3 places you can go) and cheap ($1-2USD per CD). People do buy orginal software, but usally only larger companies and people who want to play online games (for example Warcraft III you need an original, unique CD key to play on Battle.net).
People are finally realising using pirated software is bad, and that licenced software is too expensive to be economically viable and as open source awareness spreads these are becoming more realistic alternatives. As far as I know many small companies are adopting Linux and OSS software packages or at least conducting some kind of testing/integration. There are quite a few Open Source advocates and groups/mailing lists here:
- OSSIG
- MyOSS
- Planet MyOSS Community
- ASIAOSC
- Alphaque
- IOSN
From what I know the state of OSS looks good here, there are regular conferences, meetings and things going on towards the advancement of open source usage in the Malaysia I.T. community. (P.S. frist psot as a non-AC)-------------
Share your Knowlege - Kung-Fu Geekery
...mr nasty mouth anonymous troll. Maybe it has something to do with my time spent reading and researching in geopolitics, instead of interesting pursuits like playing video games or downloading porn and movies? I don't know, perhaps this guy's speech might provide you with some answers you seek, although I doubt it, the big words will probably confuse you, and it's not in anime form so you might not "get it".
If you want more, as usual, google is a click or two away. Ask your mommy for some decent search terms.
Good for them. Solid , sturdy and trouble free performance of open source software must have influenced their decision.
Chris ,
Php Programmers.
"Final solution" provider? who was this? hitler? i hate to imagine what his final solution was.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
As a foreigner, I can hardly say being against current US government policies which does things even Chris Carter (X Files) couldn't imagine, is anti patriotic.
;), being against that awful government which literally fucked up your image at World _is_ PATRIOTIC.
For the record and as a sensor how many Fox News fans are moderators now
Talk about a weak argument. Would you defend construction of roads, bridges, etc, that you could not use? Besides, the grandparent poster COULD use tanks, etc. He/she just needs to join the army and get into a tank division.
Another extremely weak point in your counter-argument is that the items you mention do not have a zero or even marginal cost of production. Software does. You can give out thousands of copies of software for pennies. In addition, sharing the code for some government software reduces the cost of future development.
I wouldn't advocate sharing a tank (or it's blueprints either for that matter) since the long-term cost of doing so would likely be significant. (In both terms of $ and lives.)
didn't I just see you?
oooh yeah, in metamod.
enjoy your "unfair" rating, fucktable