Continued Look at Global Open Source

sebFlyte writes "In the second part of its look at open source in governments around the world, ZDNet takes an interesting look at open source in the developing world. Pricing obviously is an important factor (if you look at GDP, MS prices in Vietnam are the equivalent, for local people, of charging just shy of $50,000 for a Windows XP license in the US), but other issues arise, such as Brazil's 'sense of community', a certain amount of security-related worries from the Chinese, and language issues in India. A good analysis of the advantages of open source generally, the huge benefits it can have in developing markets, and the fact that open source is on the up despite massive amounts of lobbying and pressure from some proprietary vendors."

Comments

A bargain!

[Black Parrot]

> (if you look at GDP, MS prices in Vietnam are the equivalent, for local people, of charging just shy of $50,000 for a Windows XP license in the US)

And worth every penny of it, just like when you buy it in the USA.

MIT $100 laptop.

[_eb0la_reston_]

That's why the $100 MIT Laptop makes sense: It's "cheap" for developing countries. Any *serious* developer should have one on hist desk just to see how his applications perform on the next half-of-the-world-hardware-standard.

Re:MIT $100 laptop.

[trollable]

Has it ever occured to you or anyone else that these people you are going to try to sell $100 laptops to have no use for a laptop, for MS Windows, or for open sourced?

Do you really think students there don't need a computer? There is a lot of IT students in these countries that would be happy to have a personnal computer. And there is already numberous contributions to FOSS coming from them already. Sometimes just localization, sometimes more. The point is not to give computers but to make them affordable.

Re:MIT $100 laptop.

[Cheapy]

So...You go from 50,000$USD to 26315.79$USD?

Assuming my math is correct, (and the price for Windows XP is the same in Vietnam as it is in the US) the $100 MIT laptop would cost that price above: $26315.79.

Sure, it's a nice saving. But it isn't realistic.

Re:MIT $100 laptop.

[oldCoder]

...and within a few months I'd kick any MS user's ass with my $100 laptop

MS Windows and GUI's in general have allowed people who are experts in fields other than computer software to use computers and gain productivity.

While you are kicking the other guys butt he is making money by serving his customers or employers.

A lot of techies have worked very hard for very long to enable non-techies to benefit from computer automation and communications. Just as auto mechanics, designers, geologists and chemical engineers have worked long and hard to enable us to drive around in cars without knowing how to fix cars, refine oil, negotiate with Arabs or engineer mass production lines.

A good auto mechanic and expert driver may be able to drive around better, cheaper and faster than you can but you don't really care, you've got other things to do. That's how most of the world feels about us and they're right.

Re:MIT $100 laptop.

[grcumb]

"Has it ever occured to you or anyone else that these people you are going to try to sell $100 laptops to have no use for a laptop, for MS Windows, or for open sourced?"

Yes, it has occurred to me. So I went and checked. I didn't just ask people 'Do you want a cheap computer?', I spent a year travelling through a developing country assessing their priority needs. I spent another year setting up community-owned computer centres where people can use computers for about a dollar an hour. There are full every minute of the day. One computer centre has 4 computers and over 250 students signed up for this term alone. The service is expensive for them, but they love it. I'm currently working on another project to replicate this effort throughout the South Pacific.

Unfortunately, a lot of people fall victim to the same kind of binary logic that you use above. Since when does buying farm implements or providing food aid preclude spending a few dollars on education and employment opportunities? Is it absolutely unimaginable that we could do both?

"If you GAVE it to them, they would sell it for $60 to buy some better farming equipment or some shoes for their kids."

Bull. Selling a computer is like selling the milk cow. You're sacrificing your (and your children's) future for quick profit today. Although every society the world over has its own quota of short-sighted people, I can tell you from personal experience that inexpensive computers have value, and they improve living conditions where they are available. I can also tell you from direct experience that most people recognise this and are committed to their children's future.

Do you know what the number one spending priority is in the developing country where I live? It's school fees. Every single parent I've spoken with cares about nothing more than ensuring a better future for their children. Many parents hold public fund-raisers on behalf of their children in order to keep them in school. Living a life of abject poverty does not mean that people aren't capable of forgoing immediate gratification in favour of a better long-term solution.

I won't deny for a second that every society has its share of short-sighted people who want flashy new toys without really considering their worth or the cost of owning and using something as sophisticated as a computer. But that's where volunteers like me and the dozens of other working here come in. I've been training unemployed youth in computer repair, maintenance and configuration. They're now earning a modest but viable living providing support services to others. One of them is training the next group of apprentices, too.

There is nothing more important to learning than access to information and the time to study it. Having a computer in the home makes both of those available. I can say from experience that this laptop initiative is enlightened and will almost certainly have a direct and positive effect on the lives of the recipients.

In a phrase

[johansalk]

or a sentence; open Source is the future, it's inevitable.

Re:Awesome

[captain igor]

Mostly US? Last I checked a LARGE portion of OSS developers were from Europe.

One added benefit for emerging markets

[RandoX]

Since many users in poorer countries don't have existing systems there is no "switch" from one system to another. The users can start out using open source without having the baggage of expectations of how things SHOULD work. They have to start out by learning how to use an OS. Why not the free one?

Indian price equivalents...

[jkrise]

Windows XP - Indian Rupees ~8,000 (average pay for an IT worker per month). Equivalent US$ 5,000. Office XP - Indian Rupees ~15,000 Eq US$ 9,000.

One problem in some less developed countires...

[sznupi]

Corruption.

The decision makers too often aren't concerned about real financial benefits of others in long term (Linux isn't that usefull for populism)

Just like the pharma industry

[surfdaddy]

In the pharma industry, prices in the US are much higher than overseas. In other countries governments regulate prices to some degree to keep them low. Socialized medicine won't tolerate the US prices. In the US we basically subsidise the large costs of Research and Development, clinical trials, etc. I wonder if the software market could handle this - pricing variation by country for the same items? The problem for MS and others is that unless they do this, they're driving other countries to either steal or to open-source software. Of course, that may not be a bad thing!

Re:Just like the pharma industry

[dswan69]

No, you subsidise the huge marketing costs.

Re:Awesome

[johansalk]

That's nonsense. Open source is world-based, *not* US-based. And if you're worried about the trade deficit perhaps it's time you do something about your Microsoft-lenient corporate-whore "patriotic" president; Clinton left you in a much better situation.

So I can move to Etheopia,

[farker haiku]

and sell my 3 legit copies of windows and have the rough equivalent of half a million dollars? That's it, I'm moving!

Dragged from behind...

[D-Cypell]

Uptake of open source is likely to be much higher in the developing world. The crazy license fees when compared to GDP as stated in the summary is one reason but the lack of an 'existing standard' is another. It is difficult for software like OpenOffice to make headway in the developed world as MS office is fairly ubiquitous.

Microsoft believe that the developing world will have to pay the fees because they will have to maintain compatibility with those of us in the west. However, it is a subtle balance. If Microsoft price themselves out of the market and the developing world look into alternative, open source solutions the it is likely that the legitimacy of tools such as open office will increase in the west too. Globalization will require internationally compatible software, and when the choice is between a western world that prefers proprietry software and a developing world which cannot afford the same software then it is a case of Microsoft dropping its prices dramatically, or the western world adopting open solutions.

Interesting times...

Pricing is not really a factor

[lightweave]

I doubt that pricing is a factor in third world countries. Since they can't afford the prices anyway, but have to communicate with the rest of the world, the majority will using pirated copies of Windows. MS is probably well aware of this, and that is the reason why the local versions for these countries are also localized in the pricing. What these countries value though, is also the independence, which is the really galling thing for the US. Linux doesn't have a stron relation to a particular country, and if it ever will get one, then there is no big problem. You got the source, you can change it and develop it however you wish. When you start out with a mostly new infrostructure you don't need to think about existing ties, because there are none. So it's cheaper and more reliable to code the appropriate converters for like Word dcouments, then taking the whole OS just to get this stuff, and have the extra advatnages for free.

Re:Awesome

[Kjella]

Awesome news. I look forward to the increasing trade deficit resulating as a direct consequence of largely U.S.-based programmers giving away their efforts for free.

And whose fault is that? If you're in a market where people will do it for free, you've picked the wrong market. Demand and supply. The free market. The american way. The anti-OSS movement are preaching protectionism and trade barriers, everything the US of A supposedly don't stand for.

