[plug] Fwd: [CS-FSLUG] A submission from the k12OS.org talkback forum

[Leon Brooks]

From: Jerry Kreps <jkreps at neb.rr.com>

http://k12os.org/

Microsoft targets schools for audits...
Posted by admin on Monday, April 22, 2002 - 11:47 AM PDT (19 Reads)

admin writes "The 24 largest school districts in Oregon and 
Washington are being audited my the Microsoft marketing department 
for license compliance. Along with the letter from MS came an 
invitation to lease software from MS as part of a school agreement 
that requires MS licenses for every Pentium and PPC computer, even 
those running Linux or Mac OS.

Steve Duin, a writer for the Oregonian has a column that tells the 
story.

If that url is too long try this one:
http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/steve_duin/

Portland Public Schools, after a successful test of K12LTSP in one 
middle school, is installing K12LTSP in 10 more labs this week. They 
have plans for 100 more next year.

To give you an idea of the scale of the problem facing a large 
district like PPS, they have 25,000 PCs. A MS school agreement lease 
of software could cost the district over $1,000,000 a year. Just 
buying a virus package would cost $250,000 a year.

Use of K12LTSP and other open source, free software is a viable 
alternative. Schools are starting to figure this out.

Quoting Steve Duin and Scott Robinson, CIO of PPS in the article 
above, "... Thus, it's not surprising that several schools are 
asking, along with Robinson in Portland, "whether we want to continue 
with the Microsoft platform."..."

If there ever was a time when using Linux on desktops in schools and 
public agencies makes sense, it's NOW when MS is shooting itself in 
the foot with predatory pricing practices.

What can you do?

DOWNLOAD a free copy of K12LTSP, get together with your local Linux 
User Group and plan a demonstration for your local schools. 
http://k12ltsp.org/download.html

TALK with your local government and school leaders and let them know 
that you expect fiscal responsibility when it comes to buying 
software.

Review their purchasing guidelines to see if open source solutions 
are given priority over proprietary solutions.

DEMONSTRATE - Offer open houses for schools and government agencies 
to showcase open source success. If we all did this on the same day 
all over the country we could make a bigger splash. We released 
K12LTSP 1.0 on July 4th last year and had a standing room only open 
house.

We have better software because it comes from a more effective and 
more responsive development model. Users are encouraged to 
collaborate and improve the code. This represents a paradigm shift 
that may be hard to understand for many. We have to demonstrate 
success stories and let folks know that the open source revolution is 
not a fluke. It's just a better way of producing the software we all 
use every day.

;-) Paul
K12LTSP.org"