When Teachers Are Obstacles To Linux In Education 1589
jamie found this blog post up on the HeliOS Project, which brings Linux to school kids in Austin, TX. It makes very clear some of the obstacles that free software faces in the classroom. It seems a teacher came upon a student demonstrating Linux to other kids and handing out LiveCDs. The teacher confiscated the CDs and wrote an angry email to HeliOS's founder, Ken Starks: "Mr. Starks, I am sure you strongly believe in what you are doing but I cannot either support your efforts or allow them to happen in my classroom. At this point, I am not sure what you are doing is legal. No software is free and spreading that misconception is harmful. ... This is a world where Windows runs on virtually every computer and putting on a carnival show for an operating system is not helping these children at all. I am sure if you contacted Microsoft, they would be more than happy to supply you with copies of an older version of Windows and that way, your computers would actually be of service to those receiving them..." Starks pens an eloquent reply, which contains a factoid I have not seen mentioned before: "The fact that you seem to believe that Microsoft is the end all and be-all is actually funny in a sad sort of way. Then again, being a good NEA member, you would spout the Union line. Microsoft has pumped tens of millions of dollars into your union. Of course you are going to 'recommend' Microsoft Windows."
Re:Let's cut the conspiracy theory (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Let's cut the conspiracy theory (Score:5, Interesting)
Who broke the law? (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm not sure which is funnier ... (Score:1, Interesting)
"No software is free and spreading that misconception is harmful."
Oh my goodness! Yes, keep that up, and students might realize they can write software themselves!!! What a horrible message that would send.
What kind of an upside-down world does this teacher live in? It's as if they were complaining that if students got free paper, they might start writing. Or if they got free wood and tools, they might start doing carpentry. Or ... learn to do anything.
"I am sure if you contacted Microsoft, they would be more than happy to supply you with copies of an older version of Windows"
BWHAHAHAHA! That was a good one. Not only would they be unlikely to do this, if Microsoft offered free copies of anything they'd probably offer free copies of Vista :-)
Even a stopped clock... (Score:4, Interesting)
It's interesting that some of her statements are not strictly inaccurate. I might even say enlightened, without the enlightenment.
Amen to this. There is always an associated upkeep to software, alluded to by the reply about releasing improvements incrementally.
Kids aren't a commodity, you have to take the rotten apples with the good ones. School teachers are just people who have a lot of different kids to deal with. Imagine grading kids' papers, errors, and half-thoughts for years. I'll cut that person a little slack for what they get paid. Much like my 6th Grade teacher (with a Master's in Psychology) who was at a loss to figure out how to properly spell Chameleon (stuck in the Ca and Ka sections of the Dictionary), people are ignorant about different things. Welcome to the world. I'm surprised she wrote a letter. I saw it as a plea for help worded in a defensive manner. Now she gets educated. The circle is complete.
Re:Let's cut the conspiracy theory (Score:5, Interesting)
I recently had a conversation with a recently retired friend of mine.
He barely uses the net- I think he has an email address with his ISP and that's about it.
He was complaining about how everything was so expensive and how he's had to pay for some antivirus software after their old computer got infected with something. etc.
I ask: "why didn't you just get some free one?"
His response: "There's so such thing as a free lunch! Either it's stolen or they'll be cheating you somehow"
I then tried to explain about linux and FOSS but he had grown up with the solid idea that nothing worth having is ever free unless you're being scammed in some way.
He could not be convinced that FOSS was legal and genuinely free. There had to be a catch. There had to be a law being broken.
This attitude is common with the older generation who aren't used to the net. "Free" rings alarm bells and this is an issue I rarely hear mention of when people talk about the problems linux has spreading.
As a fellow teacher... (Score:4, Interesting)
As a fellow teacher, let me speak in this woman's defense:
As a teacher, and especially as a K-12 teacher, no one has ever asked her to be anything other than an ignorant, time-wasting simpleton bent on convincing the children in her charge that all adults are blathering morons and that education is for douchebags. In fact, I'm pretty sure "Time-Wasting" and "Self-Righteous Ignorance" are required courses in most teacher-training programs.
There is a reason why most people don't learn much until they get into college. College professors have never had to take any classes in the education department.
So cut the lady some slack, folks. She's just doing what she was trained to do.
