UN Supports OSS/Free Software In Developing World

headisdead writes "This BBC report has details of the IOSN's (International Open Source Network) role in yesterday's Software Freedom Day. As the article rightly points out, the economic potential of these new markets for large tech corporations like MS makes this a real battle in the making. Question is, can Free Software really stem the tide when other sustainal development projects are struggling so much?"

Comments

Money

[Orgazmus]

This all comes down to money.
How can you compete against free, when the customers have little or no money.
A school in an underdeveloped country buys 100 old PCs.
Would you use 100 licenced copies of XP, or just download a linux iso for free?

Re:Money

[Scarblac]

The big players, like Microsoft, can use pressure form their government.

Use MS software, or you won't get as much aid money.

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem is that they are actually downloading windows for free in many of these markets.

Despite all their whining about software piracy I'm pretty sure that MS is delighted about this. There is even some quote by Bill Gates saying that he doesn't have a problem with that as long as the people pirate MS software, but I'm to lazy to google for it.

To say it the slashdot troll way:
1. Let people pirate your software
2. Be the dominant player in yet an other market
3. Now start to campaign for stricter intellectual property laws in these countries.
4. Profit. ;-D

Re:Money

[pjt33]

When you say "old PCs", do you mean "but new enough to have CD burners"? Otherwise it's a question of whether the people who supply the PCs also supply an install disc (or, perhaps more to the point, what they install before supplying). I wouldn't want to run XP on an old PC either, especially as most people don't have anywhere near as much RAM as they should.

Re:Money

[krymsin01]

Of course everyone knows you can squeeze more processing power out of a camel with Linux than with Windows.

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[Riktov]

Would you use 100 licenced copies of XP, or just download a linux iso for free? Neither. They would use 100 pirated copies of XP.

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[krymsin01]

A lot of third world countries do not recognize copyright, so it wouldn't acutaly be pirated software there.

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

Except, since they're probably using donated equipment that may be five years old there's no way they can expect to get anyhwere with XP. So, they're probably using Knoppix or Damn Small Linux and thinking damn if this stuff is so great that XP must be some real fancy shit.
Imagine their disappointment when they finally get a chance to see it.

Re:Money

[phreakv6]

They would use 100 pirated copies of XP.

Nope.
One pirated copy would suffice :)

Re:Money

[Gooba42]

Until MS lobbied their government for support of their intellectual property at which point everyone is forced to stop using their computers or forced to pay MS for the privelege of using their computers.

Considering this tactic is already being used in southeast asia by Microsoft as a ploy to get users hooked and then jack up the price, I'd rather these impoverished regions use a Free free system than a proprietary-but-pirated free system and they hopefully agree.

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmmm... pirated copies...

...without any kind of support, without the possibility to install patches like SP2 and with a large amount of viruses and worms that exploit the holes

...of an OS that requires state-of-the-art hardware

...of an OS that has no i18n-support for lesser known languages and no possibility localize it (remember: not everybody speaks English)

Re:Money

[zerblat]

Actually, currently 156 states have signed the Berne Convention. I can't find a list of non-signees, but at least Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Nepal, Ethiopia and Somaila are missing. Anyway, I doubt there are many non-Berne countries with any significant computer usage.

Of course, signing a convention and actually complying it are two different things...

Re:Money

[jkrise]

To say it the slashdot troll way:
1. Let people pirate your software ...etc.


If this is true, I think Microsoft has lesser intelligence than the average Slashdot troll. Bcos, between steps 3 and 4, MS has made their newer versions more daunting to use, and less of a value for the software pirate.

There is nothing, absolutely nothing, that a home user can't do with Win98 which XP allows him to do. And yet, XP crawls under 128MB on a PIII whereas '98 runs okay on a Pentium with 16MB RAM. The latter is the kind of system most 3rd world users get in hand-me-downs or aid agencies or whatever. MS has made pirating their latest versions useless for such people.

In another 5 years, I'd imagine there will be more pirated Win 98 systems than genuine Windows LongHorn or ShortShrift users. It really indicates there's little innovation at MS for the common user.

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Re:Money

[jkrise]

They would use 100 pirated copies of XP.

Actually, 100 'ghost'ed copies of Windows 98 would be the best option. A friend of mine works for an NGO that recently got 500 Compaqs - Pentium 233MHz, 32 MB RAM and 1.2GB disk. They used ghost to load '98 on all the systems and sold them at about $75 each. Uselss trying to load pirated XP on these systems.

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Re:Money

[tacocat]

As a correlary how can compete against someone who has the millions to subsidize hardware to assist their software inclusion and help tip the hands of the decision makers?

You have to include the support for Linux when you consider these equations. While you can go to San Francisco, CA and find a lot of potential Linux Admins, how many might you expect to find on the streets of Sri Lanka or Haiti?

There will be a more truthful display of TCO when really poor nations consider the software. It may not be all about proprietary mistrust of The Man.

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

1999 computer can run XP smoothly with 512Megs of RAM. Ooops.

Re:Money

[legirons]

"Neither. They would use 100 pirated copies of XP."

Or they could use the $10 copies of Windows98 which Microsoft sells to schools who've been given PCs [presumably ones with a valid Windows license already, since it was impossible to buy a computer without such a license]

--

How would you like software from a company who suggests you spend 4% of IT budget on keeping track of your licensing compliance?

Re:Money

[Alain Williams]

The trouble is that a modern Linux desktop also crawls under 128MB on a PIII. I regret to say that the Linux desktops are suffering as much from bloat as does MS.

Serverwise: the bloat does not seem to have hit - fortunately.

Should we send a request to Muguel & KDE leads to mandate that their developers should use 64MB PIIs as their desktop machine? It would result it usable systems on old machines and take Linux users off the hardware upgrade treadmill.

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, China signed 12 years ago, and look how well that's gone.

Re:Money

[leonmergen]

This indeed has been the case. Redmond didn't start enforcing the real serial checks until XP for no reason, neh ? First, make sure that everyone uses Windows by not doing anything about copying, making sure that all developers develop applications for Windows, and when you're big enough, start enforcing legal serials.

Re:Money

[postgrep]

Our school is pretty good (private) and could easily switch to linux, but they PREFER to use windows for EVERYTHING. They are freaks.

Re:Money

[jkrise]

That would be a valuable suggestion indeed. People upgrade their h/w often bcos the current version of Windows needs more. If Linux can steer away from this path (no point depending on RedHat, Lindows or Mandrake), it would be a great service to the user-base, indeed the usage of Linux should increase many-fold.

Knoppix, TinyLinux or the OpenCD group could take some initiative on this.

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Re:Money

[The Cydonian]

A lot of third world countries do not recognize copyright, so it wouldn't acutaly be pirated software there.

There's this 1985 study by the World Bank on exactly this issue. Turned out the actual graph of nations versus IPR protections (ie, copyrights, trademarks AND patents, although not necessarily software patents) was an inverse bell-curve; that is, the more improverished nations (sub-Saharan Africa?) actually had protection-levels equivalent to that of the (so-called) First World nations. Essentially, all their IPR laws were colonial-era laws; with other pressing issues taking center-stage, their governments didn't fiddle around with them. It was only nations that were (are) developing economies, notably countries such as Malaysia, China (?) and India (drugs industry as an example), that had lesser IPR protection because their industries needed tech fast.

Of course, the WTO changes all that; now the graph is more or less a straight line. That is to say, that Windows XP SP2 CD you bought off Kuala Lumpur's streets for 8 ringgits is still illegal, even if it's affordable.

Re:Money

[Dashing Leech]

Sure, this is a business model that has worked well for drug dealers; hook 'em when they are young/naive with freebies and then once they're locked in you force them to pay through the teeth. Works for the tabacco industry as well, though it tends to be through "coolness" advertising rather than freebies. Similar principle though.

People on /. have been saying for years that Microsoft should change its business model which was to force people to use Microsoft by having it pre-installed on every PC at purchase. Perhaps following the drug dealer approach is a step towards a new model. (Nobody said the business model should be moral -- that wouldn't be consistent with Microsoft's history.)

Re:Money

[Sunnan]

Wouldn't be easier for the pressuring group to just give the money to MS outright? Why go via a poor country?

I don't really get this. Is this some money-laundering scheme?

"You will recieve money for free if you spend (a large part of) it on Windows."

"Huh, ok? Why don't you give that amount to MS yourself if you're so keen on them?"

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

List the 3rd world countries that do not recognize copyright.

Re:Money

[n3m3sis]

Excuse Me! Who's licencsing software in the third world! We get Windows a lot cheaper than redhat. Here in Pakistan Windows costs 30 Rupees (.5 US dollars) where as Mandrake costs 90 Rupees (1.5 US Dollars) WHy? Because windows comes in a single CD and Mandrake comes with 3 CDs thats why the additional cost

Re:Money

[Tonytheloony]

Despite all their whining about software piracy I'm pretty sure that MS is delighted about this.

And I can confirm this first hand, having spent 10 years in Singapore from 1988 'till 1998. An entire modern shopping center used to be the center of piracy in Singapore (Sim Lim square). Ath first (from 1988-1990?) you would go to any shop and choose games/software in a catalog. The guy would make copies for you on the spot.
A few years later you could buy ziplock bags sitting on shelves with disks + manual for a few dollars. All in open view. From maybe 1994 onwards those disks became CDs. There were maybe 20-30 shops in the commercial center, none of them hiding. You would go buy your software like you would your groceries. I remember friend buying over 150 CDs (Windows, Office, games, 3D studio) at a time.
Around 1998, it was widely consider that Singapore was not 3rd world anymore. People actually had the money to buy original software. Microsoft which had always turned a blind eye, started requesting that the government raid the shops. In 1999, all the shops selling pirated software suddenly closed. An over 10 year old activity was shut down in the blink of an eye.

I am convinced that it was in MS's best interest to allow the rampant piracy until they had a strong foothold in the market. It made business sense anyway, at a time where no singaporean would spend the cash for an original version of Office.

Re:Money

[Scarblac]

Because now the country can claim to have given X amount of money to a third world country, which is nice to be able to tell left-wing voters, has secured orders for their companies, which is nice to be able to tell right-wing voters, and there are probably some treaties as well that say that the US is supposed to spend some amount of money on aid.

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

Libya has signed it. :(

Re:Money

[Sunnan]

Now I see.

have given X amount of money to a third world country

But they took it right back, for nothing.

has secured orders for their companies

.But they paid for those themselves.

spend some amount of money on aid

But they aren't helping.

So it's just a big con game. Thanks for your clarification.

Re:Money

[digitalgiblet]

Keep in mind when Microsoft or Gates give "money" to someone, a large part of that "money" is actually licenses for Microsoft products, not currency. They tally up the MSRP of the products and count that as money...

Re:Money

[LousyPhreak]

there is absoluely no problem running linux on that spec, the real "problem" is windowmanagers like kde and gnome

you can easily work with windowmaker, icewm, or whatever "small" wm is around but kde is imho VERY much like xp:
has almost everything onboard
needs huge amounts of processing power/ram
is (what many say) "userfriendly"

while i do use kde on my workstation (which is advanced enough to run it without slowdown) i would never use it on an old computer like a PII with 64MB. i guess (almost) no one would whine if his 20 year old golf cant carry a 10 ton trailer.

so use the right tool for the job, its your choice (yea we all know thats what linux is all about)

Re:Money

[4of12]

To say it the slashdot troll way:
1. Let people pirate your software
2. Be the dominant player in yet an other market
3. Now start to campaign for stricter intellectual property laws in these countries.
4. Profit. ;-D

If you count GPL enforcement, then not just Microsoft software, but free and open source software also goes through the same steps 1,2,3.

The 4th, step, profit, effectively gets dispersed among the users instead of concentrated into one place.

Re:Money

[phazethru]

They also gain something else. A small army of people raised/trained on their products. Now when those people need new computers, their first though wont be "Which OS is cheapest?" but rather "Should I upgrade my windows?"

Plus, Microsoft giving away software is a lot like a fan company giving away air. It costs them nothing. You could say it costs them sales, but these are sales they wouldn't have gotten anyway becuase the target audience is so poor.

By giving away their product, Microsoft has nothing to lose, but reputation and loyal users to gain.

