Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Venezuela Moves Further Toward Open Source

Posted by michael on from the leading-the-way dept.

baquiano writes "Today the Venezuelan press reports that the government has formally issued a decree (English translation) which prioritizes the use of free/open source software over proprietary systems in government entities. This follows a year of pilot deployments in Venezuela's Info Centros (Internet public access points) and some ministries. (Past attempts, reported by Slashdot, by former Minister of Science and Technology Felipe Perez Marti to push ahead this initiative were allegedly foiled by Microsoft.) The decree calls for plans to actively deploy FOSS during a 24-month period."

6 of 406 comments (clear)

  1. Re:it never ceases to amaze me... by GoofyBoy · · Score: 2, Interesting

    >I know for damn sure that the US government wastes tens, perhaps hundreds, of billions of tax dollars paying giant companies for closed, proprietary systems that never work as advertised.

    Waste is waste. It doesn't matter if its Open or Closed Source, it will still cost a huge amount and still barely work because it is the government.

    --
    The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
  2. Re:Great, but... by bit01 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    ... a slightly more major player joins our side?

    A country of 25,000,000+ people? That's major enough progress to make the daily news for me!

    If even a fraction of the Venezualan programming population get involved in open source that will mean significant improvements for open source software producers, packagers and consumers world wide. Remember, one of the most valuable attributes of software is that it can be copied at minimal cost. All it takes is a single person to program it and a hundred million people can use it, something the commercial pay-an-arm-and-a-leg-per-copy advocates like to ignore.

    ---

    Don't be a programmer-bureaucrat; someone who substitutes marketing buzzwords and software bloat for verifiable improvements.

  3. Re:A positive development ...? by Pig+Hogger · · Score: 3, Interesting
    If you care to actually read the article, you would notice that Chavez is simply counterbalancing the greater disinformational power of the bourgeois-controlled media in order to avoid further destabilization attempts by the bourgeois who cannot bear to see the State help the poorer people by providing them by better education (the bourgeois are dependent on an ignorant population in order to suck their wealth).

    In effect, the Chavez government is providing A LEVEL PLAYING FIELD, something the bourgeois hate because they got ahead because of a playingfield blatantly lopsided in their favour.

  4. Re:Don't really see this having much effect by stephanruby · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I suppose you're part of the minority elite that would have been satisfied that the coup had succeeded.

  5. Re:We should look at this from a wider perspective by Pig+Hogger · · Score: 2, Interesting
    From what I see, president Hugo Chavez has a deep hatred towards the U.S. And he sees any american company as a threat to his government. In other words, his move towards open source is not to be seen as something "defending the rights of the people", but rather as an instrument of pressure.
    This is not surprising, given that in order to promote the leeching bourgeois agenda of siphoning off the country's wealth, the US has been trying for a long time to destabilize Chavez's goverment.

    Why should Chavez be grateful towards people who wants to suck his country dry and leave the majority of the population in abject poverty and ignorance?

  6. Re:THe Irony OSS in a closed society by wheelbarrow · · Score: 2, Interesting

    As Buddha said, "When someone points at the moon, the imbecile looks at the finger."

    How about Human Rights Watch. Is this unbiased enough for you?