How to introduce free software (Score:5, Interesting)
I find what works best is to supply examples of fine open source software that runs on Windows and Linux. Once they grasp the concept of free open source software and the missing hurdles to it's use, the next step is to note the OS itself is free software. As an example, this page I wrote concerning an engineering challenge for launching t shirts at a NBA game. The engineering task was to find the optimum length for the launch tube. Note the use of open source software in the solution. When the teacher compared the open source solution to the Microsoft Sound Recorder or other packaged solution, then the seed for the concept is planted. Have the teacher read the license. um End User License Agreement. On a side note, the final and winner announcement will be this Friday. Our team has an excellent chance of winning. The teacher knows that I use The Gimp to size photos for the wiki, etc on a Linux machine. Windows is not needed.
https://inteltrailblazerschallenge.wikispaces.com/Barrel+length+trim+method [wikispaces.com]
When Open Source is the best solution, it gets noticed. It is no longer just hobbiest software.
Ken Starks (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Let's cut the conspiracy theory (Score:4, Interesting)
And still - does that give the teacher the right to confiscate something that's not criminal to possess?
If I was a parent then I would at least file a complaint with the school. If they didn't respond in a responsible manner then it would have been time for legal action.
You're American: Sue her for libel (Score:4, Interesting)
"At this point, I am not sure what you are doing is legal. No software is free and spreading that misconception is harmful"
The law isn't just there for assholes to misuse. She's calling him a thief and accusing him of corrupting children. She's also hindering his business and bringing his him into disrepute. I think it would make an interesting case and that it would have merit even if he didn't win.
To the best of my knowledge she's got every right to choose to keep Linux out of the classroom if the laws and regulations of her school, district, state etc. give her that power. However she has no right dictating what software the children use after hours or what their political views should be. So get a parent or two involved as well/
Of course you could use this as an opportunity to demonstrate that she's wrong, but you're not going to win her over, and if you did you'd have won one hell of a prize ally.
Re:Let's cut the conspiracy theory (Score:5, Interesting)
Even better:
I had a Networking teacher confiscate my laptop, which was running ubuntu, cause he thought I was running some hacked version of XP. A friggin computer teacher. Had to explain to the dean of students what linux was, provided several wiki pages, and pleaded my case before two department heads. Two weeks later, I get my laptop back and the teacher still thinks I'm doing illegal stuff on there. Classic quote from my interrogation.... "What is this Gimp? Is it some hacked Photoshop?"
So yes, they do exist. And they're growing more stupid by the moment.
Re:Let's cut the conspiracy theory (Score:4, Interesting)
I've read enough articles from reputable news sources about people claiming to be university trained computer experts saying some very ignorant and fallacious things to say that this story is definitely in the realm of probability. There are too many people in positions of authority who haven't a clue what they are either doing or talking about. Ted (the Series of tubes) Stevens rolls off the top of my tongue quite easily (though he never claimed to be a computer expert AFAIK).There are many more examples I would need to Google for.
Re:Let's cut the conspiracy theory (Score:5, Interesting)
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/02/23/1330220 [slashdot.org]
"The idea that Free Software can be sold has some government officials perplexed. Times Online has the story. A UK Trading Standards officer contacted the Mozilla Foundation to report catching a business selling copies of Firefox. The organization confiscated the CDs with the intent to prosecute said business. When informed that such distribution was authorized, the officer first expressed disbelief that Free Software could be sold then said 'If Mozilla permit the sale of copied versions of its software, it makes it virtually impossible for us, from a practical point of view, to enforce UK anti-piracy legislation'."
there ya go
Re:Take note of this, everyone. (Score:1, Interesting)
I don't think Linux was designed to "free people from Microsoft." I think that it was designed as an alternative to closed-source operating systems in general, which being "freed" from Microsoft Windows is a side effect.
There really is no difference. Microsoft software is closed-source, as you wrote, linux was designed to be an alternative to closed-source operating systems. Thus linux was designed to be an alternative to Microsoft software. It doesn't really matter that the universe of closed source software is bigger than just Microsoft.
A true side effect would be something like IBM changing their business model as a result of the prominence of linux.