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course everyone knows you can squeeze more processing power out of a camel with Linux than with Windows.

Much to the dismay of the camel.

Re:Money

[ImaLamer]

The trouble is that a modern Linux desktop also crawls under 128MB on a PIII. I regret to say that the Linux desktops are suffering as much from bloat as does MS.

I don't use Slackware personally but a quick check of their website shows me that they host versions going back to 3.3.

I'm sure most major distributions have their past versions out there somewhere. You may have to use an FTP searching site to find them but they are out there. RedHat 7.3 your favorite? It's out there. Even Caldera "Open Desktop" is out there. (Or I can send you a copy, take that SCO!)

The beautiful thing about linux is two-fold. First you can create your own "distribution" based on what you need. (Plus, there are plenty of slim distributions out there, many working off of floppies or compact discs) The second thing is this; they can't stop you from distributing it further once you get your hands on it and they can't stop you from forking your own from a version.

There is no need to stay attached to one distribution, you can create your own. A developing country can do just that. As computer use rises they can use students or enthusiasts to create a custom distribution for their country. Not only does it solve their problems but it also can help as a teaching tool when it comes to the basics of computer science.

That is the good thing about free software, you can do what you want with it - no one can stop you from doing what you want to do with it. I'm sure there are good quotes on this in "Free as In Freedom", which I'm looking at now on my bookshelf, but I'm too lazy to look them up.

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyway, I doubt there are many non-Berne countries with any significant computer usage.

Iran has not signed it, and some estimates say that one in five Iranians households own computers.

They do have a copyright law, but it simply doesn't recognize the Berne Convention.

Re:Money

[Just Some Guy]

Should we send a request to Muguel & KDE leads to mandate that their developers should use 64MB PIIs as their desktop machine? It would result it usable systems on old machines and take Linux users off the hardware upgrade treadmill.

I bought a used laptop with a K6/333 and 64MB of RAM. I spent an extra $40 at CompUsa for a 128MB stick to bump it to 192MB. That little laptop runs Debian/unstable with KDE 3.3 just fine, thanks.

By what arbitrary means did you pick P2/64MB? Why not P1/32MB, or 486/4MB? The Gnome and KDE folks are developing systems that run well on machines made within the last 5 years, and given that commodity PCs aren't expected to last forever, I think that's a perfectly reasonable standard on their part.

You can keep your toy systems running with Slackware or a downscaled Gentoo system if you want to, or you can pay $100 to buy a more recent system and get to play with the current set of available software. Where's the problem?

Re:Money

[AstroDrabb]

but free and open source software also goes through the same steps 1,2,3

Huh? How does the GPL "Let people pirate your software"? Pirating implies stealing. There is no stealing with the GPL, you are _allowed_ to take the software.

How does the GPL go through #3? The _whole_ point of the GPL is to grant MORE rights then standard copyright allows, not take away rights like more strict copyrigth laws would.

Re:Money

[Ben Hutchings]

That's how foreign aid mostly works. There's another trick, which is to put the aid in the form of loans. The third world country cannot afford to pay back the loans, so it remains in debt and under substantial control by first world countries (possibly indirectly through the IMF or World Bank) indefinitely.

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

MS will give for free to the school, at least is this they are trying to do in some "poor" countries.

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

have given X amount of money to a third world country

But they took it right back, for nothing.

Not all of it. Some will have found its way into the pockets of UN administrators.

Re:Money

[4of12]

The _whole_ point of the GPL is to grant MORE rights then standard copyright allows

Absolutely.

But IP enforcement (Step 3) is still useful for those occassions when unscrupulous people attempt to incorporate GPL'd work into proprietary products and not make the source available.

As far as the term "pirate" is concerned; it's become as meaningless as "terrorist".

Re:Money

[Bloater]

The problem is the contribution to worldwide environmental damage due to the accelerated End-Of-Lifing of products that are otherwise good for 15 years. Products that contain large quantities of heavy metals that are not normally present in topsoil and freshwater.

IMHO we need to start designing application software like OpenOffice and Mozilla for clusters and get those old 486s shipped out to schools in developing countries. The bonus is more robust, cheaper solutions for the western coporate markets.

Re:Money

[edittard]

There is nothing, absolutely nothing, that a home user can't do with Win98 which XP allows him to do

Other than get USB to work or support mulltiple users other than as a joke, you mean?

Re:Money

[edittard]

A developing country can do just that. As computer use rises they can use students or enthusiasts to create a custom distribution for their country

When you install it, a splash screen comes up saying "Greetings. I am the son of the recently assassinated former IT minister of Nigeria..."

Re:Money

[H09N0X10U5]

and some estimates say that one in five Iranians households own computers

I think you mean one to five?

Re:Money

[Sunnan]

Yeah, and some maybe even found its way to the intended recipients, but I meant the sum that they took back. Why bother with that?

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[Stevyn]

This surprises me a lot. I'm running a k6-2 550 on gentoo with kde 3.2.3 with twice the RAM and it's dogshit slow. I put xfce4 on it, but it's still too slow to use without falling asleep.

Re:Money

[Just Some Guy]

Gentoo never seemed particularly fast on that same laptop; I have no idea why. What CFLAGS are you using?

Also note that the initial login takes a bit, but once in, opening Konqueror or Kontact or Konsole or K* is pretty snappy.

Re:Money

[HiThere]

IF you want snappy performance with minimal memory, and minimal CPU...ditch X Window. Make do with ncurses graphics. (Ugh, but it works.)

P.S.: I'm not sure what minimal is, since I NEVER aimed in that direction. But there was a big change in usage between around RH 6.0 and RH 7.0 (I can't remember it more precisely.) The increase in cpu/ram usage didn't seem to be accompanied by any similarly great increase in user frienliness...so for a fairly responsive, fairly old/slow/small machine, try Red Hat 6.1 or 6.2.

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

Odd how all of those countries are the ones being the subject of some kind of wars lately, except Nepal. Well, they had some guerillas (CIA funded?), but nothing much came of it.

Is the purpose of war to drive the media machines?

Re:Money

[ImaLamer]

Funny.. had to commend you.

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

crawls under 128MB on a PIII

Try XFce4 -- Fast and User-friendly. Works fine, even on P1's with lower than 128 MB RAM.

I have used KDE1 and KDE2 on a P2/400 with 128 MB. Worked ok. Not great though.
I'm using GNOME2 on a Duron 800 with 256 MB. Works ok. Not great though.

It's all about what you're used to and kids, you really don't need that newest and greatest Intel/AMD for running some basic apps.

Re:Money

[Anonymous Coward]

A decent way of convincing them is to sell the CS department on the educational value of knowing their own kernel. I think it'd be cool if more universities had their own distros.

officail site !

[phreakv6]

Here is their official website since the article
fails to mention it anywhere

A fundamental question..

[jkrise]

What role does the UN play in deciding what type of software gets used / bought in the World? Is the UN a sort of marketing organisation? Does the UN make no distinction between promoting democracy and promoting capitalism?

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Re:A fundamental question..

[alphan]

your point being?

what is the relation between recommending FOSS and promoting capitalism?

UN should help nations, especially developing ones.

Clearly communication and computers are important parts of development process. What is wrong with suggesting a cheap way?

Re:A fundamental question..

[HenrikOxUK]

This story has just been getting way out of hand. The UN has alsmost nothing to do with this, appart from being a regular supporter of one of the over 60 teams world-wide.

Re:A fundamental question..

[jkrise]

Exactly. I thought the Software Freedom Day teams and their website should've been mentioned in the article - not the UN involvement.

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Re:A fundamental question..

[jkrise]

Sometime ago Kofi Annan was suggesting that 3rd World nations could 'leapfrog' into WiFi notebooks! (running Windows). Entities such as the UN cannot be relied for their knowledge on technical matters and software.

A better role which the UN could play would be to fight against software patents etc.

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Re:A fundamental question..

[_Bucktooth_]

Not marketing, but the UN does have an interest in local development and technology transfer. Or it should anyways.

Re:A fundamental question..

[Anonymous Coward]

If this isn't flamebait, I don't know what else is. Anyways, I'll bite:

It's not like these third world countries can figure it out on their own, or they would have already.

Even the US can't seem to figure out whether outsourcing work to 3rd World is good or not! People care for their own money and long-term welfare, and both are better assured with Open Source.

UN must become corrupt and take the place of the forces it seeks to protect weak nations from.

A bit like saying GNU should become non-free in order to fight Microsoft and Adobe. Very silly.

but then robotics will make slave labor obsolete

Maybe in the next millennium or so? And what would it do to the poor people in the 1st World? They'd be redundant with robots in place, won't they?

the UN can make all the men have sex change operations, and then use all the women as sex slaves.

That doesn't sound like the UN charter, maybe the US.....

Re:A fundamental question..

[upside]

I'm not sure how the UN was dragged into this. I'm pretty sure you aren't going to ask whether the UN is supporting specific pharmaceutical companies or mainstream medicine over alternative cures when it goes on a vaccination drive in Africa. Mind you, I'm pretty sure they did have arguments over producing generic HIV drugs in developing countries.

Re:A fundamental question..

[Teun]

What role does the UN play in deciding what type of software gets used / bought in the World? Is the UN a sort of marketing organisation? You don't get it.
As an impartial Global organisation they help with knowledge and training.
A lot of developing nations see the UN as a valuable aide on their way to a better future.
MS and the likes have their own sales teams all over the place, the Peoples Alternatives, eg. FOSS, are often not known with the decision makers but do deserve consideration where money is tight.
The nature of FOSS development is an other reason why 3rd. world nations might want to concider it, it can realy be a grass roots sytem where local needs can be met by local developpers.

Does the UN make no distinction between promoting democracy and promoting capitalism?
Weird question, one does not exclude the other!

Re:A fundamental question..

[Anonymous Coward]

His point was that he's scared of the UN. This is standard conservative paranoia that is rooted in their inherent self-loathing. It's a desire to overcome the father's resentment that we see so pronounced in Dubya that he would murder to prove his devotion to his father.
The fascinating part is that the US created the UN on its own terms to try to come to grasp with its role in the world after WWII. But the problem is that with the end of the great wars that had been such an integral part of western culture there was no more opportunity for the repressed homosexual conservatives to outdo their fathers in acts of macho-homo-bravado like genocide.
The result is an extreme paranoia and self hatred where institutions created by the US become the enemies within. Everything they do is suspect because they come from within. It is self-hatred.

Re:A fundamental question..

[ctr2sprt]

I don't want this to turn into a diatribe against the UN, but don't ever mistake it for a neutral, impartial, or unbiased agency. That's the exact opposite of what it is. It's more like the sum of all the biases and partisanship in the entire world, and it just happens that most of them cancel each other out via all the elaborate balances in the system.

Re:A fundamental question..

[helarno]

Yep. The IOSN team has spent the better part of last week contacting reporters, correcting news stories and still, this story won't die. They contacted over 60 news agencies last week. BBC's original version was the standard mistake: "UN organizes software freedom day". Fortunately, BBC is responsive and by the time Slashdot got to it, it's the corrected version. Still, the UN angle is too strong for any of the news agencies to resist.

Sorry Henrik. They're doing the best they can but it's crazy how this story keeps spreading.

Re:A fundamental question..

[H09N0X10U5]

Is the UN a sort of marketing organisation?

That's ridiculous.

"UN" and "organisation" in the same sentence without "total and utter lack of".

Re:A fundamental question..

[Anonymous Coward]

What role does the UN play in deciding what type of software gets used / bought in the World? Is the UN a sort of marketing organisation? Does the UN make no distinction between promoting democracy and promoting capitalism?

The main role in this case isn't promove either capilasm or democracy it's just to promove intelectual and technological independence. So if my country (Argentina) has any econonomical or politic system, it doesn't matter, because the whole idea is to create a good scientific and technologic system that creates science and technology for the country not just adapt foregin technologies.

This on the CS field may not be as diferent in either case, but in fields like agriculture and soil science its a HUGE difference

By the way sorry for my poor english

FAIR, using FOSS (skolelinux)

[Anonymous Coward]

Some organisations are already using open source software in their work. Look at FAIR (http://www.fair.no/english/home.htm), a norwegain project that are bringing ICT-equipment to development countries. They are aming to use Skolelinux (http://www.skolelinux.org/) in their projects.

