Happy International Software Freedom Day!

[Bob Chandler]

Today (September 15th) is International Software Freedom Day!

I understand from the "Software Freedom Day" website that events have
taken place in about 60 countries around the world in over 300
locations.

http://softwarefreedomday.org/

I wasn't aware of any events connected to SFD being held in Toronto this
year but I did a couple of very tiny things of my own that I guess are
in the spirit of the day ;)

I teach an entry level internet class for senior's at a local senior
citizen's centre in my neighbourhood.   The computers at the centre all
run Linux and we use the Firefox web browser.

On my way home, I stopped in at a local computer repair shop that's sort
of a neighbourhood "geek hangout"...and if you're "hanging out" you're
often put to work fixing someone's machine.    

Someone came in and asked one of the staff to burn him a copy of
Microsoft Office.  I turned him on to "Open Office" and we opened up a
simple Excel spreadsheet with it that he had on his USB thumb drive.

He quickly came to the conclusion that "Open Office" was "good enough"
for whatever his needs were (quite simple) and so he is no longer
dependent on Microsoft Office!   The owner is happy not to have a
customer coming in asking him to pirate software.

I'm convinced that the majority of computer users needs are quite
simple.  (Web browsing, e-mail and basic office tasks).   And if they
start learning to use Firefox, Thunderbird and Open Office, it's not
that great a leap to shift them to Linux. 

Happy Software Freedom Day everyone!

Yours in freedom,


Bob