Is she even a member of the NEA? (Score:4, Interesting)
Not all teachers are members of NEA. My wife is a teacher in Georgia, and she is not a member. Considering that Karent is a teacher in Texas, I would bet she's not in a union. Unions have never been strong in southern states.
Re:Let's cut the conspiracy theory (Score:4, Interesting)
Yes, teachers can confiscate pretty much anything. The child or his/her parents have a right to have it back, but anything that the teacher deems to be unlawful or harmful or disruptive can be confiscated. Sure, this teacher made a mistake, but if they were treading on eggshells all the time then their job would be impossible.
Re:Who broke the law? (Score:4, Interesting)
Teachers have to have the right to confiscate property. Such property must of course be returned to the pupil or his/her parents, but making confiscation a potentially criminal act would make school discipline impossible. It's the same with refereeing a sport, the ref's authority has to be unquestionable on the field.
Just read the license! (Score:5, Interesting)
Eighteen years ago, I discovered emacs. I got hold of a printed copy of the whole manual for it, which was pretty thick, even back then. I took it to a copy shop so I could have one for myself. (Remember, this is back when a 4-foot wide line printer in the terminal room was about all I had access to.)
The girl working the counter flipped open the binder to the very first page, and saw a copyright notification, and promptly told me that she could not copy the manual because it would be illegal to do so. I told her to simply READ what she was looking at. In about thirty seconds, she was copying the manual.
I understand that people want to respect copyright law. I do too. But any sort of ignorance to the fact that it's actually copyright law that MAKES open source work ought to be able to be remedied quickly by just reading the copyright license to the software. Any questions about the situation could then be resolved within about 5 minutes of Googling.
And, just to threadjack my own post, I just-as-quickly forgot about emacs, and allowed myself to be beat about the head and shoulders by vi until now, to the point that I won't go anywhere near emacs. ;-)
Re:Let's cut the conspiracy theory (Score:2, Interesting)
Bla Bla Bla (Score:1, Interesting)
Yes, we all know the mantra: Windows is Evil, Linux is Robin Hood.
Howeer, is Linux really FREE? If you are using it and have a problem who gives you support?
1: Ask on the web and get a responses from people who don't have time to answer your questions but have time to say you posted in the wrong forum/you are stupid/the question has been answered elsewhere. You then walk away feeling frustrated with no answers. (Been there done that)
2: Buy support which makes the product no longer FREE
If you need a change to the software what do you do?
1: Beg/pray/hope the community makes the change you want.
2: Pay a developer to do it which makes the product no longer FREE
The point being, is the software really free or is there a hidden charge associated with it?
I understand there are Linux Guru's out there who don't need support since they know everything, and if they'd like to come do work for me for free than I'll be happy to be proven wrong.
Oh, and one other point - how do you know if your Linux Kernel is authentic? For example, if an angry employee adds code to the kernel to cause everything to crash when they are gone how do you tell? Sure, with a lot of work and knowledge you could look into it, but is an average business manager going to be able to do that?
Using something for fun in your parents basement is one thing. Using it as the foundation for your business is something else. How does Red Hat make money again? When something is "FREE" you'll find out you can't really afford it.
...Who Would Do This? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:You need to explain (Score:1, Interesting)
And nearly every other language has two different words for those concepts.
All companies aim for the education market (Score:3, Interesting)
Apple used to own the schools. Every major company targets the education market (or used to). If you can get people hooked on your system as students then they will want it as paying or decision making adults. I've seen discounts as much as 90% off for educational markets, sometimes hardware sold well below production cost. This may be less important these days as most people encounter their first computer at home instead of schools.
What I find shocking and offensive is the teachers belief that "no software is free". Attacking teachers on their ties to Microsoft (known or unknown) isn't nearly as effective as educating them on open source software and its benefits (there is a term for this, "teaching the teachers").
Re:How not to reply to people (Score:1, Interesting)
Do you really think that pointing her to different places, or even politely pointing out the flaws in what she said would work any better? I doubt it. She'd likely think that you're just being an elitist, know-it-all prick, and not bother even reading up any links that you sent along, no matter how nice you were. Not that we shouldn't try to be nice, but she didn't want to know the facts anyway.
It's a shame when some of us GNU/Linux geeks act like pricks towards people trying to get to grips with the OS, and are really wanting to learn. But I don't really care much about being rude to this person.