Diversity

[bioglaze]

I hope this will increase the use of free standards like Ogg Vorbis, XViD, PNG etc and it is only healthy to have many different operating systems.

Re:Diversity

[Ziviyr]

I thought XViD was an MPEG 4 implementation, therefore being not-free in relation to your other mentions.

Developing countries and OSS

[PingKing]

It certainly won't be easy for free software in these developing countries, especially considering how inexperienced with computers many of the users will be. Love it or hate it, any idiot can use Windows.

It's certainly an oppurtunity to introduce many new people to the Free Software philosophy. This can only be a good thing and give MS cause for concern. in these new markets.

Re:Developing countries and OSS

[Anonymous Coward]

"Love it or hate it, any idiot can use Windows."

*Sigh*
No, he can't. Look at the millions of infected PCs, just work one day at a help desk for normal users and you will know that most people are not able to use Windows.

P.S.: Just because a lot of idiots use Windows doesn't mean any idiot can use it. Btw., I know a lot of idiots using Linux, what does that tell us?

Re:Developing countries and OSS

[AnuradhaRatnaweera]

Coming from a developing country, I know that there are many `inexperienced' users around, but certainly most of them are not `idiots'.

We had a nice time promoting the localized GNU/Linux (site not upto date with the work) on the Free Software Day. The response was phenominal, and we can see more and more people and commercial organizations are coming forward to help us take the message across.

And we make it clear that FOSS is better not because of the cost, but because of the flexibility, freedom and control that comes with it, and the mindset change from dependence to independence.

Re:Developing countries and OSS

[Anonymous Coward]

Too bad there isn't any "idiot for beginners" courses around here, because I am not enough of an idiot to figure out how to use Windows.

Re:Developing countries and OSS

[RAMMS EIN]

``It certainly won't be easy for free software in these developing countries, especially considering how inexperienced with computers many of the users will be. Love it or hate it, any idiot can use Windows.''

Dude, take of your blinders! Icons are just as easy to click in X11 as they are in Explorer. A system that just keeps working is easier than one that crashes and gets infected. And don't forget the benefit of a real command line (typing is more intuitive than moving a pointer with a mouse in a different plane).

Windows is only easier to use if you're more used to it, so especially for people inexperienced with computers, Linux is at least as easy.

Re:Developing countries and OSS

[helarno]

The delegate from the government of Mongolia who attended the Free and Open Source Software Asia Pacific (FOSSAP) consultation in February had an interesting tale to relate.

In order to expand the reach of their ICT in schools program some years ago, they put FOSS on 20% of the PCs they installed in the schools there. Microsoft had refused to give them a discount, so to have full reach, they had to resort to this.

Their findings? No surprised to anyone who's used FOSS for a while - kids adapted equally quickly to both FOSS and proprietary software (Windows). For ICT education purposes, there was no drawback with using FOSS.

Other countries, such as Thailand with their successful Schoolnet program, have had the same results.

You can find references to Mongolia's report in the FOSSAP final report.

Re:Developing countries and OSS

[noselasd]

>It certainly won't be easy for free software in these developing
>countries, especially considering how inexperienced with computers many
>of the users will be. Love it or hate it, any idiot can use Windows.
Might be, but any idot can use linux as well.
I thing you might be using the wrong linux distro though.

Re:Developing countries and OSS

[Ba3r]

Frankly, from my experience writing and supporting software run in a manufacturing setting, users usually fall into two categories:

1. oblivious to everything computer and frustrated by the whole mouse thing, not mention the crazy cutoff text and boxes and shadows and oh my eyes hurt!

2. knows enough to be dangerous, likes to poke around, has a pc at home and downloads mp3s, chats on IM, plays games, and really, really wants to be able to do that while at work (and thus is always screwing around with system settings).

The latter of which is perfectly capable of learning the Linux env, or mastering Windows intuitively. And the former is guaranteed to be confused by a microwave without a timer dial.

Re:Developing countries and OSS

[Suchetha]

i would like to know. when and where did you promote it? how come you guys didn't give it the kind of promotion it deserves (media and all that).

last time i tried to join the Computer Professional's Club or whatever you call your little exclusive coterie i was told that since i don't have a degree i can't join.

i've been running a dotcom for ages, i cut my teeth on slackware in 1996, i've been spending more time on the net than i have been sleeping. and they tell me because i dropped out of uni i can't join.

am i bitter? fucking right i am. mainly because there are people like prof samaranayake trying to hold back the IT development in this country (i know all the stories and i am sure there are more) while people like us who are more dedicated to the DISTRIBUTION AND ADOPTION of foss are left in the cold.

so if you do read this post give me a holler. but as far as i know, the free software groups here are just like the rest of the organisations, full of internal politics and backstabbing

Suchetha

Re:Developing countries and OSS

[AnuradhaRatnaweera]

i would like to know. when and where did you promote it? how come you guys didn't give it the kind of promotion it deserves (media and all that).

We tried to give publicity as much as possible. But don't forget that we are just a group of individuals and not even a registered organization, and we don't have any budgets for a huge marketing campaign. And we don't want to do it either. We have been helping people on our mailing lists and other events without making much of a noice like many others do. Please check our site for more details.

last time i tried to join the Computer Professional's Club or whatever you call your little exclusive coterie i was told that since i don't have a degree i can't join.

You have been mistaken. This is not that. Anyone can join LKLUG (just subscribing to the mailing list would do). We don't have those hard and fast `rules and regulations' etc. Specifically, I don't have a digree either. ;-)

but as far as i know, the free software groups here are just like the rest of the organisations, full of internal politics and backstabbing

Please spend a bit of time on our mailing lists and the web site to see if there is any internal politics or beurocracies in our group. Hope you will find enough to change your mind.

We have created a nice Sinhala Linux interface. And we did it by our own interest. All of us are working for different organizations, and we found time in the night and weekends to do this.

Sorry that we missed you. If you had come, you will be happy to know that there are many goodies happenning in this little paradice. Anyway, please do communicate, and let's work together.

Re:Developing countries and OSS

[Anonymous Coward]

> Btw., I know a lot of idiots using Linux, what
> does that tell us?

Well they don't use Slackware.

Slackware RULEZ.

Re:Developing countries and OSS

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh the irony;-)

Re:Developing countries and OSS

[Tezkah]

P.S.: Just because a lot of idiots use Windows doesn't mean any idiot can use it. Btw., I know a lot of idiots using Linux, what does that tell us?

That um... uh... we should use FreeBSD?

Copenhagen event pictures

[HenrikOxUK]

I apologise to our Danish friends for Slashdotting their server, but I just had to share this gallery from the Copenhagen event (It was a world-wide day, not just Asia). Check the penguin and devil suits :)

They write in the SFD wiki:

Update: Our Local event was a huge success!

We handed out 300 CD's in little less than an hour.... We also had 500 balloons promoting the day, and we gave out balloons to every stroller, child and adult who wanted one - in fact people came over to our booth asking for free balloons....

The balloons were red with white text, saying Software Freedom Day 2004 on the front and having penguin footprints on the back.

We had help from about 25 volunteers, a large Tux, a little Tux and a daemon

All the volunteers were wearing red t-shirts with white text, saying Software Freedom Day 2004 on the front and "Free Software er foran" at the back. The text in Danish has two meanings, first "Free Software is at the frontier" (we are ahead), second - you could get your free copy of the CDs, at the front of the person wearing the t-shirt....

It was very fun - and its not the last time we are willing to do this!

The Boston team handed out 450 CD packs in the park, in Goa, India 200 people got together to celebrate, etc. (reports are still coming in)

Re:Copenhagen event pictures

[HenrikOxUK]

To be fair, I guess I should also Slashdot the gallery of the Dutch team in Arnhem.

Microsoft will always try

[KitFox]

They want to make sure that more people are ingrained with the "need" for Windows, so that they will keep using it. Almost like a drug addiction. So they came out with Windows XP Starter Edition, in an effort to target the low end markets. However, as a Google News Search shows, XP Starter Edition is a bust... Sure, they are selling it "cheap", but honestly, according to reviews of features, it's worse than crippled shareware that is given away for free.

Overall, I'm happy that people in those countries will not be starting life addicted to the drug Microsoft sells, and start with a clean slate. And when 2 billion users in China are using Linux, maybe we'll get more games that run under it. ;)

Re:Microsoft will always try

[SpectralOne]

Yeah, but you won't be able to afford the games that they SELL back to you using your free work, while you work at McDonalds for minimum wage in the US. Yay.

Re:Microsoft will always try

[KitFox]

But if the games are targeting "Quantity sales at lower volume" in the low income countries, then they should be affordable to everybody. Even the people who work at Mccy D's in China. (Note: I actually work as a contractor for the DHS. Still broke, but not as bad as could be.)

Re:Microsoft will always try

[RWerp]

But if the games are targeting "Quantity sales at lower volume" in the low income countries, then they should be affordable to everybody.

They are. The trick is, not to buy them when they hit the market, but one-two years after, when they appear bundled with magazines or in some 'Games Classics' collections. The price drops by a factor of 3-5 or more. After all, if you can't afford to buy a fresh game, you surely can't afford to buy hardware it needs, can you?

new software markets

[SpectralOne]

It's your choice: improve the economy of the US by selling software to new foreign markets and maintain the success and standard of living that the US enjoys, or give it away for free and see other countries begin to take the lead. While there is no issue with giving aid in the form of food, clean water and housing, handing out blueprints for CPUs and operating systems is another thing altogether. Don't give up the competitive advantage unless you like Indian food so much you're willing to move there to get a job.

Re:new software markets

[Anonymous Coward]

It's this kind of attitude that is going to make us weaker in terms of competitive advantage when the aliens start attacking. C'mon, we are all humans. Give them the plans for the cpus. Give them the software.

Who cares if they make some money and we lose some? We are all going to die anyway. It's inevitable! Perhaps they'll come up with something interesting enough to take our minds off the inevitable abyss of cold black death for a bit.

Oh, and India, although parts are bad, is hardly a third world country. They have fucking nukes.

Re:new software markets

[Secret Agent X23]

It's your choice: improve the economy of the US by selling software to new foreign markets and maintain the success and standard of living that the US enjoys, or give it away for free and see other countries begin to take the lead.

If the U.S. economy depends on selling Windows to third-world nations, we have far worse problems than even the deepest, darkest pessimist could ever have imagined.

Re:new software markets

[Teun]

You are clearly no economist, neither am I.
Yet I understand that trade with developed countries is for all parties so much more rewarding than with the underdeveloped.
Why can't you grasp this?

Why would others take the lead when you give something to them, at best it makes them equal.
When they can take the lead you must have stood still yourself.

Re:new software markets

[SpectralOne]

Take a look around; the world economy is not built on equality. For countries to prosper, there has to be an underdog. It's unfortunate, but true throughout history. When the US is surrounded by equals, the economy will be weakened by the world-pie being split into more pieces.

US has an important stake in the UN, right ?

[Anonymous Coward]

So the US will simply, in the long term, block or veto stuff like this; at the behest of its own software industry. It also means that the MS and buddies will pony up a little bit of cash to lobby UN people. And if you're really cynical, then you could argue that this is a veiled attempt by the UN to start taxing an industry for its money: 'give us so many lobby dollars or we will promote free software in the developing world.' Not unlike the scare tactics used by some of the (local/national) governments of this world recently.

Re:US has an important stake in the UN, right ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Last I checked IBM, SUN, Oracle, HP, etc were all US companies, so what exactly is your point here?

Re:US has an important stake in the UN, right ?

[bbbl67]

If open source is more accepted in the developing world, then the need to pirate commercial software will not be there. How can you pirate something that is already free?

Re:US has an important stake in the UN, right ?

[Elektroschock]

The funny thing is how little money we need in order to have huge lobbying impact. On the international level the lobbying of Brazil really makes a difference. Hope the world summint on the Information society II in Tunesia will be another great show of FOSS adoption.

Goa, India

[HenrikOxUK]

Frederick Noronha in Goa writes:

On August 28, 2004 -- the last Saturday in the month -- some 200 students gathered to mark Software Freedom Day at the Rayeshwar Institute of Technology, in Goa.

