Ever wonder why Brazil and other BRIC countries are so hot on open source, including Linux? Gustavo Duarte gives several reasons, not the least of which is the punitive pricing that Microsoft inflicts on these developing markets.
In the case of Brazil, Microsoft pillages businesses to the tune of 20.1 percent and consumers at a 7.8 percent clip. Some people pay tithing to their church; Brazilians are asked to pay a tithe to Microsoft. Perhaps this is indicative of Microsoft's self-important belief?
Microsoft licensing as a percentage of Brazil Gross National Income
(Credit: Gustavo Duarte)Sounds, bad, right? Well, it's particularly pernicious when you take into account how this compares to Microsoft's pricing in other markets:
... Read moreIf we want bigger software markets, we need to develop the developers who will create them. That's the lesson I take from this article on HIV research. Researchers are learning that it's a Very Good Thing to enable local scientists in Uganda and elsewhere to tackle HIV research, in large part because the closer someone is to the problem, the better positioned they are to think intelligently about how to solve it.
"Old fashioned 'parachute science' -- where scientists from the developed world flew in, bled a few patients, and immediately returned to their country of origin with their samples, are no longer required or acceptable. In-house development and research is an effective and efficient way forward," said Professor Frances Gotch, one of the commentary's authors from the Division of Investigative Science at Imperial College....
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Mark Shuttleworth knows how to build communities and he knows how to make money. It turns out the two go hand in hand.
As he suggests in this article, the traditional software world forces customers and the countries that give them citizenship into a consumer, dependent status. Open source does the opposite, ennobling and enabling these same users. The result? Economic development:
...[T]he goal for any country, including South Africa, should be sustainable economic growth, part of which is derived from the contribution made from a technology perspective. "In this context it is wealth creation that matters, since the former will potentially generate high-quality jobs," [Mark Shuttleworth] adds.
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