[first draft: please submit your suggestions, changes. once a final draft is
ready, will post it so those interested may sign or contribute their name to
it. will then forward this to the indian finance minister and others in the
government.]
[cross-posted,
and further cross-post, especially to other mailing lists, if required]
***
Dear Sir,
Re: Levy Excise Tax on All Commercial Software Sold in India.
We, the undersigned, propose the Indian Government levy excise tax on all
commercial software sold in India. Reasons:
1) Commercial software (C.S) is a big cash drain for both the Indian
government and Indian corporates.
2) Almost all commercial software are non-free. This means, they do not give
the end users the freedom i) to use the software for any purpose ii) to study
the source code of the software iii) to make changes and improvements to the
source code iv) to legally share copies of the software with their neighbours
and colleagues. v) to pass on such freedom to those who further receive the
software.
3) these freedoms are important for a developing, poor, country like India,
where every citizen, organization, and state, dreams of harnessing the
opportunities offered by IT.
4) these freedoms also significantly curtail strong anti-competitive
behaviour in the software industry.
5) countries like China are moving away from non-free software to
freedom-based software. India has no such significant, clearly-defined
initiative in place for adopting freedom based software.
6) in the lack of such a clear initiative, commercial software vendors raise
the stakes for both their competitors and for freedom based software. this
further kills innovation in the industry.
7) a large and significant percentage of commercial software is usually sold
as bundled, OEM software. end-users find they are *forced* to use such
software, since their requests to buy machines with such software uninstalled
is usually turned down.
8) indian customers usually find their *only* option is to buy the computer
with the bundled software, then carefully disagree the end user license
agreement (eula) of the bundled software preferably in front of witnesses,
then contact the OEM software vendor independently and press for a refund.
this is clearly anti-competitive. and the computer is perceived in cost as
(hardware+OEM software as One).
9) Commercial software companies are usually quite rich. Not taxing them
allows them to hoard their wealth even more and give them more implicit power
to quash their competition in commercial software and in freedom-based
software.
10) by taxing them, the indian government will immediately have more powers
to i) accelerate the adoption of freedom based software.
ii) fund the development of much-needed indigenous solutions in IT for india
using freedom-based software (indian language technologies, education
projects, free and freedom-based education software, more secure and
transparant software for indian defense industries, lower IT infrastructure
costs for indian government and businesses, etc.)
11) by taxing commercial software and funding several projects in india on
freedom-based software, the indian government also creates a quantum leap in
the number of jobs and opportunities available to the indian developer
community and IT industry, thus creating and sharing more wealth.
12) the adoption of free and freedom-based software allows indian corporates
to save considerable sums of money towards commercial non-free software,
where the Return on Investment is loudly questioned. this money can then be
used for further job-creating opportunities such as expansion of new units of
industrial manufacturing, factories, etc. shareholders of indian companies
will also benefit from stronger dividends due to stronger profit margins due
to the adoption of free and freedom-based software.
13) the already financially-starved education sector in India will gain,
since the large allocation of funds for software in education can be used
more productively, even for opening more schools instead.
14) finally, as a statement of leadership and values, india must adopt
freedom-based software that is being proposed to the UNICEF to be declared as
a world-culture heritage.
We hope the Indian government sincerely considers these suggestions. For more
information on what is freedom-based software, please check out www.gnu.org.
Bizarre as it sounds, when it comes to software:
Give us Freedom, or Give Us Taxes.
Your Sincerely,
<signatures...>
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