This three-years young engineering college is seated atop a hilltop at the seemingly remote village of Shiroda, about 40 kilometres from Goa's state-capital Panaji (also called Panjim). Goa has 1.4 million inhabitants, and is a former Portuguese colony along the Indian west coast.
...
Among the speakers was former Goa education minister Subhash Shirodkar, who said: "The idea of freedom needs to be strong in this country of Mahatma Gandhi. I would never tolerate the clutches of bondage -- whether it is economic or educational,"

Back to the roots

[Anonymous Coward]

Isn't empowering people one of the main ideas of free software? So giving people that until now had no means to use modern information systems the opportunity to finally participate is great and somehow at the heart of the free software movement.

Don't get me wrong, I think it is great that Linux (or rather GNU/Linux) is making inroads in corporate environments and has a lot of backing from big business like IBM, HP, etc., but I sometimes got the impression that the most important idea behind free software, giving the people means to make more of their lives, somehow slipped into the background recently.

So in this sense this is really going back to the roots of free software and that's a good thing.

Re:Back to the roots

[Anonymous Coward]

I think there is a bigger and more daunting divide in areas of healthcare, nutrition, agriculture etc. Computers and computing are a peripheral aspect of existence for most 3rd World people. The UN should focus on agriculture etc. and work to abolish subsidies, rather than getting into the software business.

Re:Back to the roots

[808140]

Nowadays, computers are really rather like telephones -- they are tools that facilitate communication. With a working IT infrastructure, hospitals can be networked, allowing doctors to transfer medical data relevant to patients to specialists at home and abroad, and they have access to a great deal of the world's information. And these days, thanks to FOSS and Moore's Law, "good-enough" computers can be had on the cheap.

Your post is essentially like saying, "What do they need telephones for? They still have problems feeding themselves!", as if having the former were a prerequisite for having the latter. Economic investment results in economic growth, which betters the lives of the common people.

Problems should be attacked in parallel, not sequentially.

Not so

[DigiShaman]

I would say Bill Gates doesn't mind. In fact, he might even give away a special edition of Window just so he "indoctrinate" the youth and thus lead that generation to the life of Microsoft. Think about it. Once your a Windows user, most people stay that way. But if you started off using Mac, then that will be your religious..err..I mean..user friendly path in life.

Re:Not so

[Anonymous Coward]

The first hit's always free...

Re:Not so

[thephotoman]

In F/OSS, so is every subsequent hit.

Re:Not so

[Anonymous Coward]

I know that Who's on first, but what about the identity of the right fielder? That one wasn't in the routine!

'I' was in right field.

*"You were??"

No. 'I' was.

Re:Not so

[thephotoman]

Totally OT, but as long as we're at it, I might as well provide my hypothesis that "Nobody" was in right field. Furthermore, Mr. Nobody (this is MLB, so there wouldn't be women) is left-handed...so not only does he play right field, Nobody hits to right field.

Dupe of old, misleading article

[helarno]

Argh. This is a dupe (though not Timothy's fault). The BBC picked up on and added to the original article by David Lugard, that Slashdot previously linked to here. The IOSN guys contacted them, requested a correction and in the process supplied BBC with additional information about what was done. However, the article, like all those based on the original IDG/Infoworld article, is misleading. The IOSN was merely publicizing the event and if you clicked through the link, you would see that. (Assuming it's not /.'ed. It was down the whole of last week due to two consecutive postings onto Slashdot.)

Software Freedom Day's true website is at www.softwarefreedomday.org and credit should go to the great guys there who did so much to organize and publicize it, including the OpenCD people (Henrik) and others.

Re:Dupe of old, misleading article

[HenrikOxUK]

Thanks. Phil Harper, Frederick Noronha, Matt Oquist and Jules Siedenburg were also key organisers of SFD and a large number of local team leaders and participants did an excellent job too!

- Henrik

Re:Dupe of old, misleading article

[headisdead]

Just to clarify my reasons for submitting the story: it was not to engage in a pro-UN propaganda exercise. Nor was it to promote the extremely good work by the people at Software Freedom Day. It was more to raise interest and debate in this particular instance of an international organisation's role in free software/oss, and the exponential number of issues which radiate out from that fact. Apologies for any confusion ;)

More event pictures

[HenrikOxUK]

From Boston, Goa and Oxford here. (These are from the main SFD site, where traffic is getting heavy)

F/OSS Won't Save The World

[reallocate]

The primary advantage of F/OSS compared with proprietary software is that it can be acquired without cost. That's a big advantage. Once acquired, though, very real costs are incurred in installing, training, and maintaining. Sys admins do not work for free, regardless of the development model used by their OS.

Microsoft could, presumably, reduce the cost advantage of F/OSS by cutting the price of Windows. While the loss of potential revenue would be large in countries as populous as India or China, it would be much easier to absorb in small countries like Bhutan, Lesotho, or Gambia.

The consequence is that MS is in a position to make Windows cheaper to acquire, and, potentially, to reduce the cost of support it provides directly. F/OSS, on the other hand, cannot reduce the acquisition cost of its products and has no real control over the cost of support.

Many Western eyes typically fail to see the differences throughout the underdeveloped world. Some nations have a burgeoning IT sector and a veneer of prosperity riding atop massive poverty. Opprtunities for indivudal economic success are present in some countries, while in others opportunity is stifled by ideology or religion, corruption, and incompetence.

Many nations cannot (or do not care enough to) provide their populations with safe drinking water, minimal health care, and sufficient caloric intake. Rather than conjuring visions of besting Microsoft in these markets, the F/OSS community would be of better service if it conjured ways to use its products to enable these nations to tackle those more pressing problems.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[Anonymous Coward]

The primary advantage of F/OSS compared with proprietary software is that it can be acquired without cost. That's a big advantage.

The greatest advantage is Freedom. Stallman didn't create the free software movement because he wanted software for no cost. He wanted freedom.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[Anonymous Coward]

"The primary advantage of F/OSS compared with proprietary software is that it can be acquired without cost."

No, the real advantage of F/OSS as you call it is that it can actually be acquired. You can't acquire Windows, you can only get a license to use it.

Now why does this matter? Because the open source model gives a lot of countries a far better opportunity to develop their own IT infrastructure then Windows will ever be able to do. That is probably the main reason why countries like China and South Africa are so interested in open source software.

"Many nations cannot (or do not care enough to) provide their populations with safe drinking water, minimal health care, and sufficient caloric intake. Rather than conjuring visions of besting Microsoft in these markets, the F/OSS community would be of better service if it conjured ways to use its products to enable these nations to tackle those more pressing problems."

And the community does. Believe it or not but there are many projects that are working exactly in this field.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[vadim_t]

And your point is?

I've been to a very interesting conference by (IIRC), Marcelo Branco about Free Software in Brasil at HispaLinux.

He very convincingly explained, that Free Software *does* help. In countries that aren't filthy rich, the Microsoft tax is actually very significant, and makes a lot of money go to Microsoft instead of being used for something useful. When Brasil buys thousands of Windows licenses, that's millions that are going to Microsoft, instead of the local industry.

The mistake you seem to be commiting is the same as the people who say we shouldn't explore space before we solve poverty on earth. Well, I've got some news for you.

Many of those things are related. Of course, Free Software won't save the world. However, if we get countries to switch to Free Software, they'll stop sending money to Microsoft and instead use it to feed their own computer scientists.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[808140]

My sibling posts say the same thing I'm going to: the true advantage of Free Software is freedom. But let me explain why.

Microsoft is seen worldwide as a very successful American corporation. This is not surprising, because, well, it is. Many countries (China in particular) are nervous about allowing an American corporation to control their IT infrastructure with so many little black boxes.

The Chinese government did not choose to move towards OSS because it likes Linux's interface more, or because it costs less than MS. It's moving in that direction because Linux, and all free software, is trustworthy. Cost doesn't factor in. With Linux, they have an enterprise level operating system that scales to absurd numbers of processors that can be audited and modified. A starting point, if you will. They know there are no backdoors because they can take a look.

Microsoft and Sun and most of the big guys offer "Shared Source" like systems that seem to offer the same deal, but it isn't the same at all. Because while you're welcome to take a look at the source, you're not free to change it. And with a vendor comes vendor lock-in; for example, suppose the Chinese government buys MS's bit and goes for Windows instead of Linux, using MS's shared source initiative as a means to "look through" the code. They do this, and build their entire infrastructure on MS solutions. Write their documents in Word. Etc. After a few years of this, MS could just stop offering the Shared Source initiative. Stop allowing their code to be audited. And by then, the Chinese gov't is screwed, big time. They know they should dump MS, but they can't; their whole country runs on the stuff, depends on its proprietary formats, etc.

But Linux will always be free. There is no evil American corporation controlling it, possibly putting backdoors into its software to steal your most precious secrets. Because its source is open and documented, there can be no format lock-in.

For foreign governments with no reason to trust the US or anything that comes out of it, the fact that Linux is free as in freedom, rather than free as in cost, is the true selling point.

As an aside, your point about Linux requiring sysadmins, support (and thus actually costing money and not being truly for-free) etc is a non-starter. This is trivially true of all software. Microsoft/Sun/etc software also have maintenance and support costs. Unless you're saying that the cost of obtaining MS/Sun/etc software PLUS the cost of maintaining it over a long period of time is lower than just the cost of maintaining a free system, you have no point. If you are saying that, it's just MS's "lower TCO" argument in disguise, which has been dissected here a million times and which not many of us believe, so I won't bother ripping into it.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[reallocate]

What's that got to do with improving health, education, economies and governments? Stallman is an ideologue. The world already has too many of them.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[reallocate]

Last I looked, there was also a license encumbering my use of open source. The GPL makes it rather difficult to make money with open source, which is a more pressing issue than developing an IT infrastructure.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[reallocate]

>> ...if we get countries to switch to Free Software, they'll stop sending money to Microsoft and instead use it to feed their own computer scientists.

Dream on.

As I said, it's only the initial acquisition that's free. It costs money to support IT regardless of whose software you're using.

I didn't say that we need to "solve poverty" before doing anything else. To the contrary, actually.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[reallocate]

And you would trust the current Chinese government more than you would MS? Geez. If anyone is going to spy on the Chinese people, its the Chinese government.

My point about support costs, as I said, is that MS is in a postion to both lower the cost of acquiring its software and of lowering the cost of buying its support, if it chooses to do that. The free software community cannot do that, because its product is already free and it provides no direct support.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[808140]

No one is talking about me, or the individual consumer; we're talking about government contracts. In this case, the Chinese government is the consumer, and Microsoft is the corp vying for the contract.

So I don't really understand what "And you would trust the current Chinese government more than you would MS? ..." has to do with it.

If the Chinese government goes Linux, this will put a great deal of pressure on corporations wanting to interact with the Chinese government to make a similar switch.

The crap about the Chinese government spying on its own people is completely irrelevant. But I suspect you knew that.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[legirons]

"The primary advantage of F/OSS compared with proprietary software is that it can be acquired without cost."

No, the primary advantage is that you can use it freely and without restictions. Cost is a side-benefit. While it's nice to argue pros and cons of getting an operating system for $30, the real benefit is that once you've found something you like, you can install it on all of your computers, update it whenever you like, and all this without ever having to worry about licensing restrictions.

As in,
Proprietary: "This program looks neat, I'd better read some reviews to find out whether it's worth the money, then reccomend it to my boss, who can look in the budget and decide whether to instruct the purchasing department to get one copy for my computer. If I need to share files with my group, we'll need another 10 licenses"

Free: "This program looks neat, I'll download it and start using it to see whether it helps me. If I need to share files with my group, they can download the program from our intranet server"

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[Anonymous Coward]

"And you would trust the current Chinese government more than you would MS? Geez. If anyone is going to spy on the Chinese people, its the Chinese government."

Ouch, parent doesn't say that. He simply says what he thinks (and imho rightly so) is the position of the Chinese government. He doesn't say anything about what he thinks of the Chinese government, nor does he in any way compare MS to the Chinese government.

"My point about support costs, as I said, is that MS is in a postion to both lower the cost of acquiring its software and of lowering the cost of buying its support, if it chooses to do that. The free software community cannot do that, because its product is already free and it provides no direct support."

Once again, there is a difference between what you get when you acquire open source software and when you acquire a license to use Windows. So even if MS lowered it's prices it would not be comparable.