Comment removed (Score:4, Interesting)
As a Highschool teacher... (Score:1, Interesting)
I'm a High School teacher and would be very uneasy about putting bootable linux CDs into the hands of teenage boys on the school network.
Having Linux at home is fine, honestly - but - the things that a teenager could get up to with a copy of some other operating system range from the somewhat cheeky (using it to play a few video games while the teacher isn't looking), to the naughty (browsing websites outside the 'safety' filters), to the illegal (accessing private & sensitive student data) to the destructive (reformatting sections of the school network).
Like it or not - giving advanced access to school computers is a very very bad idea.
The vast majority of students will do no harm but it only takes one to spoil a few days, or even a whole year's education for the entire school.
Think - what if a student used advanced access to delete a whole year's coursework?
Teenagers don't have the maturity or self control to understand the wider effects of their actions, and schools don't have the money to bring in the level of security experts we need to protect against the kids.
Whatever the case in with this line about "no software is free" (sounds like a load of bunk to me) the idea that kids need Linux in highschool is ridiculous.
The HeliOS response is just as bad or perhaps worse. To the point that this whole thing sounds like two children bickering in a playground.
Tying the ignorance of one man the people who fight for worker's rights is just plain offensive.
The struggle of teacher's unions is in place to ensure a number of things like for example: the person standing in front of the room is highly qualified. The person standing in front of your teacher is not overworked (and therefore will have the patience to deal with your children calmly when they step out of line) and so on...
Teacher's unions are good for your children.
All things considered - they're both wrong.
Not ALL teachers (Score:3, Interesting)
My wife is a teacher and routinely refuses to use the Windows XP boxes in her classroom for anything other than what is required for the students use. In fact, she's pushing to get Linux in the classrooms since they are less susceptible to viruses and spyware and can be monitored and maintained with much less pain.
Re:From TFA (Score:4, Interesting)
"There are two major products that come out of Berkeley: LSD and UNIX. We don't believe this to be a coincidence." - Jeremy S. Anderson
Re:You need to explain (Score:5, Interesting)
Why not expand your vocabularies a bit and use "gratis" when speaking about free as in beer to avoid misconceptions? It's a valid word.
Then again, when a teacher cannot use "either/neither" correctly... (re: the teacher's letter)
Re:Let's cut the conspiracy theory (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Let's cut the conspiracy theory (Score:3, Interesting)
There are people that don't know what Linux is... (Score:4, Interesting)
I once had two managers asking me what is this Linux company and if it is as big as Microsoft...
In the end, the year of Linux on the desktop will come not when technology matures, but when it is advertised appropriately...it seems Linux has a marketing problem!
Mistake after mistake. (Score:2, Interesting)
Here we have a story of a teacher who has a valid concern (in theory) over what might be going on in her classroom and then reacts out of ignorance.
No effort was made by the teacher to actually research the subject before jumping to conclusions and sending off what must be one of the silliest, most ridiculous emails I have seen.
A thought that might have helped prevent the teacher avoid the ridicule that will follow:
"Better to be silent and thought a fool than to open one's mouth and remove all doubt."
In truth I am not entirely surprised by the teacher though.
Nor am I too surprised by the blogged response that perpetuates the negative stereotype of linux users as arrogant, obnoxious know-it-alls who might be a little bit crazy... (Conspiracy theory? Please.)
Linux improves all the time.
The amount of POSITIVE media attention and awareness linux gets continues to grow, as does marketshare.
The response posted in the blog reinforces my belief that what holds linux back the most is
some of the users.
Too bad, really, because linux users and the community is also one of the greatest strengths we have.
Re:Why Should Teacher Know or Care About Linux? (Score:5, Interesting)
Unless you are applying for a job as a unix/linux admin.....
I have NEVER used Microsoft office. Well ok, I guess I should say that I have never used most of microsoft office. I used outlook in the past, I've used access in the past. But I have not used Word, Powerpoint, Excel, etc. Never had a class on them, never used them in my job.
What I was brought up on was wordperfect. We didn't have classes in high school that covered spreadsheets. I did learn dbase in high school. What my computer teachers taught me was how to use a graphical interface, how to research information, and how to understand technical writing.
