Ok here's some follow up discussion we also had: MS has developed most of their products with core attribute: user friendliness. OSS on the other hand has started with technology in mind, how to share and how to improved.
OSS target audience is skewed towards "literate computer user" to stat with, thats why most people who were in IT business during the 80's were engineers, mathematicians, compsci's, and ECE's (during the 80's, Phillippines is the #1 source of IT workers in the region. Most of them worked abroad and now they handle large companies and govt offices like BPI,PLDT, etc). MS target audience were the un-trained users, MS expressed this with GB's motto: a computer on every home. Hence MS skewed their technology developement toward mass market... $$$$$. cashing! ;p (GB is a brilliant maketing strategist not a tech ;p) Unfortnately MS has to depend mostly on its technical resource to this, because using OSS scheme would compromise MS's advantage to stay on top of the market (imagine if MS is open source at start, there could be more that 1 giant software companies right now -- like we have 3 giant telcos here ;p). We are currently moving into a technology paradigm shift. !!! Because of MS, a lot of users have become literate, even the computer literacy rate in out children has tripled. Thus this fits now to the OSS scenario..we have lots of computer literates and are looking for cheaper and fast growng alternatives. I think MS's motto that says do more with less backfired.. It became... Do more with less expenses! Well.. MS is such a budget headache..right? . hehehe. Now, everyone is shifting to OSS. Our goverment and schools are shifting to OSS which is a big piece of MS's cake. These were the untrained or needs training market of MS yet computer use has become so common right now that we dont need the too much user-friendly Windows anymore. Even MS developers right now are getting less and less attention and they dont get paid much as before. (I did try, i packed my resume with MS credentials and asked for 120000USD.The HR said no we dont really need .Net - its costly and that they can get that at way lower price. I found out later they were referring to outsourcing here in the Philippines..PHP programmers. We'll i should have taken the ride during the MS hype 4 years ago) ;p So we partially concluded. OSS is much better for developers and people with computer training while MS is better for the rest. hmm...Just our 2 cent's worth. Anyway, to be continued pa yung discussion, nag close na ksi yun starbucks.hehe -- Philippine Linux Users' Group (PLUG) Mailing List [EMAIL PROTECTED] (#PLUG @ irc.free.net.ph) Official Website: http://plug.linux.org.ph Searchable Archives: http://marc.free.net.ph . To leave, go to http://lists.q-linux.com/mailman/listinfo/plug . Are you a Linux newbie? To join the newbie list, go to http://lists.q-linux.com/mailman/listinfo/ph-linux-newbie