Finally about MS lowering the prices for support. They can of course do that as can any company providing support for open source software so I really fail to see your point.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[Alioth]

I think you're missing his point. Of course it costs something to support. But with Microsoft software, you are spending $BIGNUM_LICENSING acquiring + $BIGNUM_SUPPORT supporting. With Free software you're only spending $BIGNUM_SUPPORT and not sending the equivalent of $BIGNUM_LICENSING overseas.

Even if $FREE_SOFTWARE_SUPPORT costs as much as $BIGNUM_SUPPORT + $BIGNUM_LICENSING (which is unlikely), all that money is staying *within your country* instead of leaving it because the people doing the extra support are all part of your local economy.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[vadim_t]

Wow, you managed to miss it. Let me try again.

Option A:
Brasil pays Microsoft for Windows, Office and tech support.
Result: money goes to MS, which is in the US

Option B:
Brasil pays less to a local Linux distro for the packaging and support.
Result: money goes citizens of Brasil

Yes, both options cost money. However, with option B it's somebody in Brasil who gets paid, instead of MS getting richer.

Why option B overall costs less? Because Brasil only needs to pay for what it really needs to be well supported. Citizens can get Linux for free, with the result of having more money for buying food or something else. Schools can have it for free if they want. And the ones who pay, benefit the local economy.

You also seem to ignore that wages are much lower in some places. My aunt, who works as a university teacher in Russia earned somewhere about $100 US a month the last time I asked. Now, doesn't the price of Windows seem to be rather significant when that's your wage?

See?

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[Anonymous Coward]

*Sigh*

1. There is a difference between actually acquiring a software that is under certain license and acquiring a license to use a certain software.

2. Yes, the GPL poses certain restrictions on someone who wants to change the code and distribute the software, namely you'll have to license the software under the GPL so that others can enjoy the same freedoms you did. Note that you will only be subject to this restriction if you actually distribute the software.
Besides, try changing the Windows source code and then redistribute the result. ;-D

3. You assertion that the GPL make it difficult to make money with open source is pure FUD. Or to put it more mildly, IBM, HP, Oracle, Sun, SAP and a lot of my friends who make their living with open source software would tend to disagree.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[reallocate]

Nope, you argued that people shouldn't trust American coporations for fear of backdoors in their software.

Compared to the existing oppression of the Chinese people by their government, that concern seems a bit less worrisome.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[Anonymous Coward]

Nope, he didn't!

He said the Chinese government doesn't trust an American corporation.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[reallocate]

Of course, there is a differencd between what you get from open source and what you get from MS. And, of course, at any price that difference would remain,

But, then, that's not what I said, is it? I said MS can lower its software acquistion prices. Free software cannot; it is already free. MS could also lower the price of contract support. Sure, open source companies could also do that, but my guess is they don't have a $40 billion cushion.

I'm not arguing against open source and for MS. I'd just like to see a little more realism and a lot less ideological fervor.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[reallocate]

That's essentially a restatement of my original post. You are assuming, of course, that domestic support can be purchased.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[vadim_t]

Ok, then please restate what you're saying in a different way, because I just don't get it. Take this post for example:

>> ...if we get countries to switch to Free Software, they'll stop sending money to Microsoft and instead use it to feed their own computer scientists.

Dream on.

As I said, it's only the initial acquisition that's free. It costs money to support IT regardless of whose software you're using.

So, which part of what I said doesn't make sense? If Microsoft software was replaced by a local Linux distro, wouldn't the money spent go instead to the local industry, where it'd feed local computer experts?

Yes, software costs money to support. So what about it? With OSS, money spent on support is spent paying local system administrators and local programmers. In poor countries, wages are typically pretty low as well, so local support would be also much cheaper. And why couldn't it be purchased?

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[reallocate]

Money that countries save is likely to go to a myriad of places rather than domestic computer scientists. In many countries, a substantial chunk of that money would, very likely, go into the pocket of the minister in charge of the product.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[vadim_t]

Ok, now I seriously don't get it.

Yeah, it may not be computer scientists. Maybe part of it is used to pay somebody to wipe the floor, or to upgrade the server room. It'd still be better than paying MS.

And sure, corruption can happen. But what does that have to do with what we've been talking about? It's a fundamentally different problem.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[pisco_sour]

Is is true that all software requires maintenance and support, but even though that's especially true of Linux and OSS, I think that comes as an added plus, especially when related to large-scale deployment in developing countries. With proprietary software, the money goes to licenses mostly and perhaps some kind of support deal, and most support issues will probably be dealt with tech support outside the developing countries. In other words, they just get shiny new software, but little on the side (although there's definitely always something on the side, it's just little).

On the other hand, I see OSS as a great way to push the development of new job sectors and technology markets within a country. Your license costs becomes nil, but that same money (which a government, for example, would probably be investing anyway) now goes to local tech staff and engineers who will not only install the services but also run and maintain them. New jobs created. And, since it's all open source, you don't have to settle with what comes out of the box, but you can actually have it tailored to your needs, using, of course, local programmers. New jobs.

Not only does that bring more money into the local IT markets, but having the software open in the future you leave the door open for expansion and thus needing more support and maintenance people, which could lead to a bigger importance in IT education and government and private spending in the sector.

I'd rather see all that money companies and governments usually shell out for XP licenses and such -which amount to really big bucks- being driven into something which, for the country and themselves, will serve a higher purpose in the long run. Not only that, but actually proving to be more useful, as you now have local support for anything and full customization at your disposal, instead of having to settle for what MS or any other company might provide you (like 3-piece multitasking or something).

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[bitswapper]

If you're a country that the US *might* choose to invade/liberate, wouldn't you be a little nervous about having sensitive information on systems run by a software from a corporation that gets special treatment from the US government? It would be unreasonable not to be nervous. The entire 'whose nicer, msoft or the chinese government' line is a red herring.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[reallocate]

You asserted that money saved buying open source would be transferred to domestic computer scientists. I find that naive and believe much of it could be drain off via corruption. It is relevant because it reduces the value returned from using open source.

Re:F/OSS Won't Save The World

[vadim_t]

Now you're just completely obviously trolling.

Corruption would be something completely independent of whether they're paying a local distribution or Microsoft. And heck, even in the corruption case some of that money could be used to pay for a new house for the corrupt person, which would at least involve some of it going to the local industry while giving it to MS is a 100% warranty that it won't happen.

You could as well argue that lowering the price of oil won't make a difference, because businesses will simply pocket the difference. Some will try of course, but there's such a thing as capitalism, and they'll be in a disadvantage respecting to those who lower the prices.

Developing countries get a head start

[erik_norgaard]

I think that the developing countries in this area have a real advantage: Since the dependency of IT in the public sector is far behind the industrial countries, they have not been locked in! They have the full freedom to choose without having to consider huge migration costs.

Microsoft is aware of this, I guess that's why they have made light versions available in some asian countries and are planning to sell this product in more countries. Also, they will probably benefit from the lockin due to software piracy.

Even if pirate copies are available, or Microsoft offers software for free, there are numerous examples of developing countries taking a step in direction of OSS. They have seen the long term consequences of M$ lockin.

Re:Developing countries get a head start

[Anonymous Coward]

What you describe is a well known phenomena of technology generation skipping. As a society develops it often jumps to the very latest tech from nothing at all instead of going through all the historical stages inbetween. For instance Portugal has one of the finest telephone systems in europe, but outside of Lisbon it virtualy appeared overnight by line of sight microwave and satellite coms, they had no huge copper legacy to factor into the economics. We are getting to a stage where development is so fast that we see a development inertia caused by the weight of vested interests in established tech which is already obsoleted. That is to say, your choices are restricted more by what you already have than by what is is possible or imaginable. The Microsoft case is just one example.

FOSS makes a difference

[Elektroschock]

Question is, can Free Software really stem the tide when other sustainal development projects are struggling so much?"

Yes, it can. OSS development models can also solve problems where traditional development can't. Such as: localized software for non-latin languages.

Another great potential use of free software could happen in the field of maschine translation.

Re:FOSS makes a difference

[808140]

Well, to be pedantic, other software development models can (and have) been able to overcome such barriers as localized software for non-european languages (I presume when you said non-latin you really meant languages that use a non-latin script; English, in particular, is non-latin, so you can't have actually meant non-latin).

There's nothing stopping most corporations from supporting languages like Chinese and Thai except laziness, pure and simple. OSS has had the edge in this arena for two reasons:

1. No profit motive. It has classically not been profitable to support languages spoken in third world countries, or in countries where the population was relatively small. Because OSS developers don't care about money (usually), this doesn't matter.
2. Developed over the internet in an open way. This has allowed developers speaking minority languages to "scratch their itch" and localize apps they use frequently. In a corporate model, this doesn't work because a) techies hired in Europe or the US don't usually completely understand the complexities of non-roman scripts, etc. and b) closed source means that translation by users has not generally been feasible.

Consider though: for point 1, a profit motive is developing. China, India, Thailand, etc are actually becoming markets that software companies care about being a part of, if only to keep Linux and OSS from getting a hold there.

For point 2, outsourcing is guaranteeing that there are lots of folks in the third world collaborating closely with company in question, meaning that access to native speakers of problem languages is becoming less of a problem. It's not just outsourcing, it's globalization as a whole.

In my opinion, the corps will never be able to compete with Free Software on the localization front, because all it takes to get a free program localized is someone annoyed enough by it not being. Still, the lead we have right now on the important languages will probably be closed. We'll still win when it comes to software available in Twi, Esperanto, Breton, and other "minority" languages, but you can bet that the corps aren't going to let us have China and India without a fight.

Of course, even if they fight, we'll still win.

Re:FOSS makes a difference

[Elektroschock]

english does use a latin character set. I mean languages such as hindi, arabic, Russian, Japanese with a different character set. these are popular charater sets but there may be less potential languages that are written by "poor people". Try to get a localized version of a software product (a texteditor shareware) in Hindi. Hindi is nothing special. With Foss you could do it yourself.

Re:FOSS makes a difference

[Iffy Bonzoolie]

I think he's pointing out the difference between Romance (Latin) languages - languages that are derived from latin (e.g. French, Spanish, Italian, Portugese), and languages that just use a latin character set (English, German, Vietnamese [sorta]).

Elementary school teachers still teach that English is a Romance language, so it is a common misconception. (English is more closely related to German.)

-If

Ease of use - anecdote

[pedestrian crossing]

A friend's daughter (13 years old) was at our house this weekend, and wanted to "play on the computer", which is loaded with straight-up Debian.

She watched me click on the menus to pull up a couple of games, and then she was good to go. She played and had a good time all afternoon, exploring the selection of games (Frozen Bubbles and Defenguin were her favorites).

Her comment at the end of the day was "you sure have a cool computer to play on". I think inexperience actually -helps-, as there is nothing to unlearn. Clicking on icons is clicking on icons, I have watched a lot of people sit down on my Deb system and just start "doing stuff". I have noticed that the hard-core Windows users have the hardest time, but the casual users really have no problem.

Re:Ease of use - anecdote

[Secret Agent X23]

Clicking on icons is clicking on icons, I have watched a lot of people sit down on my Deb system and just start "doing stuff".

I wish I had a mod point for you. I had pretty much the same experience with my now-16-year-old daughter about three years ago. At that time, I was trying out Red Hat on a dual-boot system. The kids' computer, on Win98, wasn't working because of a hard drive problem I hadn't fixed yet.

So the kid needs to use the computer to look up something on the net for school. I let her sit down at my computer. She finds the Mozilla icon on the desktop, and off she goes. Looks up what she needs, and then -- as she'll do -- visits some other web sites she likes, checks Yahoo mail, etc.

Then it's time to write her report. She finds the Open Office icon, clicks on it, writes the report and prints it out with no comment except that this is a different word processor than the one she has on her computer. But she was able to figure out how to use it because she had used word processors before.

The only time I had to intervene was to find her a place on the hard drive to save her file (which I would have had to do in Windows as well). And the whole time, she never had any inkling that she wasn't in Windows.