Here in mexico

[Spy der Mann]

we went thru a HORRIBLE crisis on 94, the dollar was valued 3 pesos per dollar. Now it's near 11, meaning software costs about 3 times more.

Would you be paying 600 dollars for a legitimate copy of Windows XP? And here a very good pay is $1000 dollars a month. It's no mystery then that most software in Mexico is pirated.

Still it's an awful dependance on foreign products (businesses MUST use legitimate software), which is another reason why i support the OpenDocument initiative.

Re:Let me tell you about "sense of community"

[nonlnear]

The problem isn't socialism. It's corruption.

Corrupt capitalism is just as oppressive as corrupt socialism. To modify your "oh so poignant" point slightly:

Armchair capitalism is very nice until it is YOU who finds himself working 3 hours to earn enough to buy a loaf of bread.

It's not capitalism that makes the USA a good place to work. It's the fact that there are effective, independent courts that do a fairly good job of maintaining the rule of law. In more socialist countries where there is a similarly effective judiciary, you will find that the three hour lines you refer to don't exist. In fact, you'll find that society does a pretty decent job of allocating goods. Note, I'm talking about socialism here - not central planning. There is a BIG difference. Distinctions like that tend to be glossed over or completely lied about in the brainwashing that a some (a lot of?) American schoolchildren get.

Comparison to GDP ... pretty strange

[courtarro]

I was planning to write a long comment concerning how retarded it is to compare prices on the basis of GDP [1], which makes about as much sense as comparing price ratios to the ratio of the number of sheep in a country. It's misleading at best, considering the large difference in the populations of the two countries. It's probably more accurate to compare the per-capita GDP [2], which yields the result that Windows (which costs $200 in the US according to the summary writer's numbers) would cost about $15,000 in Vietnam. However, this too is somewhat inaccurate because a) no one pays full price for Win XP Pro non-upgrade, b) You don't have to have XP Pro to get most of the benefits of Windows, and c) MS offers XP Starter Edition in Vietnam, which is supposedly offered for as low as US$15 [3]. Then again, when you figure that price based on per-capita GDP, it still comes to the equivalent of $1120, which isn't small change. So yes, the price is still pretty terrible, but when it comes to the intricacies of currency exchanges, is it fair to pound Microsoft on the basis of price comparisons when they're already discounting a product roughly 75% ?

Oh wait, free products aren't affected by currency exchanges. Oh well ...

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_ GDP_(nominal)
[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_ GDP_(nominal)_per_capita
[3] http://news.com.com/Windows+for+India,+others+wont +run+on+faster+chips/2100-1016_3-5704942.html
[4] 1 - (Price of XP SE) / ((Price of XP Home non-upgrade) * 0.60), assuming SE has roughly 60% of Home's features ... wildly estimative!

Methods

[headkase]

All of human progress including technology is characterized by a repeating cycle of exploration and simplification. I do think that Open Source software is a better way to make software but does not always result in better software.
What I think is far more important than Open Source methodology is the setting of standards in the first place. Consider all of networking, it was formalized as a framework called OSI (Open Systems Interconnect) and was structured in such a way that it could be modularily extended with minimal disruption to other areas. Imagine what the Internet would be today without the OSI model. I think we would instead of a world wide system would be stuck for quite a few years with a mish-mash of protocols that wouldn't communicate well with each other. What I mean by that is there would be AOL networks, Microsoft networks, Sun networks, and so on and they would only communicate with each other through kludges at best. I don't see that situation as a healthy one at all. Now, given enough time everything clears up so eventually one(ish) networking standard would come to prevail but there would have been a lot more resources wasted to arrive at the equivalent point of a designed from the outset standard.
I don't think that very many people would disagree if I said that the Internet is an essential service and in many different ways that alone implies a need for regulation. Internet service is run as a free market right now and market forces are great at optimization of variables but are not intelligent and do not always do smart things (beta vs. vhs anyone?). What I'm trying to say is that governments should introduce new standards into the Internet, things that try to make it the most efficient and flexible Information conduit it can be. It's all about where you start and where you end, and with standards as a better starting point than random less effort is expended traveling to where we should be.
So where I'm going with all this is that the conflict between proprietary and open software vendors could be easier to resolve if regulations were established that in effect stated that all the pipes were going to be the same size so they would fit together. This is where the commons doesn't have to be a tragety, the removal of scarcity from the system does allow for "The Magic Cauldron" effect and that is where Open Source should be. Now, if all the basic information infrastucture is regulated, what does that leave for private enterprise? Content, baby, content. That's where all the real money is ;).

This is the part I was talking about

[Hosiah]

To get straight to the point: everybody who sits there with a wet-diaper attitude complaining that Linux is too hard, learning any one single thing is too much to ask, I'll pay someone else to do it for me, etc: Well, say howdy-do to your new slave-master! He comes from a village of mud huts, is skinny from eating on 50 cents a day, wears a loincloth and a castaway bandana, and has three teeth left. But he can program cirles around you. He's taking technology into his own hands, the way all the lazy slobs with nothing but fat between the ears won't. And he will control your life with a few keys.

It's been one of my favorite sayings for going on ten years, now: The technology that you do not master, will master you. What a shame that America won the space race, pioneered the computer race, and then lapsed into barbarism. Quite a shame; what a lead we lost. How glorious we could have been! Check the distros at DistroWatch.com sometime - a growing percentage of them are *NOT* in English! Many are tailer-made for a specific country or language other than the US.

Well, I'm glad I kept *my* hand in, instead of vegging on the couch watching football. As a second-generation immigrant myself, who taught himself eight programming languages and landed a string of tech jobs with nothing but a little vocational training paid for by his own job, don't expect me to be all sympathetic when the rest of the world leaves America behind. No one can bail you out of this mess, if you won't lift a finger to help yourself.

A mind is, indeed, a terrible thing to waste, and a person throwing away their mind on purpose wastes their life as well; an even greater tragedy. So I'll sign my rant off with deepest regrets...

EXACTLY!

[brunes69]

As a Canadian, I can never help but laugh myself silly at all the US drug ads I am subjected to on a daily basis.

What is the point of these ads? Do Americans actually see an ad for some weird drug for low cholesterol, and for some reason believe they are more qualified than their doctor to decide if they need it? Who would do this?

I can't even fathom this amount of commercialism in medicine - it is wrong on so many levels I cannot even begin to explain. "Ask your Doctor about <insert drug here>. I have a better idea - why dont I assume that my doctor, who has trained for nearly a decade (and more), and who would probably have multiple orders of magnitude more information on me on my condition, would know best, and let them tell me if I need you drug., instead of listening to drug company propeganda?

Re:EXACTLY!

[microwave_EE]

Don't forget that here in the states, the drug companies also market directly to the doctors. I know several medical assistants, and the drug reps regularly would come in and leave "samples" for the docs to give out, and they'd buy everybody lunch. All of this is done in hopes that the doctors would prescribe their company's meds...and once a few folks get hooked on claritin (sp??), or Zoloft, or whatever, then the drug company will more than have recouped their investment.

As a Brazillian citzen...

[vhogemann]

... and a government employee, I have one or two things to say:

First, actualy there is no coerent effort to push OpenSource solutions in the Federal Government. There are isolated efforts, and little coordination between them.

I work at the Rio de Janeiro Municipal Dept. of Health Care (Secretaria Municipal de Saude), we has been working on a really open framework for the past 3 years, based on Java + Tomcat + Hibernate + Firebird runnig on Debian. It's already used on a social program called Medicine at Home (Remedio em Casa), that delivers medicine by mail for people with diabetes and high blood pressure.

We had plans to extend this, and use the same framework to devellop a full hospitalar management solution, based on opensource sollutions, and enterprise ready. But it has been put aside, in favor of a project develloped by the Federal Ministery, called SNIS.

SNIS (National System for Health Information), is a nightmare of ill concepted technologies. Everything is based on proprietary solutions, such as Oracle Forms, Windows and even WindowsCE.

But the worst part are the special build PCs running WindowsCE, made of an ITX motherboard, 320x240 LCD touchscreen, termal printer, and SmartCard reader. They are meant to be used for data input, such as schedule consults on a ambulatory. The idea is that those custom "thinclients" would be cheaper to mantain than regular PCs... This could be true, if they didnt cost U$900,00 each! And, to make things even worse... the only firm that makes those babies is Procomp, a firm that is owned by DIEBOLD!!!

So, belive me when I say that OpenSource is a priority for the Brazilian government only when there are political interests behind it.