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The Argument For F/OSS In Schools
pfaffman sends us word of a two-part article in LinuxInsider that lays out to an audience of non-tech educators a cogent argument for using F/OSS in schools. The piece was written by a University of Tennessee professor for the education journal TechTrends. It makes the case that proprietary software is inconvenient and that when schools choose to use proprietary products they spend their constituents' money. The article won't contain a whole lot of surprises for Linux initiates (save perhaps some software recommendations for educational use), but it's interesting to see these ideas presented so clearly to a wider, and influential, audience."
Dear PC users,
You fools owe Mac users for everything you have. The great achievements in human history were all the work of Mac users, in spirit if not in fact. Meanwhile, you and your PC-minded forebears fought these Mac users, because PC users are for the status quo. Mac users are all about growing in new directions.
We Mac users said the Earth was round. You didn't believe us. We said the Earth was not the center of the universe. You excommunicated us. We said there were dinosaurs. You said it was a hoax. We said there were cavemen. You still don't have an answer for that one. We Mac users said women and blacks deserved to be equal members of society. You PC users fought us, and killed many of us.
We are the great painters, comedians, writers, playwrights, poets, songwriters, scientists, and lovers. Name me one PC-using legend in human history who was regarded as a good person. Just one. You can't, can you? There are no PC-minded Mozarts—only Salieris. We had MLK. You had Bull Connor. We had Picasso, Warhol, Dali, Da Vinci, Michelangelo. You would have hung a few of these guys for being gay. Where are your artists? You have nothing. No artists. Because you PC users are not creators. You are destroyers.
Most of Silicon Valley and Wall Street's cutting edge is aesthetically intuitive Mac users and Apple fans. The Mac-leaning states account for most of this country's wealth. We have Harvard and the Ivy League. Where are the great PC colleges? University of Texas? Name the great cities of the world that are known for being PC? London, Paris, Rome? Anyone?
You PC users have been a drag on human development since the very beginning. Since Cain (the would-be PC user, always trying to please Daddy) and Abel (the good son, the open-minded son). When you PC-minded folk ruled the world, you hijacked Christianity and turned it into a ritualistic mega-church with a standing army. You massacred millions. There is a reason why that era was called the Dark Ages.
We Mac users countered with the Enlightenment. The Renaissance. It is a fact that all the writers, all the artists, all the great men and women to come from this era were latent Mac users. Many were seen as enemies of the Church and State and would today be enemies of Microsoft. But as always, we Mac users brought you PC-using fools out of the darkness. We dragged you out, kicking and screaming, as usual.
We showed you the wonders of evolution, of science, and you hate us. We are showing you the miracle of stem cell research, the promise that it has, and you want to shut it down. We have shown you the dangers of global warming, whether it's manmade or not—and you still refuse to believe.
We tried to free the slaves. And you fought us. We crafted the world you PC users live in. Your 40 hour work week, getting paid for overtime, no child labor, Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid... We created all of it. We created the very world you live in. The art you see, the movies you love, words on the page that stir your heart. And still you fight us.
You PC-using fools would let a simple TV ad stop you from purchasing a product that would probably benefit you. As usual, you cut off your nose to spite your face. Typical. But completely expected. After all, when your heroes are Ballmer and Thurrot and Michael Dell, you must live a sad, hateful life. Anti-everything that makes sense—and pro-everything that doesn't.
I guess that's why you fools support your Vista, even though it makes you less safe. We're fighting malware over there, so we don't have to fight them over here! Genius.
So, continue to hate the Mac users and Apple fans among you. Just be sure to step out of the wa
People have been coming up with this sort of thing for years. Why Slashdot it?
Anyhow, F/OSS in the UK's education sector is the realm of the one-man band consultant.
The margins are so thin it doesn't make commercial sense for a more substantial F/OSS services company to be bothered with.
The sad reality is if you don't lock the bastards in you can't make any money out of them.
F/OSS is obviously about saving the world etc. but, for people like me, its also about making a few quid. This being the case, I give the whole sector a wide berth.