All three kids have been using Linux since shortly after that, and they love it.

in sri lanka

[Suchetha]

as part of the trade agreement to ensure that the sri lankan garment industry gets a good deal in the multi-fiber agreement, SLGOV signed an IP protection treaty with the US.

a friend of my father's when to meet one fo the signers of both 'agreements' and asked "you signed that agreement to save the garment industry, and did you ever stop to think what would happen to the village/smalltown kid who wants to buy a bootleg copy of windows for 100rs (1usd), do you want him to have to pay 100USD for it??"

the response was "i didn't know about that side of it"

morons

anyway as a celebration for FSD (free software day) we didn't do JACK SHIT as far as i know (despite the post on it stating that something was supposed to happen). so in order to maintain the theme, i went and shoplifted myself a free beer

Suchetha

(and i know i know, they should be getting free linux cd's instead of bootlegging windows, but frell it.. they wanna play games, they DON'T want to spend time compiling kernels, they barely speak ENGLISH for fuck's sake)

Re:in sri lanka

[The Cydonian]

Would be interesting to see exactly what has changed with the new IP protection treaty. Like I said in an earlier post, most post-colonial nations actually have pretty stringent copyright laws; my gut feeling is that the Windows bootleg was illegal even without the treaty.

Wait... you telling me that Harry Potter VCD I bought at Sirimavo Intl Airport for SL Rs 300 is ILLEGAL?! :-)

Re:in sri lanka

[Suchetha]

and over priced, its 200rs for a DVD, 110 for a vcd

i'll post an analysis to my journal as soon as i can get one

but in a realistic sense, we didn't have much of an IP law system, basing it on the British legal system and Roman Dutch Law. most of the precedents in use today have been set in the 1800's (yes really)

and all of a sudden we seem to be using the same level of IP law as the US. more to come

suchetha

Re:in sri lanka

[The Cydonian]

and over priced, its 200rs for a DVD, 110 for a vcd

NO wonder that female couldn't stop smiling! And there I was, thinking I've gotten a huge bargain... (just spent like four times on DVD's that amount at Singapore before flying over to SL)

but in a realistic sense, we didn't have much of an IP law system, basing it on the British legal system and Roman Dutch Law. most of the precedents in use today have been set in the 1800's (yes really)

Yup, the precedent I can think of is in India during a cricket series. ESPN/Star and the (state-run) Doordarshan basically fought over those rights; the courts finally gave their decision based on, I'm not kidding, The Telegraph Act of 1897. My point is that most countries have some fair amount of IPR protection, although you're right, not to the extent to which the US has now.

Btw, we're facing a similar situation out here in Singapore; gov.sg recently signed an FTA with the US. Which (may be?) is good and all for trade, but fact is, we now have a DMCA-clone here, and yup, playing around with your satellite stream is a criminal act.

Should be interesting to read your JE on this; looking forward to it!

[link] Gates on piracy (original)

[leonbrooks]

Open Letter to Hobbyists

Top line: "Who can afford to do professional work for nothing?" Boy, has that one been thoroughly answered! (-:

Re:[link] Gates on piracy (original)

[Nicholas Evans]

What hobbyist can put 3-man years into programming, finding all bugs, documenting his product and distribute for free?

That has also been answered quite well.

[link] Microsoft _wants_ you to "pirate" software

[leonbrooks]

c|net interview 2 jul 1998

Key phrase: "As long as they are going to steal it, we want them to steal ours. They'll get sort of addicted, and then we'll somehow figure out how to collect sometime in the next decade."

[link] Bill gates prophecies the FOSS movement

[leonbrooks]

Jan 2000 transcript of 1980 interview

"If something's expensive to develop, and somebody's not going to get paid, it won't get developed. So you decide: Do you want software to be written, or not?"

We've decided, Bill, now stop hogging The Road Ahead, OK? (-:

[link] Bill Gates & the value of truth (soberi

[leonbrooks]

from this list of quotes

"There won't be anything we won't say to people to try and convince
them that our way is the way to go."

"There are people who don't like capitalism, and people who don't like
PCs. But there's no-one who likes the PC who doesn't like Microsoft"

"Microsoft has not changed any of its plans for Windows. It is
obvious that we will not include things like threads and preemptive
multitasking in Windows. By the time we added that, you would have OS/2."

"I know not a single less irrelevant reason for an update than bugfixes.
The reasons for updates are to present more new features."

"Imagine the disincentive to software development if after months of work
another company could come along and copy your work and market it under
it's own name [...] without legal restraints to such copying, companies like
Apple could not afford to advance the state of the art." - presumably he was foreshadowing Windows 3, which was a clone of Apple's Mac (well, Lisa) interface, which was a clone of Xerox's original "Palo Alto" WIMP interface. If that statement had been more ironic, you could pick it up with a magnet.

Support

[hughk]

If you choose MS, you are pretty much locked in to their support. Well, it is a binary. With Linux, or any other FOSS, there is no lock-in so local resources may provide support. Ok, you may have to pay for the support, but if it is local, it is easier to afford than paying a multinational company.

Software is a tool that helps.

[twitter]

F/OSS, on the other hand, cannot reduce the acquisition cost of its products and has no real control over the cost of support.

You must have been reading some of those M$ "Get the Facts" publications to think that free software ever costs more than Microsoft based junk. I can't think of anyplace that's true.

Many nations cannot (or do not care enough to) provide their populations with safe drinking water, minimal health care, and sufficient caloric intake. Rather than conjuring visions of besting Microsoft in these markets, the F/OSS community would be of better service if it conjured ways to use its products to enable these nations to tackle those more pressing problems.

Free software provides tools for people to solve their own problems and does so with much leaner hardware. Once a free driver for a piece of hardware is made, that hardware is never obsoleted by an OS version change. Free compilers for working hardware are useful in providing food, water and health care. From administration and records keeping to equipment automation, free software can do anything and more than Microsoft can, but better and cheaper. That's why the UN is starting to push it over commercial software.

Free software use may be another area, like cell phones instead of POTS, where developing markets are more efficient than developed ones.

Re:Software is a tool that helps.

[reallocate]

I didn't say free software "ever costs more" than MS. I said what I said. Go read it again.

I'm not asserting that people should use MS in preference to free software. One more time, read what I wrote. Is it factually wrong? Can free software be any cheaper than free? Does the free software community run a business providing support? No, so it can have no impact on the cost of support. MS, if it chooses, can give Windows away and cut the cost of its paid support.

Note, if you will, that that isn't an argument in favor of using MS. It's just a statement of fact.

Re:Software is a tool that helps.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, as you know a 486 should be sufficient to run any large multinational corporation, as long as you're not using Micro$oft crap.

Please... Win NT, -not- 98

[ivi]

Better yet... Win 2000 Pro

(Both 98 & NT don't run Skype... ;-)

I note nothing of the kind.

[twitter]

Note, if you will, that that isn't an argument in favor of using MS. It's just a statement of fact.

Your "facts" are less than convincing and your opinion, that software is no help or unimportant in developing markets, is simply wrong.

MS, if it chooses, can give Windows away and cut the cost of its paid support.

No they can't because they would quickly go out of business. Google has quicker and better answers than any paid "support" does anyway. Microsoft will never be cheaper for anyone to use than free software.

Re:I note nothing of the kind.

[reallocate]

1. I've not said "software is no help or unimportant in developing markets" or anything of the kind.

2. Tell me, if you need a staff of sys admins and floor support people to keep, let's say. your network of 26 servers running Lotus Notes on Linux, 13 application and database servers running Linux, plus a few web servers, along with several hundred client machines in several dispersed buildings, how you're gonna support that with Google??

SW Brodcast via DRM or DVB-S!

[radionacht]

Salve,
Open Source for the (developing) world would be good. One idee of mine is to broadcast a distribution via the Air (www.drm.org) or Satellite. Digital Radio Mondal allows to stream 16-24 kBit/s and Reciever should get RS232 or IrDA interfaces to receive Data like Programm infos, weather maps or vocabulary for languages.
-IMHO it would be nice to broadcaste once a year a selection of Debian all over the world, and security updates from time to time.
-A free DVB-S broadcast is IMHO realy no problem (e.g. every Sundy mornig 3:00h to 7:00h a.m.) Encrypted confing files and data could refinanciate such a broadcast.
-A sw drm broadcast would be more expensive and would take more time, some weeks/month to broadcast the Debian selection - but it could be an alternative beside burning CDs and sending them with snail-mail all over the world.
-Such a broadcastsystem would it make possible to install new software on manless wetherstations, "surface marker buoys" - scientists would have only to pay for ther config-files and own scripts and programs.
-Beside open source Software the Broacast should include documentations, tutorials, important webpages, mailing-lists, newsgroups and even radio shows about open software ;)

What do you think about this?
rob

Re:SW Brodcast via DRM or DVB-S!

[edittard]

I think that most third world[1] countries need to sort out things like removing kleptocratic elites, supporting the rule of law and feeding their citizens, before they start faffing around with computers.

[1] Ooops. I meant "developing". Honest. Don't shoot me Kofi!

Re:SW Brodcast via DRM or DVB-S!

[Anonymous Coward]

NO DRM! DRM = BAD!! We must never allow any open source development designed to steal human rights even exist at the first place!!!

Re:SW Brodcast via DRM or DVB-S!

[radionacht]

Salve,
please go to http://www.drm.org/ and see that Digital Radio Mondial is not BAD.
Digital Radio Mondial != Digital Right Managment.
Digital Radio Mondial allows 16-28kBit/s Broadcasts via SW, LW, MW (w=wave, not windows, ergo Short Wave, Long Wave, Medium Wave)
rob

gates roi

[mattr]

Bill Gates has donated perhaps $1G but his organization's attempts to lock in countries is worth much more.. and possibly his donations support that. Developing countries have 2 needs - they need to satisfy potentially destructive political realities, and once they've gotten beyond that they need to best leverage their assets to develop their future. If a country is being given official aid, so long as there is a viable free alternative (or lower cost when tco calculated), commercial interests have no business selling to them. Even giving it away for free is bad if it is done by a known rapacious monopoly, and risky even if done by other companies with lock-in tactics, for what is then really going on is a bargaining away of that country's potential, either by hapless individuals or far more likely, someone who intends to make a profit. Of course if Gates wants to invest a cool billion in cash altruistically that is another story. Perhaps a story we'd like to hear.. how do organizations in fact organize that level of giving and make sure it goes to good use? How can we believe Gates is altruistic when his company is the corporate equivalent of a gang-backed serial killer?

Re:not good

[Anonymous Coward]

What are you talking about Bill?
Your support for the UN or for free software?

The emporer is fully unclothed!

[pedestrian crossing]

My point about support costs, as I said, is that MS is in a postion to both lower the cost of acquiring its software and of lowering the cost of buying its support, if it chooses to do that. The free software community cannot do that, because its product is already free and it provides no direct support.

I am getting so tired of hearing this old canard.

I spend a lot of time supporting commercial software, and I support my own FOSS system, so I think I am in a position to argue this.

Commercial software support (even paid support) in general is no better than FOSS support. In fact, FOSS support is usually better. If you know how to ask, you can usually at least get a dialog with the actual developer of a FOSS product. If he says "fix it yourself", you can usually get someone with the capability to fix/enhance it at a fraction of the cost of a commercial support contract that doesn't provide anything beyond idiot help desk stuff. With a commercial product, you usually get the outsourced idiot help line, or even with a company that keeps that in house, you get third-line lackeys who can't/won't give you the straight story or real support. And customization? No comparison, with commercial software, this is a pipe dream, with FOSS, it is a concrete possibility.

My experience with developing countries is that there are a lot of young, smart people who are eager to do the coding that needs to be done. These countries don't have the resources to put into the abstracted RIP-OFF that most commercial "support" actually is.

Re:The emporer is fully unclothed!

[reallocate]

I'm not talking aout you supporting one system. I'm talking about businesses and institutions and government needing support for thousands of installations and hundreds of networks. That kind of support doesn't come from "young, smart people" eager to help out or from calling a help line. It comes from in-house or contract professional staff who expect to be paid.

Re:The emporer is fully unclothed!

[pedestrian crossing]

In this case, there is no difference between commercial products and free products.

The sort of support you are referring to has to come from somewhere, and has nothing to do with free/non-free.

The type of support that adds value to the product is the kind of support I referred to in the parent, getting added functionality, or getting broken functionality fixed.

