Wednesday 11 February 2009

FLOSSIfy

An intro to the very wonderful FLOSSify project, which is introducing textbooks about free software into schools and universities:

For a long time educational courses have been cheap marketing for proprietary software companies. Can a student really afford all those expensive softwares required by the courses? No. Ever hear of a software company kicking up a fuss because students are using 'unofficial' versions? 

Well, it does happen but not often. And why not? Because proprietary software companies know, as the universities know, that once the students leave their training they will be indoctrinated with those tools and simply slipstream into being paid up proprietary software citizens. Simply put, unlicensed software used in education is tolerated because it is cheap marketing.

1 comment: