I read the article. Very interesting.
> -----Original Message----- > From: Tim Churches [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] > On the [EMAIL PROTECTED] list, David Guest wrote, wrt > "The Register - Gnome to be based on .NET - de Icaza": > > Times change. > > > > http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/23919.html > > > In other words, although multinational corporations typically > insist on > oppressive levels of labour market deregulation, huge tax > concessions or > subsidies and then repatriate large profits, they do offer access to > capital, technology and most importantly, vertically > integrated markets > which the beleaguered and impoverished newly liberated country would > otherwise only be able to dream about. > In the world of information technology advances, especially with open source healthcare software, all roads lead back to education, not private enterprise. It's the information technology that drives the market and determines options/choices/opportunities. Not multinationals. In the case of modern information technology, which has its genesis in the educational system, if such beleaguered and impoverished countries put enough emphasis on education they too can have access to the same (and perhaps better) technology that any multinational corp. can have. Leadership by technological advantage is a fleeting thing. The ability for the common person, with a proper education, to work on openly available projects is what gives life to Open Source projects. The openhealth group is evidence of that. > In this case, the vertically integrated market is future > Windows systems > based on .NET and associated Microsoft infrastructure, such > as Passport > authentication (or even Windows authentication). Windows .NET (which is still largely unproven at this point) was born of computer scientists. Not the other way around. Some people will claim that .NET is a silver bullet, but it's value is undetermined at this point. DOTGnu (http://www.dotgnu.org), for example may very well be poised to create a competitive product. With respect to open source healthcare software, .NET based open source products will be a subset of the entire open source healthcare product set. Incidentally, Windows authentication in general lags the rest of the computer industry by several years. > > Having just listened to the entire George Dubya Bush State of > the Union > address, I was reminded of the distinct parallels between the > discomfort > which open source proponents feel regarding the Microsoft > dominance over > the computing landscape with the pain which so many Two-Thirds World > countries (also known as Third World countries, but two-thirds is more > accurate) feel regarding the Western (and US in particular) > economic and > cultural hegemony over the rest of the world. I think that is a subject better left to other discussion lists. > > Tim C > Richard Schilling Webmaster / Web Integration Programmer Affiliated Health Services Mount Vernon, WA USA http://www.affiliatedhealth.org phone: 360.856.7129