I guess the question I pose is: what exactly is the "support" that the original post refers to? What is the support that you refer to? What value are vendors of commercial software adding beyond what is available for free?

In my experience, commercial vendor "support" doesn't mean jack.

F/OSS is a necessary part of saving the world

[Sunnan]

"Sys admins do not work for free, regardless of the development model used by their OS."

System adminstration costs is an issue orthogonal to whether or not a system is F/OSS or not.

Microsoft could, presumably, reduce the cost advantage of F/OSS by cutting the price of Windows.

A large part of the benefit of F/OSS is putting that pressure on Microsoft. It could be beneficial if Microsoft were to release their programs as free, open source software. To me, it seems so primitive and childish to bother with keeping software proprietary. It has no advantage for consumers or society.

Rather than conjuring visions of besting Microsoft in these markets, the F/OSS community would be of better service if it conjured ways to use its products to enable these nations to tackle those more pressing problems.

Agreed, but A) there are people doing that, or trying to do that, and B) people can do what they can, what they are good at. And even just "besting Microsoft" can prove to be vital in the third world, where Microsoft has the potential to become an even bigger problem than it already is (in it's role as corporate overlord).

Re:F/OSS is a necessary part of saving the world

[reallocate]

Why is it that only geeks say things like "orthogonal"?

I said sys admins aren't free, regardless of OS. That's true. It highlights the fact that free software is not cost-free.

What is with this "corporate overlord" stuff? Of course, it is unwise for any country to become dependent on any single source for IT, including the U.S. Ditto for any critical segment of its infrastructure. There have always been plenty of alternatives to Microsoft, and there still are, even ignoring free software. Sure, MS preloaded hardware via unsavory tactics, but no one held a gun to anyone and forced them to continue using Windows. If Linux can make inroads against Windows, even as small as they currently are, then something else could have done it earlier.

Re:F/OSS is a necessary part of saving the world

[Sunnan]

Why is it that only geeks say things like "orthogonal"?

It's natural to use the language and vocabulary at hand to form thoughts and express them, even if the words sometimes become clumsily multisyllabical. I guess it's just one of the drawbacks of being a geek.

What is with this "corporate overlord" stuff?

It's because large corporations are very powerful entities with very few checks.

There have always been plenty of alternatives to Microsoft, and there still are, even ignoring free software.

It's not "Microsoft vs other companies", or "Windows vs other operating systems". It's a matter of software freedom.

no one held a gun to anyone and forced them to continue using Windows

I don't know about that. What I do know is that there is, and have been, a massive propaganda push behind Windows and other proprietary programs, going back to the seventies.

These days, while shopping around for a desktop PC, what are you likely to find? "Our computers come with legitimate Windows XP pre-installed" - as if it was a necessary advantage, billed as a "feature"!

No gun, sure, but changing operating systems is a major hassle (Linus described it as "doing brain surgery on yourself").

Re:F/OSS is a necessary part of saving the world

[reallocate]

It's not propaganda, it's advertising. Ignore it.

The world is full of "very powerful entities with very few checks". Most considerably more powerful than corporations. (What do anti-business people wnat to do, replace corporations with village cobblers?)

In truth, most people haven't a clue about how to install an OS, don't want to have a clue, and are quite happy that their PC comes with an OS already installed. That may not nexessarily be a good thing, but it is reality.

And, Linus was right, swithcing to a new OS is difficult. That's why people don't want to do it.

The computing industry is, by nature, conservative. The industry and its customers do not really want a variety of choices. Variety leads to incompatibilities, from their perspective. The most potent phrase in the industry is "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." Like it or not, the world has a lot of Windows in it that aren't broken.

Re:F/OSS is a necessary part of saving the world

[Sunnan]

What do anti-business people wnat to do, replace corporations with village cobblers?

I can't speak for all "anti-business people", but I'd rather have cooperatives than hierarchical corporations, and I'd rather they'd compete fairly instead of abusing copyright law like Microsoft do.

And, Linus was right, swithcing to a new OS is difficult. That's why people don't want to do it.

My point exactly. So it's not a "gun that's to their head", that's not necessary. Microsoft have their hold on the world with a minimum of violence.

Like it or not, the world has a lot of Windows in it that aren't broken.

And it'd be better if those Windows were free software.

Re:F/OSS is a necessary part of saving the world

[reallocate]

>> ...I'd rather have cooperatives...

People are competitive by nature, not cooperative. So is every other living species. That's because if that Darwinian thing, you know. Short of a fantasy utopia that magically supplies al of our needs and wants, and keeps us all competely free of disease and discomfort, that kind of "cooperation" can only imposed by force, usually by ideologues who think they've got all the right answers and, hence, have the right to impose their will on others. If the 20th Century taught us anything, it should have taught to be frightened of ideologies.

I'm always amazed by people who apparently believe engaging in business is unethical, or that making a profit is unethical. It's as if these people read Marx but never heard of Lenin, Stalin, Mao, , Castro or Pol Pot. Perhaps, though, they are outnumbered by people, like me, who believe it is immoral to compel individuals to "share" what they have earned with "society" in the the name of "cooperation."

>> ...it'd be better if those Windows were free software.

It would be better if people had better software, whether or not it was "free". I've used Linux for a long time because I like Unix and because Linux runs better than Windows on my machines. The fact that Linux is "free" has nothing to do with it. I'd still use it if it wasn't, and I never avoid using good software just because it isn't "free".

In that, I suspect I'm like most people, who make software decisions based on cost and capabilities, not on a belief system that is trying to impose a software development model on the rest of the activities of the human race.

Re:F/OSS is a necessary part of saving the world

[Sunnan]

People are competitive by nature, not cooperative.

Maybe that goes for you, but I know that I've got those both traits.

So is every other living species.

Not really. There are many species where taking care of each other is common.

Short of a fantasy utopia that magically supplies al of our needs and wants, and keeps us all competely free of disease and discomfort

You mean a post-scarcity society? It seems to me that the capitalist movement is trying real hard to keep us from getting there; a readily available example is (yet again) copyright - a law that allows (for example) Microsoft to artificially limit supply - to create scarcity.

that kind of "cooperation" can only imposed by force

Well, I'm hoping that isn't true, that we can voluntarily cooperate. There are lot of examples that indicates that, the free software movement being a prominent one. You know, I've never seen so many flamewars and hostility as within the F/OSS movements, and yet it's been able to produce so much.

the right to impose their will on others

How do you mean? It seems to me that it's capitalism that rules us; how's that for freedom?
It's easy to want a live-and-let-live attitude when you have the obscene amount of power that some capitalists have. It's like if the machines of the Matrix would say "Neo, how can you be so intolerant and try to impose your will to break free on us? We leave you alone in your cocoons, we've got the live-and-let-live attitude, you're the ones making a ruckus."

If the 20th Century taught us anything, it should have taught to be frightened of ideologies.

It's easy to label dissenting thought as an "ideology" (and use association guilt to tinge it with the likes of Pol Pot) while being oblivious to the "ideology" that's already in power.

I'm always amazed by people who apparently believe [...] making a profit is unethical

Making a profit on the expense of others, by abusing the capitalist system. I'm not opposed to profit in and of itself, as long as society as a whole benefits.

Proprietary software companies deem it necessary to limit reproduction (and often alteration) of their software in order to maximise their profits. When they do that, it's got a negative effect on all of us.

Perhaps, though, they are outnumbered by people, like me, who believe it is immoral to compel individuals to "share" what they have earned with "society" in the the name of "cooperation."

Do you think it's immoral to even ask? And do you think it's perfectly moral to forbid individuals to share? That sharing is "piracy"?

I'd still use it if it wasn't, and I never avoid using good software just because it isn't "free".

Well, I do, mostly because I'm a programmer and having source code is valuable to me, and being allowed to share it freely with my friends and family is valuable, as well.

trying to impose a software development model on the rest of the activities of the human race.

And Microsoft's licences aren't "imposing"?

In this thread, I've merely argued, and been told that I've been "imposing" and immorally "compelling". How's that for a capitalist hegemony?

Re:F/OSS is a necessary part of saving the world

[reallocate]

1. Given any number of individual members of any species and a resource supply that is sufficient for a smaller number, the individuals who succesfully compete for those resources will survive. The others won't. There is nothig wrong with that.

2. There will never be a "post-scarcity" world. People needs and wants increase at a faster pace than the means to satisfy them.

3. Capitalism is about meeting needs, not limiting supply. Resources must be put into the system to generate supply. Absent selling products at a product, the only other way to support production is government mandate and government control. That way leads to tyranny.

4. The F/OSS example isn't applicable outside its own artificial environment. More to the point, F/OSS development and developers must, by definition, have an income stream coming from somewhere in order to continue doing F/OSS work.

5. Captialism gives me the choice to buy or not to buy Microsoft. It gives me the choice to buy or not to buy computers. It doesn't send me orders from a central planning office ordering me to use the government-mandated OS. I'll trade companies like Microsoft for government central planning every time.

6. Have never seen a Matrix movie. Besides, it's only a movie. Pretend stuff. Like a comic book.

7. Profits benefit the seller. They aren't supposed to beneift "society".

8. Make no assumptions about my political opinions. Have an ideology is fine. I don't care what people believe. I care very much if people become convinced that the assumed correctness of their beliefs gives them the right to impose behavior on others.

9. Companies aren't Limiting production to maximize profits. Have you ever heard of Microsoft "running out" of XP? If you want it, they'll sell it to you. In any case, no company has any obligation to continue selling anything that it does not want to sell.

10. Sharing is fine. Taking something that doesn't belong to you and "sharing" it is wrong. If I create something, I own it. No one has any rights to it at all unless I give them those rights. That's what copyright law recognizes and protects.

11. The F/OSS model won't work in thereal world because it cannot generate sufficient resources to sustain itself, much less an entire economy, Who pays for the input when all the output is given away? What generates new money?

Re:F/OSS is a necessary part of saving the world

[Sunnan]

Given any number of individual members of any species and a resource supply that is sufficient for a smaller number, the individuals who succesfully compete for those resources will survive. The others won't. There is nothig wrong with that.

By cooperating we can better manage and increase our resources. It won't always be enough for everybody, but we can do a lot better than today. It makes no sense for the rich minority of the western world to have such a surplus and wasting such enormous quantities just because our traditional economic systems require it.

Capitalism is about meeting needs, not limiting supply.

I know that that's how it's "supposed to" work, but in practice limiting supply makes sense for many capitalists since that enables sellers to increase their prices. There are many areas of business where that's auctally happening, software being one.

Software has low manufacturing costs (just CDs or bandwidth) but high initial costs.

With proprietary software, Microsoft can prohibit manufacturing (and label it "piracy") to keep supply low enough to justify charging hundreds of dollars for, say, Windows XP.

Resources must be put into the system to generate supply.

Of course.

Absent selling products at a product, the only other way to support production is government mandate and government control.

No. It doesn't have to be like that. We can and must try to find other ways.

That way leads to tyranny.

Capitalism leads to the tyranny of the rich over the poor.

More to the point, F/OSS development and developers must, by definition, have an income stream coming from somewhere in order to continue doing F/OSS work.

People doing work, whether it is F/OSS, or being a nurse, or an artist, or anything else, must ("by definition"?) have a steady supply of food, shelter and other wants and needs.

Of course.

We need a functioning distribution system of goods and services, lest we all have to live isolated on self-sufficient farms. That goes without saying.

But do we need all the baggage that a capitalist system brings with it? Corporations, hierarchies, artificial scarcity, propaganda / commercial advertising, a corporate-sponsored justice system, a corporate media?

Do we even need a trade-based market economy?

These things aren't questioned enough, debated enough, researched enough, experimented with enough. Maybe there are other ways, especially taking into consideration that the level of technology is steadily increasing. With the more advanced level of information and communication technology, it's becoming easier and easier to cooperate and coordinate large voluntary efforts.

Captialism gives me the choice to buy or not to buy Microsoft.

That's not true for everyone - some people are more or less forced to use Microsoft, since they're stuck in a corporation or school where it's mandated to do so - and even for individuals, there's a strong pressure to buy Microsoft; it's bundled with most computers (for a big fee, of course) and there's a heavy push with many forms of advertising.

It doesn't send me orders from a central planning office ordering me to use the government-mandated OS. I'll trade companies like Microsoft for government central planning every time.

