Dan Gillmor's been in Africa, and in his column this week, he turns in good insight on the role that open source software plays in the developing world.
Around the globe, educators, companies and governments are getting tired of paying the Microsoft tax, which tends to rise inexorably, and sending the money to America. They don't like the upgrade cycle, especially when older computers run Linux just fine. They want to inspire more software innovation at home, and suspect Linux may be the best platform in a world where Microsoft also takes most of the profits in Windows application software…
Microsoft's best argument against open source in the corporate and government contexts is to say it really isn't free, given the support and training costs. There's some truth to this, but the logic also assumes that people are willing to keep buying new hardware to support Microsoft's latest products.
In Africa, that's not just flawed logic. It's nutty, and cost fundamentally rules out Windows on much of the continent.