So when I got my first personal computer with windows 98 on it and finally had a need for something other then the blue goodness of wordperfect I found star office. I didn't need any training to use it. I just figured it out.
This year my job required us all to receive a IC3 certification (http://info.certiport.com/yourpersonalpath/ic3Certification/). It consists of three exams. One covered basic windows/computer knowledge, one covered basic internet knowledge, and the last covered microsoft office 2003. I did not even have microsoft office installed on my work computer. I walked into the testing center, took my test, got 100% and walked out.
Why? Am I a computer genius? Hell no! I was taught how to use computers, and not how to use a piece of software.
This is a mindset I'm fixing where I work. I'm in the works of switching the campus to Open Office 3. I dream of a day where we stop teaching how to use Word, and start teaching how to use a computer as a tool to get your job done.
That's cooperation, one of two ways to self-govern (Score:5, Interesting)
Humanity has two basic options for government:
Cooperation and control.
In cooperation, we support each other and do not require institutions and Nanny State/Authoritarian governments to tell us what not to do. It's obvious murder is wrong, if you get something give something, etc. PROBLEM: cooperation requires the ability to kick out or kill non-cooperators, and it requires a strong innate culture, an "organic state."
In control, enough people are reckless with their desires that a strong institutional state emerges, mainly to tell them what not to do. Don't kill, don't steal, no nonconsensual sodomy, etc. They're ideal for unifying a whole bunch of people of unknown values. PROBLEM: control requires increasing amounts of control, because people learn to expect society to wipe their asses and so they stop thinking critically about their own actions, making them more not less reckless.
I know which one I'd prefer. (Portions of this message are paraphrases of the text of Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs, approximately page 112 in the new edition.)
Re:Let's cut the conspiracy theory (Score:3, Interesting)
I have a coworker who is like this. Every time he hears that I'm using a free piece of software, he makes a snide remark. If the server goes down, he tries to pin it on some freeware that I used. (Nevermind that the crash could in no way be realistically tied to the freeware.) In his mind, Free = Junk. He seems to think that you have to pay money to get quality software. That's why, when I tried to recommend OpenOffice.org to replace our Lotus WordPro installations, I decided to recommend StarOffice instead. I figured that he wouldn't object as much if we needed to pay something for the software. (He must be silently fuming that I've got tons of people here using PDFCreator to convert their documents into PDF for posting to our Intranet.)
Re:Let's cut the conspiracy theory (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Let's cut the conspiracy theory (Score:1, Interesting)
I also remember that we were not allowed inside the school during sub-zero temperatures during recess because recess is about being outside.
I don't even know how to respond to this... I'm just going to assume you're from a part of the world that isn't very cold... The thought that I shouldn't go outside because "it is too cold out" never crossed my mind.
Hell, we wouldn't have to go outside for half the school year under those conditions!
But I suppose they wouldn't have let us out if it was below 40 with windchill (I once had a friend from northern Quebec describe how careful they had to be growing up).
Re:Not a good example... (Score:5, Interesting)
The problem is thinking of software as a physical good rather than as information...
Information can be passed around freely and often is, it can also be bought, sold and hoarded. Giving someone a free piece of software is no different from giving them a free piece of advise or just having a general conversation with them.
Re:Let's cut the conspiracy theory (Score:3, Interesting)
I think the problem is that "if it's free, there has to be a catch" is a hard-won adage, with many people learning for themselves why it was true, and it takes time and education to put them in proper perspective with the way free software is done.
There are free-as-in-cost AV programs, the way to think about it is the home use license is considered the "promotional" version, if you want more features or if it's for organizational use (business, gov, non-profit), then there is a fee.
Re:Take note of this, everyone. (Score:3, Interesting)
It's still control freak, it's just using a different method to the authoritarian one.
Re:Let's cut the conspiracy theory (Score:3, Interesting)
PDFCreator? Doesn't staroffice export to PDF natively?
Your colleague is clearly rather ignorant. It makes perfect sense in virtually any situation, especially business, to evaluate multiple options thoroughly and decide based on relative merits of each.
I deal with similar people at work too... They are very jealous that I always have newer hardware to play with than they do, and they refuse to believe i'm not getting favoritism from the bosses... Infact, I save so much by not buying any software and making more efficient use of servers etc, that I'm able to spend the surplus budget on new hardware like fancy new laptops and such. My budget is actually considerably lower than theirs, too.