I don't want "government central planning", which I see as about as bad as companies like Microsoft.

I haven't yet ceased to be amazed by how people can gladly accept (and even advocate) a system that pushes commercials down their throats 27/7, yet never consider how a system with even a tenth of that information (but with cooperation information, instead of corporate propaganda) could enable us to do so much more with less.

If the UN supports it, it MUST be good

[AwesomeJT]

Personally, I'm a big fan of OSS but just because the UN supports it doesn't exactly sway me. In fact, it probably takes ways from the credibility. I think most developing countries have figured out that "free" is often just as good as pirated MS products. Although, I'm sure there are plenty of countries that don't care one way or another, they don't have much in the way of technological infostructure -- they cannot even feed their own people. Seems like they have bigger things to worry about at the moment.

Re:If the UN supports it, it MUST be good

[Anonymous Coward]

"5 hourses"

Are they those animals that run round racecorses?

Same here - with Mandrake

[kbahey]

Two of my kids are in the same age group. Each has computer in their room. I installed Mandrake (first 9.1, then 10.0) on it about 9 months ago. They use it for homework, Neopets, games, playing MP3, and chatting with friends (using GAIM). I even introduced them to FreeCiv the other day and they played it for a while (and understood what a server and a client is, ...etc).

Homework and important stuff is stored on a server and directories are shared via NFS.

They complain every now and then that such and such site does not work (Shockwave or MS specific ActiveX perhaps), but they can do most of the Windows stuff on it.

The computers are second hand Pentium II bought on the cheap.

I don't have to deal with spyware, viruses, or spend big money on games, software, ...etc.

sustainal???

[Anonymous Coward]

There is no such word, dumbass.

Don't Infer

[reallocate]

I didn't argue that using open source was not economically advantageous, or that any country, including the U.S., should become dependent on any single OS or vendor.

I simply said what I said in that post. Go read it again, and don't infer things that aren't there.

Free software is only free...

[Anonymous Coward]

...if your eyesight is worth nothing. Seriously, have you ever actually used a typical Linux desktop? The sheer ugliness of the fonts makes me want to claw my eyes out with a rusty fork. You'd think that after years of work done by open source hippies, they could figure out how to get the fonts not to look quite so terrible in X-Windows. But unfortunately your typical open source fellow is not concerned with the end user experience.

26 servers?

[Anonymous Coward]

26 servers? Clearly you're not familiar with twitter, who believes that any large organization can replace its massive Windows clusters and application servers with a 486 running Linux. This is the depth of twitter's insanity. It's futile for you to argue with him - best just to log out and harass him endlessly. Bill Gates pays me very well to dole out the truth about twitter.

Linux Hobbyists Can't Provide Support

[reallocate]

>> What is the support that you refer to? What value are vendors of commercial software adding beyond what is available for free?

Last time I was involved in hiring one Linux sys admin, we figured out total annual costs for that position were just about $250,000. That includes salary, insurance, pension, etc. That's not quite free, right?

Do you imagine that Linux hobbyists can support substantial mission-critical networks in their spare time using Google as their resource? You wanna tell the chief of payroll for some country's government employees that you don't have time to fix his server, so the workers will just have to wait for their money?

When businesses and institutions are dependent on their IT structure, they require 24/7 support. You don't get that for nothing.

Exactly how much IT support, commercial or otherwise, have you been involved in purchasing?

Re:Linux Hobbyists Can't Provide Support

[pedestrian crossing]

You didn't answer my questions. You talk about a sysadmin. OK, if you use free software, you have to have sysadmins. If you use commercial software, you have to have sysadmins.

No difference between the two there.

You talk about "fixing a server". OK, if you use free software, you're going to have to "fix servers". If you use commercial software, you are going to have to "fix servers".

Hmm, still no difference between free software and commercial software.

My point is that if you are going to set up an IT infrastructure, you are going to have to support it, whether or not you use free software. Oracle doesn't come out and fix or admin your servers just because you bought their software.

Denigrating free software developers as "Linux hobbyists" misses the point entirely.

I am not talking about "commercial support" vs. "free support" at the operational level, that is asinine. That is something you have to pay for somehow, no matter what product you choose.

The difference I am talking about is development support (ie., bug-fixing, feature enhancement, etc.).

That is where the difference lies.

Re:Linux Hobbyists Can't Provide Support

[reallocate]

You implied that commerical support for open source infrastructures was both poor and unnecessary. I can only conclude if you don't believe it is necessary to provide commercial support for open source IT, you assume someone will do it for free.

I did not denigrate free software developers (not that developers have any business runnning networks). Since you as much as declared that knd of support could be provided by people in their spare time, I concluded you must be talking about hobbyists.

"Development support", in my experience, rarely comes into play on a working network. The last thing the network's owners want is to bother with development. They want their software to work out of the box. They don't want to maintain inhouse developers to fix other people's software or to write their own. They want to acquire software once, install it, use it, and forget about it.

Re:Linux Hobbyists Can't Provide Support

[pedestrian crossing]

"Development support", in my experience, rarely comes into play on a working network. The last thing the network's owners want is to bother with development. They want their software to work out of the box. They don't want to maintain inhouse developers to fix other people's software or to write their own. They want to acquire software once, install it, use it, and forget about it.

Ah yes, you sound like a system administrator. Your attitude is quite understandable.

In my experience the "network's owner" (not administrator, but rather whoever pays the bills/makes the decisions), wants the software to do what they want it to do. Rarely does it do that out of the box. Managers (rightly) see the technology as an enabler, that needs to be flexible enough to handle the Real World. Every company's RW is just a little bit different, that's where comptetition happens.

This drives the people who administer and support the systems crazy! (I should know...)

Development support is where the business or government can build the competitive edge, and development support is where, in general, I have observed FOSS to be more responsive and enabling to the customer than commercial software.

Please keep in mind the context of this topic - developing nations, trying to build low-cost, sustainable infrastructure from the ground up.

Re:Linux Hobbyists Can't Provide Support

[reallocate]

Having worked both sides of the tech/management divide, I can attest that managers would be thrilled never to sit in another meeting talking about software issues. Typically, they've been burned more than once by vendors promising, but not quite delivering, wonderful things. (Ever see managers agree to some high-falutin' "guaranteed" reliability rate on the order of 98.5 percent only to find out that means they'll be offline for, say, 24 consecutive hours every 3 months and there's not a damn thing they can do about it except change the contract and give the vendor more money?)

Don't get me wrong. Countries should not chain themselves to a single variety or source of IT. Ideally, they should develop it at home. I just get a bit tired of all the ideological rhetoric and ranting about "Evil Corporations", etc. Those guys are trying to play politics, but they're in w-a-y over their heads.

If the UN supports it, it's anti-American

[Anonymous Coward]

Its worse than that. If the UN supports it, then I don't. I am uninstalling Linux (by installing Windows XP) as we speak thanks to the intrusion of surrender monkey politics into what was once my favorite OS.

Open Source used to be about great libertarian ideals of individuality and self-reliance. It has now become a leftist marxist catch all for stupid politics and idiotarians to preach about the evils of corporations. What a shame.

How do you eat an elephant?

[twitter]

Tell me, if you need a staff of sys admins and floor support people to keep, let's say. your network of 26 servers running Lotus Notes on Linux, 13 application and database servers running Linux, plus a few web servers, along with several hundred client machines in several dispersed buildings, how you're gonna support that with Google??

If you have bought into Lotus Notes, IBM will be telling you how to run things.

If you want to run free software instead, there's plenty of it available. Key Largo is a good example of how things should run. It's a lot easier and cheaper than Winblows.

Re:How do you eat an elephant?

[reallocate]

Regardless of the software you run on your network, you will still need to pay professional staff to support it.

Why is that so difficult to grasp?

Telling me about some wonderful piece of open source is a waste of time. No matter how wonderful it is, it won't support itself.

BTW, IBM isn't going to support those 26 Notes servers for nothing, either. You want support, you pay IBM.

Perspective for the AC.

[twitter]

Yes, as you know a 486 should be sufficient to run any large multinational corporation, as long as you're not using Micro$oft crap.

At least not the new crap. I've been told that Gulf States Utility's first non mainframe billing system ran off a 386 running DOS. It was connected to a big printer, but the hardware requirements were modest.

Free software's hardware requirements have not grown the same way M$'s has. You do not need a fancy graphics card, GUI, or tons of RAM to make most real work go.

Missing "option"

[Anonymous Coward]

3. Similar to #2. but wants to surf /. while at work.

BBC report

[Quiberon]

BBC seem to think 'free' means 'worse than cheap'. Not so; there is nothing inferior about Free Software. I think they know really, though; look at their proposed Free video codec

Software freedom trumps money.

[jbn-o]

Software freedom does not come down to money.

If you only focus on cost, you have no reason to reject an illicit copy of a proprietary OS (a zero-cost copy of Microsoft Windows which Microsoft is ready to provide under certain circumstances, for example). Regardless of how much money you paid, you get no freedom to share or modify non-free software. The real costs of the software are hidden from you. If you have the freedoms to share and modify software, you can distribute the software at any cost and you have the freedom to make the program do what you want. These are the freedoms that make proprietors nervous because these are the freedoms no proprietor delivers; these are points on which no proprietor can compete.

What really bothers me about this...

[dodongo]

Is that there's no concurrent effort in the United States. I mean, yes, you can donate to FSF and EFF (great causes; yes, I support them) or even, God forbid, support a commercial linux distro with your purchase (yes, I use SuSE). While it's true the developing markets are worth a ton, as some extremely populous countries are in the "developing" category, software purchases are, to many people, still a way to spend some disposable income.

Spending $300 here on an OS / office productivity suite subscription hurts businesses here to an extent, but even our businesses typically have a shit-ton more money to be throwing at IT solutions than these developing markets.

So while it's true these developing markets have a huge incentive to stick with the lowest-cost options for any IT they might choose to purchase, this incentive still ignores the fact that the country with far-and-away the most money at the asking to spend on IT is doing it in a rather irresponsible fashion.

Crap. That was nearly incoherent. But do you see what I'm getting at? It's not that this isn't a great deal for the F/OSS community, it's just that in the largest of the markets, the battle is still uphill both ways in a foot of snow without any shoes on.

We need UN reps here for our election and for our software purchases both, IMHO. And if we have to subjugate ourselves to global government instead of Bush, so be it ;)

Re:What really bothers me about this...

[QuantumG]

Maybe this isn't what you are saying, but it made me think of it. I believe it is impossible to use Free Software without contributing in some way to the community, even if it is not terribly productive contribution, like whining, and if you have enough users there's always a small percentage that will actually do some activate development. If developing nations are going to embrace Free Software then surely that means they will be doing a lot of development on Free Software. The populations of these countries are enormous. Could it be that soon a large amount of Free Software development will be done in third world countries? Could it be that the majority of it will be? In which case won't you feel a bit guilty about using Free Software, especially for business. After all you're capitalising on the work of developing nations, just like those evil corporations.

UN support means nothing

[Anonymous Coward]

Who cares if UN support free software if this organization is mostly a toothless authority who can't really do much to punish nations violating human rights, with decision making being dominated by US government and multinational corporations, and with 5 countries always hogging the UN security council seats just because they are winners of WWII? If UN can't even do simple things such as stopping Rwanda massacre or making the councils more accountable to everyone in the world, support of OSS/Free Software by UN is meaningless in reality.

Re:UN support means nothing

[Elektroschock]

Oh, the UN has money and spends money. The UN is a good forum to lobby the lawmaker and to set the international agenda.

Not the UN was to blame for the Rwanda massacre.

The UN security council is just one institution.

Nothing for you to see here. Please move along.

[nerd256]

We know how well the United States listens to the UN.

Re:[link] Microsoft _wants_ you to "pirate" softwa

[kwr2k]

I think the point you missed out is that FOSS makes it legal to copy software while M$ wanted us to "pirate" it. This, IMHO, is what M$ is worried about: If the FOSS way is entrenched, it would make people somehow "guilty" of pirating software. Why steal, when you can get for free?

Also, FOSS has stolen...

[leonbrooks]

...one of Microsoft's most effective marketing models, then gutted it by not following through and demanding the money. (-: