[CS-FSLUG] Sydney Morning Herald: Cuba to Dump Windows for Linux

[Don Parris]

On Thu, 19 May 2005 19:32:37 -0700
David Aikema <daikema at gmail.com> wrote:

> On 5/19/05, Don Parris <gnumathetes at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Does anyone else here see the irony of Communist Cuba adopting libre
> > software, especially while the libre US continues its dependence on
> > non-free software. ;)
> 
> I don't think that it's ironic at all.  To me, the ideas of communism
> and open source seem to have a much closer correspondence then that of
> free enterprise and open source.  Of course, communism in theory and
> communism in practice are two different things... human sinfulness
> always gets in the way.
> 

I think libre software guarantees - and, quite possibly, inspires - free
enterprise. Just my opinion, though. :)

> Anyways, I think that the main reason for this is political...
> Microsoft is a US-based company after all, and it and the US don't get
> along to  well.  Hence, you gain access to and control over the source
> code so you can ensure that backdoors are in the compiled software
> (unless of course your compiler setup to insert those backdoors but
> let's not go there).  I think that in China, there's actually a
> government-sponsored Linux distribution for example.
> 
> David
> 
> _______________________________________________

I felt that was obvious.  However, since I am in the midst of Lessig's "Free
Culture", I am kind of mingling the concepts of a libre society with libre
software.  Political or not, I find it a little humorous.  Of course, I'm
weird like that.


Don
-- 
evangelinux    GNU Evangelist
http://matheteuo.org/                   http://chaddb.sourceforge.net/
"Free software is like God's love - you can share it with anyone anytime
anywhere."