[ppi] [ppiindia] Linux versus Microsoft di negara sedang berkembang

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from the October 19, 2004 edition -
http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/1019/p05s01-woam.html 

Developer world: Poor nations on front line of
computer wars

By Andrew Downie | Correspondent of The Christian
Science Monitor 

SÃO PAULO, BRAZIL - Until two weeks ago, Vanusa
Pereira had never used a computer. The uneducated,
unmarried, and unemployed mother of two did not know a
PC from a CD-ROM or a blaster worm from a Trojan
horse.

Today, thanks to a government-sponsored course that
has taught information-technology skills to more than
100,000 of São Paulo's poorest citizens, she knows how
to write e-mail, surf the Internet, and create basic
documents.

The fact that so many people like Ms. Pereira are
taking the first tentative steps toward computer
literacy is remarkable, but it is not the reason these
classes are newsworthy. The unusual thing here is that
the students are using Linux, an inexpensive,
open-source software platform increasingly popular
with governments, especially in the developing world,
who see it as a cheaper, safer, and more flexible
alternative to Microsoft Windows. Experts say
countries from Brazil to Russia to China are shunning
Bill Gates's proprietary operating system in favor of
open source, mounting a major challenge to Microsoft's
global dominance and making the executives in Redmond,
Wash., sweat.

"In emerging countries people are using Linux to
accelerate development," says Scott Handy, IBM's vice
president for worldwide Linux. "[There's a] relatively
similar model in Brazil, Russia, India, China, and
Korea. In those five countries, Linux is growing
faster than the IT [information technology] market in
general."

The growth of Linux, created by Finnish university
student Linus Torvalds and released in 1991, is not
restricted to the developing world - the cities of
Florence and Munich, parts of the German and French
governments, and even the US Department of Defense
have all installed Linux systems recently. But its
growth here is faster, experts say, due mainly to cost
and control. Because the development code behind
Windows applications is hidden, it can only be
accessed by licensed Microsoft engineers. Linux code,
meanwhile, is freely available and programmers can
improve it, change it to suit their individual needs,
and even give it to other people without infringing on
copyright laws.

Brazilian officials hope this will help create a new
generation of software engineers that will put the
country in the forefront of computer development.

"In developing open-source software, all innovations
are immediately shared with the community, thus
allowing everyone to share in the improvements," says
Sergio Amadeu, the head of Brazil's National
Information Technology Institute. "The country goes
from being one of mere consumers to one that develops
solutions."

Brazil currently shells out $1.2 billion a year in
royalties and licensing fees to foreign software
manufacturers, according to Mr. Amadeu. If
governments, businesses, and other institutional users
all start sharing open software, the potential savings
are huge. Since 2001, São Paulo has saved almost $10
million by ditching Microsoft and buying hardware that
does not require nearly as much memory or such fast
processors as required by systems running Windows.
Officials also say they save on maintenance and
security because Linux systems are less vulnerable to
attacks from hackers and viruses.

The Linux systems being used in São Paulo were
introduced by leftist Mayor Marta Suplicy as part of
an overall revamp of the city's digital projects. Mr.
Suplicy's first initiative was to reconfigure all the
city's websites using Linux software, and the second
was to establish Linux as the base platform for more
than 100 Telecentros, cyber cafes-cum-IT schools set
up in poor neighborhoods like this one on the edge of
the city's rough north side.

Although the Telecentros were warmly welcomed by the
75 percent of São Paulinos who have no access to the
Internet, however, the decision to ditch Windows
provoked controversy. Some critics accused the
left-of-center Workers' Party that governs both São
Paulo and Brazil of waging a nationalist war against
Microsoft, perhaps the biggest and most emblematic
example of US cultural and commercial hegemony.

Amadeu, who aims to transfer 40 percent of the federal
government's computers to Linux before the end of
2006, even compared Microsoft to drug traffickers. He
says Microsoft's offer to provide Windows software to
schools was like that of dealers offering children a
first hit for free.

Although Microsoft would not comment on the
repercussions of Linux's rapid development in Brazil
(and the company says Amadeu did not respond to their
requests for a clarification on his comments),
industry experts say there are clearly big changes
afoot. More and more governments and companies will
either adopt Linux as a cheaper alternative or use it
as leverage in negotiations with Microsoft.

"Brazil will do what a lot of other governments are
doing, which is to put Microsoft under a lot of
pressure to cut the price and increase the support,"
says Mike Gubbins, editor of Computing, Britain's
bestselling technology magazine. "Microsoft said they
would never give away their code, but as soon as China
came in with a billion people, they were reasonably
happy to do that because they haven't got much choice.
Brazil is another developing country that is in a
strong situation."




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