Capitalist ideology. I have a similar story. (Score:5, Interesting)
Anything cooperative is hurting society and clearly illegal. Individuals producing for free are breaking the law; only corporations are legitimate suppliers/producers, and only those who pay should have access to society's production.
I had the experience in high school way back in the late '80s and early '90s before "OSS" was a term.
I was suspended for writing software and sharing it with my friends. My own source code. The administration of my school told myself and my parents in no uncertain terms that I was breaking the law by writing software and giving it to others, and they were having none of it on school property.
They suggested that to be "constructive," my dad could help me to "start a company" and sell the software to my friends in the computer club, which would be legal, and, they suggested, if priced properly ($5-10 was what they suggested), still affordable to other students and not in violation of the "law," which forbids giving away goods for free. They mixed up anti-socialism/communitarianism in their heads with some kind of Sherman anti-trustiness and applied it to a 13-year-old kid.
My parents allowed me to leave school immediately and I finished my education as a home schooled student, went to a university CS department at 15 and eventually to the University of Chicago for grad school.
Those same administrators still run the local high school, which has 5,000 students and is an inner city campus.
Re:Not a good example... (Score:4, Interesting)
"The problem is thinking of software as a physical good rather than as information"
Interesting. I think of my e-mails as not just information but as property. They have value to me, they do actually exist as represented by the data bits on some media somewhere (I know of the precise location of only 2 or 3 copies of my readily accessible emails, my archives are on 2 CDs or DVDs, and my phone may or may not have a copy at any given time), and are indeed property in that were I to give the disk to someone, they would physically possess the data.
I think the problem is thinking that information cannot be a physical good. Perhaps you should use the term 'idea(s)' instead of 'information'.
Then you've come to the crux of FOSS. The idea is given away, as software. It need not be a new idea, but the expression of it may be something new and different from other expressions. And while you can pay for some of those expressions, you can get some for 'free', that is for no cost other than making it physically available to your use - downloading onto a disk, for instance, or even using it remotely via a web site...
We do have to think of how property and ideas are different. And how many people can keep an idea secret. And the futility of a secret idea.
Re:Let's cut the conspiracy theory (Score:3, Interesting)
"I'm fairly sure that E=MC^2 should've been outlawed before they used that formula to bomb the hell out of 2 Japanese cities..."
Hey...it was war.
Not to mention...in the long run..it saved many more lives that would have been lost on a normal assault of the Japanese mainland. It brought a quick end to the war, it served its purpose.
That is a terrible misconception. Conventional bombing was already doing more damage and killing more people than we could do with our two little atom bombs. Japan had already started the peace negotiations before we dropped the bombs. The bomb was probably dropped for two reasons, neither of which was to force Japan to surrender. First, the emperor could use this new super bomb as an excuse to surrender. And second, the cold war was already starting in post war Germany, and we wanted to show the Russians to not mess with us. It worked for a few years, until they detonated their own bomb.
Never explain by conspiracy . . . (Score:5, Interesting)
a) Most people in education barely know linux exists. I was running XP in virtualization under Ubuntu one day when a guy from IT came over to put Active Directory on everyone's computers. (Long story.) This guy in *IT* had never seen anything like it before. "That's so cool," he said.
b) For the faculty, using some other OS is inconceivable. Literally. Trying to explain some of this stuff to them feels just like going all the way back to teaching kids the alphabet.
c) They're so far away from having a clue, they don't know they don't have a clue. The teacher in the post probably felt about like you would if somebody removed all the books and computers from class and substituted comics. I mean, look at the ga-ga reaction: "How dare you try to feed these children drivel instead of Solid Practical Experience?"
Re:That's cooperation, one of two ways to self-gov (Score:4, Interesting)
In cooperation, we support each other and do not require institutions ... PROBLEM: cooperation requires the ability to kick out or kill non-cooperators, and it requires a strong innate culture, an "organic state."
Actually, in the primary example of social cooperation, raising children, this isn't true. There are hundreds of social species on this planet, and none of them expect their infants to contribute, or even "cooperate", for most of their childhood (however that's defined). Of course, part of the upbringing of species like ours is to teach the kids that cooperation and sharing are expected. Others (e.d., bees and ants) have builtin instincts that "force" them to cooperate when they become adults.
