On Tue, 23 Oct 2001, David Fitch wrote:
> On Tue, Oct 23, 2001 at 11:09:52AM +1000, Richard Hayes wrote:
> > On Tue, 23 Oct 2001 08:44, eurk-dsl wrote:
> > > Does anyone have any figures on how much M$ are helping the deficit each
> > > year in Australia?
> >
> > My personal guess is of the order of $2.5 billion per year.
>
> while I completely agree that the govt should be using OSS and not
> contributing to M$' coffers, talking more generally about the
> balance of trade and a world view:
>
> 1) it doesn't really matter who owes who how much money, it's all
> just imaginery money (what are they going to do? foreclose on
> the country?)
Ahem.... foreclose on counties? yes.. quite possible... send countries
into spiralling inflation and economic collapses.. quite possible.
Is this relevant for SLUG? YES.
If we don't advocate a sensible alternative.. who will? OSS is a
commodity, and carries with it a viable industry.. .support, installation,
new software (far easier than under a proprietry model). Tell the stupid
politicians now... if you don't do it at election time, when CAN you do
it? They may not get the message this time, but maybe by next time the
penny will drop.
After all, the Liberals are making television commercials about Cheryl's
$5000 stamp duty. Why not inform them about billions of dollars of
software licences?
David
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