South Korean Gov't. Advocates Linux

Anonymous Coward writes "Korea has now taken the plunge on the Linux operating system, and is now starting to advocate Linux for use in government and public sector applications. South Korea's Ministry of Information and Communications announced the move today, which will result in decreased Microsoft market share in the region." According to the article, Korea's Ministry of Information and Communication "will provide a total of 3 billion won (US$2.95 million) for government agencies which want to use the Linux and other open-source computer programs this year."

Comments

Nobel

[commodoresloat]

Dynamite can be used by terrorists, that doesn't tarnish the Noble prize.

Actually, the Nobel prize was Alfred Nobel's attempt to make up for his regret about the fact that dynamite was used by terrorists and governments in war. Dynamite had plenty of legitimate uses in construction but he was uncomfortable with the uses of it for violence, and gave the fortune that he made in dynamite to the fund for the Nobel prize. So while dynamite doesn't tarnish the Nobel prize, its use by terrorists actually did tarnish Nobel himself (at least in his own mind), and the Nobel prize was sort of a way of redeeming him.

For the average Korean...

[alwsn]

I've been teaching in Korea for two years so far and the average Korean could not use Linux productively. The reason being is that almost every web site requires ActiveX to do anything; logon, make purchases, check email. Even on the sites not requiring ActiveX, they look like garbage on anything but IE. One plus is that MS office is not nearly as intrenched as it is in the States with many Koreans preferring a Korea Office suite (I cannot remember the name as I do not use it myself.) And, of course, you cannot play Kart Rider on linux.