This point might seem silly, but surely a very 'sensible' alternative OS would be a very *cheap* Windows XP, with very cheap Office or Works versions? If Windows XP were sold at the price it usually commands in pirate markets, it would be perfectly OK. So doesn't it make just as much sense to pressure M$ for the equivalent of educational licences, or simply donated software? The demand would be for a more appropriate pricing structure, and would be similar to demanding that drug companies allow or produce very cheap generic versions of drugs that are essential to lives in poor countries.
I tend to get worried (particularly as an ethnographer) when I see the word 'only' used in these discussions - there may seem to be only one solution *technologically*, but there are always multiple political and economic strategies, and Linux is 'only' one of these. Linux makes sense for example in India which has the resources (huge population, armies of software engineers, vast internal market, etc) to generate bespoke open source solutions; it makes bugger all sense in small countries like Ghana (where I am doing research at the moment), which do not have these resources and which - moreover - are most concerned to develop globally valued computer skills, which usually means MS skills. Their priority is not to take on MS and ditch it because it is a nasty and exploitative multinational but rather to develop appropriate ICT resources. The key demand is *cheap* OS and software; the preference would be cheap MS software. And let's not forget the very expensive overheads of developing the kind of northern hacker culture capable of supporting Linux in small countries like these - it simply does not exist there whereas MS skills are already abundant. I've got nothing against Linux, by the way, though I - like many other people - don't have the time or commitment to undergo the reskilling and retooling it would involve for me to use it. What I distrust is the presentation of any particular technology as a unique solution to any real world problem. We've been down that road far too many times before.... Don _______________________________________________ Don Slater Reader in Sociology, London School of Economics Houghton Street, London WC2A 2AE Tel: +44 (020) 7849 4653 Fax: +44 (020) 7955 7405 http://homepages.gold.ac.uk/slater ______________________________________________ On 3/2/05, Edward Cherlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > The only OS that actually makes sense for the poor is Linux. Free > Software that can be adapted to any language and to any set of cultural > and legal requirements without waiting for a vendor is essential. > > The Simputers use Linux. Microsoft has effectively taken over the > Grameen Foundation USA's Village Computing Project. ------------ ***GKD is solely supported by EDC, a Non-Profit Organization*** To post a message, send it to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>. In the 1st line of the message type: subscribe gkd OR type: unsubscribe gkd Archives of previous GKD messages can be found at: <http://www.edc.org/GLG/gkd/>
