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Open Economies - RE: [OpenEconomies] Digital Divide bridged by Linux

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RE: [OpenEconomies] Digital Divide bridged by Linux

  • To: openeconomies(at)cyber.law.harvard.edu
  • Subject: RE: [OpenEconomies] Digital Divide bridged by Linux
  • From: Mikael Pawlo <mikael(at)pawlo.com>
  • Date: Thu, 17 Jan 2002 22:31:02 +0100
  • In-reply-to: <8BEC443F1D4AD51181B300A0C9840C2811704F@GEOMAIL>
Dear James,
You pose very hard questions. I haven't had the time thinking through this
entirely, but I will give you few, hardly consistent thoughts on this
matter. From the top of my head. I will submit something more substantial
this weekend, when I have thought of this more.

At 06.40 -0500 02-01-16, Moore, James wrote:
>Dear Mikael,
>Given the Open Economies is a list about policy and law, can you make the
>policy linkage to your posting on Linux and Open Source?  What do you think
>that government officials in developing countries should do, or do
>differently, given the promise of Open Source software?

"A 'New Economy' drives the world today. Yet, nearly a quarter of the
people this Assembly represents have neither prospered nor gained from
these developments. Often, they find themselves further marginalised and
more vulnerable as development economics gives way to unbridled market
economics and social objectives are erased by profit motives."

Those are not my words. Shri Vitar Bhapal Vhajpayee, prime minister of
India, said them during the Millenium Summit.

With Linux and outranged computers from the West, the residents in the
so-called third world countries could get aquainted with IT and perhaps
even the Internet at a very low cost. I think the most important barrier to
cross is the one of the first IT contact. Most users can come a long way
with email and news only to begin with. If you speak with Rawls we need a
society whereas every person has equal opportunities to start with (the
position of the lawmaker behind a veil of ignorance and so forth). Nozick
has critisised Rawls, but I think we should keep Rawls' - if naive - basics
in the outlook on society and policy. It's better to start with a lousy
computer than no computer at all.

You can learn a lot with equipment that no one in the Western democracies
would pay a penny for. Further - this argument is valid intra-state as
well. In the USA you could give computers to homeless shelters etc. YES - I
know this isn't what they need most, but I think you should not only give
shelter, but also teach a way for people to get out of their poverty. The
means may not be perfect but with the right Linux distribution and a 386
you can work miracles.

(---)
>Many argue that if China could actually enforce the laws against software
>piracy, the burden of either paying for the software, or slowing diffusion
>of information technology, would put a huge drag on China's national
>economic and social development efforts.

All societies need a market based incentive structure to make software
developers release code attractive to consumers. I know South Korea works
with software in a totally different way wheras there is no author, but
only a collective author - the community. This seems to work, but I guess
its a type of meritocraty.

This doesn't mean proprietary software might co-exist with free software
and open source.

"In India, the state of Goa has finally addressed the issue of illegal code
on classroom computers by distributing Linux. Linux enthusiasts from local
colleges
have pledged to help the government conduct a mass migration of PCs to a
localized version of Linux based on the Red Hat distribution."

From:
http://www.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=02/01/16/0310222&mode=thread

>Over a few years, this might (1) lower the Chinese cost for foundational
>software such as client and service OS and basic applications, due to the
>substitution of Open Source for imported commercial software; (2) create a
>highly networked community of developers and support experts--due to the
>intense community-building nature of Open Source movements; (3) provide
>intellectual property protection and financial incentives for Chinese
>companies doing knowledge work--and thus help efforts at local economic
>development.
>If this macro argument makes sense to you, what do you think are the two or
>three most important policy and legal actions China (or another nation,
>perhaps South Africa) might take?

Hard questions indeed. I am a lawyer, a hobby economist and anything but a
public policy scholar.

That much said, I think we need to start bottom-up by introducing computers
to the masses. Most of the world population still have not tried a computer
even once.

I think the UN should devote its talents to educate and spread open source
knowledge plus do installations in third world contries. It could also
co-ordinate all these efforts. One could actually fund this with all the
revenues in ICANN. I know they are not related in anyway, but why not?

On a related note, you might also be interested in my recent community
column from Newsforge, The case for "lagom" copyright:
http://harvard.pawlo.com/newsf02.html

Well - just some loose thoughts for now. I will be back .-)


Regards

Mikael Pawlo

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