A Computerworld Philippines Opinion on OSS
Roberto Verzola describes How the Government Can Save Millions of Pesos in an opinion piece published by Computerworld in the Philippines.
Making the transition is not so difficult:
“As University of the Philippines president Dodong Nemenzo said when he decided to shift the whole UP system to free/open software, the shift from DOS to Windows and from WordStar to WordPerfect and then to MS-Word was, in fact, much more difficult for him than the shift he made from MS-Office to OpenOffice.”
And, Verzola plays hardball:
“Of course, in offices where the decision-maker is corrupt, it is easy to see why he would prefer commercial software. The more expensive the software, the higher the commission. Free software means no commission.”
Whether a country is a developing country, or already wealthy, spending money recklessly cannot be justified. Verzola concludes:
“It is criminal, in fact, for government officials to spend millions of pesos of public funds for software procurement, when a free or low-cost alternative exists.”