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back to article UK is a closed source 'stronghold'

The UK lags behind the rest of the world in deployments of open source software. Steve George, vice-president of business development at Canonical, believes this is a mistake that compromises not only our economy but also our global competitiveness. In China rural communities are receiving millions of PCs running Linux. In …

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  1. Shocked Jock
    Flame

    Corporations' grip...

    ..on British society is the cause: an addiction to the blandishments of big business, whether that's the few big supermarkets on your high street, the few big banks threatening to bring down the economy, or the shrinking select band of media owners, who control information and ensure that their political friends throttle the BBC at the same time.

    The failure of closed source provision is just another symptom of the economic malaise in the UK - and it predates New Labour, too. The corporate "vision" of the UK ensures that all society's major needs are sold by the "private sector" (big business, more like - the CBI's members), while being subsidised by the public purse (or did you think that the road system was there for private car owners, rather than for Tesco?). That's the kind of sclerotic malaise which stifles innovation or even quirkiness: IT just shows the effects, like almost every other sector of an over-centralised UK economy that is firmly controlled by oligopolies.

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  2. Albert

    It's about Innovation and not Open Source

    From reading (most of the posts) and the original article the crux of the situation as far as I see it is that there isn't a culture of innovation and experimentation.

    We stopped teaching computers and started teaching MS Office in schools.

    When I was in school we were allowed to play games if we wrote them ourselves.

    Those of us with an interest in tinkering thought ourselves programming, graphics, animation, sound and game design so we could play games.

    This is what's missing.

    Whether it is Visual Studio Express, or Python it doesn't matter as long as it's going on.

    Now to pin my colours - I believe Open Source makes this easier not because the tools or code is better, but because of the culture of sharing means it is easier to get help when your stuck. Closed means this isn't as easy.

    Rather than talking about the O/S, or the office applications I would love to see a show, touring group that showed what's possible for those interested in tinkering.

    Maybe looking at:

    Gimp/ Inkscape - Bitmap / Vector Graphics

    Blender - 3D Modeling

    Scribus - DTP

    Python/PyGame - Game Porgramming

    Audacity/Ardour/Hydrogen - Audio Production

    Pitivi/Openshop - Video Production

    Arduino - hardware hacking and programming.

    All of these (except maybe Blender) have a low cost of entry and a relatively low learning curve which means things can be achieved quickly.

    Showcase this and forget the O/S and the chances are you would get a new generation of Tinkers interested.

    Then put it on a Linux box and it will be faster and more reliable. - ;-)

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