BBC World Documentary on FOSS

[Evan Leibovitch]

Jason Shein wrote:
> http://www.apdip.net/news/fossdoc
>   

It's good to see the Bangkok office of the UNDP involved in this. In my
time at LPI I found that the UNDP (and the UN in general) was hamstrung
by a major contract with Microsoft
(http://news.com.com/2100-1011-5146305.html). In return for MS donating
a tons of free licenses (in countries where people couldn't afford them
anyway, so they'd either pirate or use FOSS), open source was (and may
still be) a dirty word within the organization. Certainly at the head
offices in New York and Geneva, open source is officially a curiosity at
best.

The APDIP office (which I visited twice when it was in Kuala Lumpur) was
a refreshing counter-movement inside the organization. Its very
existence gives hope that the UN had not totally succumbed to the lure
of the MS money and knows the development potential of open source.

There is a source-of-pride Canadian connection to all of this. The APDIP
established the International Open Source Network
(http://www.iosn.net/), whose major source of funding is the Canadian
International Development Research Centre. Yes, that means your
foreign-aid tax dollars are going to support the promotion of open
source in the developing world.

Indeed, it is possible to take advantage of that generosity even within
Canada. The IOSN has created a number of FOSS primers and other free
documentation that can be part of any campaign to introduce and/or teach
FOSS concepts to newcomers: http://www.iosn.net/foss-primers

- Evan

PS: It'll be interesting to see how Microsoft tries to squirm into the
picture. In the rich world it fights open source with all its energy, in
this documentary it's apparently quoted as having embraced open source.
Hmm....
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