ONU organiza dia del OSS en Aisa

[Alejandro Barros]

Una noticia interesante, aparecida en infoworld,


UN organizes open-source software day across Asia Microsoft stands to 
lose significantly if Asia makes a large-scale move away from Windows

By David Legard, IDG News Service August 25, 2004

The United Nations, through its International Open Source Network (IOSN) 
will organize the first annual Software Freedom Day on Saturday in an 
effort to educate Asian users about the benefits of Free and Open Source 
Software (FOSS) and encourage its wider use in the region.

IOSN will organize events in Bangladesh, Brunei, India, Malaysia, New 
Zealand, Philippines, Sri Lanka and Vietnam, setting up stations in 
public places to give away informational brochures and CDs with selected 
open-source software, including TheOpenCD and a Linux Live CD.

"Access to ICT (information and communications technology) is severely 
limited in developing countries due to high costs," IOSN said on its Web 
site. "FOSS ... represents an opportunity for these countries to adopt 
affordable software and solutions toward bridging the digital divide."

Apart from Linux, high-profile FOSS applications being promoted include 
the OpenOffice productivity suite, the Mozilla browser and e-mail 
project, mySQL database and the Apache Web server.

IOSN has also released a primer describing the philosophy, history, 
benefits and disadvantages of FOSS, with topics such as localization, 
licensing and Linux also briefly covered.

Several Asian countries have begun initiatives to promote Linux and 
open-source applications, although none have yet mandated its use over 
proprietary equivalents. A three-country initiative involving Japan, 
China and South Korea has resulted in a localized standard version for 
Linux known as Asianux.

Microsoft Corp., which stands to lose significantly if Asia makes a 
large-scale move away from its standard Windows desktop has recently 
agreed to sell a cheap version of its flagship XP desktop operating 
system in Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia. The software, called Windows 
XP Starter Edition, will be available on low-cost hardware from October.

-- 
Alejandro Barros
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