[Ubuntu-SG] South-East Asian FOSS Collaboration

Sun Aug 10 23:56:53 UTC 2008

Hey,

Malaysia is going somewhere with FOSS, even their government is
promoting it.

I would like to be informed about FOSS happenings in Malaysia, events.
talk and seminars, these are one of the ways we can schedule a meetup
too!
We can share FOSS event dates.

There are 2 dates I would like to share:
1) The Singapore Linux August Meetup - 20th August 2008 - 1900hrs

SIS Seminar Room 2.4, SMU, School of Information Systems
80 Stamford Road
Singapore 178902 Singapore (Website: http://linux.meetup.com/5/)

2) Software Freedom Day Singapore - 20th September 2008
SMU, School of Information Systems
80 Stamford Road
Singapore 178902 Singapore (More information will be provided at
http://softwarefreedomday.sg/)

Thank you!

On Mon, 2008-08-11 at 01:58 +0800, Nicholas Ng wrote:

> Hi guys,
> 
> Well, actually the problem occurred elsewhere including Malaysia.
> Microsoft have been brainwashing our minds from the start when we have
> "pirated" Windows, Office, etc. Those illegal software which we can
> get for free (or with very cheap price) has made all of us addicted to
> it and therefore most of us do not dare to try out other software or
> operating systems (OSes) because we have been too dependent and "get
> used to it".
> 
> In Malaysia, our FOSS adoptions mostly carried out and driven by FOSS
> advocates, LUGs as well as other open source communities throughout
> the country. These groups has been carry out various activities such
> as meet up, talk, seminar, InstallFest, workshop, etc to public where
> public can learn more about FOSS as well as know more about the
> benefits of it.
> 
> In the last few years, Malaysia government has started to recognized
> the important and benefits of FOSS and through the [1] Open Source
> Competency Centre (OSCC) which is under the [2] Malaysian
> Administrative Modernisation and Management Planning Unit (MAMPU), the
> government started to push for the usage of FOSS and introduce the [3]
> Malaysian Public Sector OSS Master Plan.
> 
> Sorry for the long introduction about Malaysia's FOSS. =P
> 
> Well, the collaboration between other LoCo teams or groups within the
> region is very welcomed and we at Malaysia LoCo Team also discussed
> about it and we have been contacting with the Indonesia LoCo Team to
> exchange ideas, experiences and knowledge. I myself planned to meet
> with the Indonesia Team last month while I was there but due to my
> tight schedule the meeting has been cancelled.
> 
> I am currently on and off to Singapore (business trips) and maybe when
> I was there, we can have a meet up just to chit chat and exchange
> ideas. :) Look forward for better collaboration among us.
> 
> Thanks.
> 
> [1] http://oscc.org.my/
> [2] http://www.mampu.gov.my/
> [3] http://www.oscc.org.my/content/view/103/96/
> 
> 
> With best regards,
> 
> Nicholas Ng
> Ubuntu Member
> Ubuntu Malaysia LoCo Team
> (http://ubuntu.com.my/)
> 
> On Mon, Aug 11, 2008 at 12:08 AM, Maung Myat Thu @ Billy Aung Myint
> <billy at ubuntu.sg> wrote:
> > On Sun, 2008-08-10 at 20:14 +0800, Muhammad Heidir wrote:
> >> Hi Nicholas,
> >>
> >> It will be certainly great if we could come up for a meeting. I'm sure
> >> we can share ideas, experiences and plan about promoting FOSS adoption
> >> in the region. This will bring great benefits to each other culturally
> >> too.
> >>
> >> I heard that Malaysia and Indonesia has a lot of FOSS users due to its
> >> low-cost(..free) and can be tailored to different languages such as
> >> Bahasa Malaysia and Bahasa Indonesia. My guess is, FOSS can be readily
> >> accepted mainstream, its just a matter of time. I would like to know
> >> you thoughts about this.
> >>
> >> Whereas in Singapore, most of the companies here prefers Microsoft,
> >> because they come pre-installed, and Microsoft provides support
> >> including most of the Administrators are MCSE certified. The problem
> >> starts at the educational level, where students are overly exposed to
> >> Microsoft based Operating Systems and Applications. Due to this
> >> familiarisation and training conducted on Microsoft products,
> >> naturally they are more accustomed to use it. If only we could project
> >> to them the benefits and advantage of using an Open systems, they will
> >> somehow understand.
> >
> > Actually the problem is a recursive loop. Teachers themselves are not
> > sure about anything other than windows so they will make a hell of a
> > noise if schools buy non-ms systems and of course they can't teach any
> > other than windows.So they teach windows to students who only learnt
> > windows.
> >
> > Since everyone who got out of IT school knows windows , they are
> > everywhere and are dirt cheap to hire and fire.Therefore companies love
> > them. And the companies only buy windows systems because the people they
> > hire only knows windows.
> >
> > Since companies only hire windows admins/programmers , schools only
> > teach windows stuff saying market only wants windows skills. and this
> > goes on and on and on and on and on.... sort of like a recursive loop
> >
> > Ramblings from former vice-president of NgeeAnn Polytechnic Linux Users
> > Group,
> > billy
> >
> >>
> >> Anyway, I look forward to meeting with South-East Asians FOSS
> >> enthusiasts!
> >>
> >> Best Regards,
> >> supervivid
> >
> >
> > --
> > Ubuntu-SG mailing list
> > Ubuntu-SG at lists.ubuntu.com
> > https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-sg
> >
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