Of course, non-cooperating adults do tend to be evicted from social groups in most species. But "freeloaders" have been documented in many species. This may be a social inefficiency, but not necessarily. One could argue that, in software, it's advantageous to have freeloaders. They are regularly viewed by developers as testers. Software with lots of non-programmer users can be among the best, because such users can contribute bug reports ("complaints"), and this information can be used to improve the software. So the FOSS crowd doesn't kick out (or kill ;-) non-cooperators, they just relegate you to the status of guinea pig for software ideas.
Re:Let's cut the conspiracy theory (Score:3, Interesting)
I've seen people have a similar reaction to Free TV.
"What do you mean you don't have cable?"
Simple I just tune it in with an antenna, and I get cool stuff like the Retro TV network.
"That's stealing!"
No it rea...
"I'm going to report you! Damn cable thief."
(sigh)
Open Letter to Mark Williams, President, AISD (Score:5, Interesting)
Mark Williams, District 5, President, Austin Independent School District.
Dear Mr. Williams:
As you may or may not be aware, it appears that a teacher in your district recently disciplined her student for demonstrating open source software to his/her classmates.
IMPORTANT: The article http://linux.slashdot.org/linux/08/12/10/001236.shtml [slashdot.org] about this is going viral on the web.
I can assure you that educators need to understand that Open Source Software is, by it's very nature, free. Free to use, free to distribute and free to copy. Further to that, Open Source Software can save your school board 10's of thousands of dollars in licencing and royalty fees. Replacing Windows and/or Microsoft Office is now easy. Furthermore, going forward, upgrades are free too.
More and more schools and school boards are adopting Linux and Open Office http://www.openoffice.org/ [openoffice.org]. Open Office is a mature, fully-featured, standards compliant Open Source office suite which adheres to fully open document standards and can open and create virtually any MS Office document, spreadsheet or presentation. Linux is virtually virus-free, stable and secure. Special versions of it are designed for schools. Here's one: http://k12ltsp.org/ [k12ltsp.org]
The most important thing about Open Source Software is that it helps to level the playing field. Less advantaged students can take home legal copies of software and use and install them legally at home.
All I would ask is this:
- Please educate your teaching staff about the advantages of Open Source Software.
- Please have your IT department review its costs and look at the savings to be had.
- Please do what you can to help give all kids the same opportunities.
Thank you in advance for your time in looking into this matter.
Re:Never explain by conspiracy . . . (Score:1, Interesting)
Microsoft gets around a lot of this by charging next to nothing for educational licenses. It's their way of making certain that the next generation grows up using Microsoft software and helps to continue the market dominance.
This is the exact same reason why (at least until the mid 90's) almost every computer in a lab or classroom was an Apple (or Mac).
It always gave me a chuckle, when you looked into the actual school offices & saw them using Windows, but promoting Apple's as "The way of business world".
They wanted the free computers (or super-cheap ones) and if they put IBM-compatibles in the labs Apple would stop donating.
This is also (from everything I can tell) the reason why most people who are Apple fans, are RABID Apple fans- they had it drilled into their skulls since childhood that Pc's are for game, Macs are for professionals. Apple could stop making computers outright, & I'd still hear people raving about "how much better the Mac is at xxx than a PC".
Re:Why does everyone fucking talk like this (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:You need to explain (Score:3, Interesting)
A few years ago, I read of a survey/study which concluded that 50% of the American population had never been more than 200 miles (that's about 300 km ;-) from where they were born. I did suspect that the "200" implied a lot of rounding, which is reasonable given the error bars on most people's guesses as to how far away from home they've been. But the number is probably useful for a rough guide.
And, of course, it implies that 50% of Americans have been more than 200 miles from where they were born.
I've had fun occasionally with visitors from Ireland, by saying that I'm about the same distance from where I was born as they are from Ireland - and I was born in the USA. This tends to get interesting reactions, because they usually have no feel at all for how big a country it is.
Anyway, I wonder if numbers like this are available for any other country? I suppose they'd be most meaningful for the larger countries, since politics tends to get in the way of travel across national borders.