[LUAU] While we Were Sleeping

R. Scott Belford scott at belford.net
Fri Apr 30 13:10:31 PDT 2004


While we were sleeping, the following has come onto the horizon

http://www.iipi.org/activities/softwareconference.htm

"Developing countries and aid agencies have thus invested heavily in 
support of building domestic software industries, particularly by 
investing in education and technology adoption.  More recently, many 
developing countries have also begun programs supporting the domestic 
development and acquisition of open source software as a means to 
technologically leap-frog ahead in this field.

While the various measures and programs developing countries have 
instituted are meant to promote the growth of domestic software 
companies, they may also have long-term negative effects upon the 
competitiveness of their software industry.  Without careful and 
enlightened policies, the well-intentioned efforts of some developing 
country governments may stunt the growth of their software companies and 
in the end do more harm than good."

As we sit and ponder the global potential of Hawaii as host to OSS 
conferences and as a presence in the OSS community, others have done 
more than sit.  Attending the conference include the following

What is Open Source?: A Survey of Open Source Licenses

    Larry Rosen, Counsel
    Open Source Initiative

The Role of Intellectual Property in Open Source Software

    Dr. Lee Hollaar, Professor
    University of Utah

Case Studies – Bridging the Open Source and Proprietary Divide –
Successfully Working With Both Platforms

    Stephen Hill, President and CEO
    Linux NetworX

and a lot more.  Why do we know about it?  Well, I received an email 
from a professor in France who is an OSS developer supporting French 
Schools.  As his email pasted below mentions, they have been very 
responsible in their fight to protect OSS from potentially devastating 
revisions to European IP law.  In order to keep this email from growing 
any longer, I will let him speak for himself.  He found my contact from 
the HOSEF site, so the beginnning addresses some potential synergies.

> Bonjour M. Belford,
> 
> 
> I was searching for a LUG in Hawaii and
> fortunately discovered a page on HOSEF,
> naming you as one of the main volunteers
> of it.
> 
> I am Francois PELLEGRINI, associate professor
> in computer science at ENSEIRB (engineering
> school at the University of Bordeaux), and
> also vice-president of abul.org , the LUG of
> Bordeaux and of the Aquitaine region.
> 
> Just to end with the HOSEF track: Abul started
> several years ago, and now goes on sponsoring,
> a full libre software distribution for schools,
> ranging from primary to secondary, called AbulEdu.
> Version 1.1 was based on Mandrake, and version 1.4
> is based on Debian. This distribution comprises
> many tools for children to write text (OpenOffice),
> handle images (Gimp),... plus adminsitration tools
> for the teachers and principals to manage classes,
> automatically print certificates of scholarship, etc.
> It has been designed to be fully multilingual, and
> is available in many languages.
> In its current form, only version 1.1 is downloadable
> from the abuledu.org website at :
> 
> ftp://ftp.free.fr/pub/Distributions_Linux/Abuledu/1.1/abuledu-1.1.1.iso
> 
> and requires a (very old) Mandrake 7.2 available from here :
> 
> ftp://ftp.abuledu.org/Mandrake/Mandrake72-inst.iso
> 
> Version 1.4 of AbulEdu is at the time being not
> downloadable, and available only through certified
> retailers. It is described in www.abuledu.com . The
> idea is to sell servers along with installed AbulEdu
> software (which is still GPLed, of course) to reimburse
> for development costs.
> 
> Maybe AbulEdu could be useful to HOSEF, as the deshtop
> have been bettered for teachers and children during several
> years...
> 
> But this is not the point why I was looking for a LUG in
> Hawaii. The point is that many LUG members across the
> world have been committed to fighting an awful regulation
> called "software patentability". If you never heard about the
> issues, please just read the following article, and I hope
> that you will be convinced :
> 
> http://www.forbes.com/asap/2002/0624/044.html
> 
> See also the statement of R. Jordan Greenhall, CEO of
> DivxNetworks, dated 27 februrary 2002, from the FTC hearing
> here :
> 
> http://www.ftc.gov/opp/intellect/020227trans.pdf
> 
> The point with Hawaii is that an awful conference will
> be held there :
> 
> http://www.iipi.org/activities/softwareconference.htm
> 
> By browsing through the description of the conference,
> you will notice how it will be biased towards proprietary
> software and such that developing countries should adopt
> "strong intellectual property regimes" that will indeed ban
> libre/free software, thanks to the software patents that
> giants such as MicroSoft have stockpiled :
> 
> http://www.advogato.org/article/453.html
> 
> Therefore, we would like to be able to distribute leaflets
> to the attendants of this conference. As we do not have the
> wide pockets of Microsoft   8^)   , we would like to know
> if somebody from the Hawaii LUG could print, copy, and
> distribute these leaflets to the attendents of the conference.
> The form of the leaflets has yet to be determined (we are
> already overworked by the fight on the European front...),
> but for instance we develop these for the Members of the
> European Parliament :
> 
> http://patinfo.ffii.org/material/flyers/a5-flyer-en.pdf
> http://patinfo.ffii.org/material/obituaries/obituaries.pdf
> 
> The purpose of these flyers would be to show attendants
> from developing countries that such "strong intellectual
> property", e.g. software patents, would severely hamper
> their ability to develop a flourishing local software
> industry, and that they should look at the US and European
> examples before signing such treaties...
> 
> If some of your members are interested by this action,
> could they contact me ? They could also participate in
> the writing of the leaflets, of course ! Volunteers
> are wellcome.
> 
> Keep on doing the good (libre) job !
> 
> Freely yours,
> 
> 
> 
>                 f.p. 

Now, keep an eye out for his next email that I am forwarding to the 
list.  There are some great ideas and insights.  What vision our friends 
of Liberty have.

--scott



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