Peru's Open Source Law

from the not-just-about-free... dept

Peru's attempt to make all public institutions use open source software received plenty of attention back in May, when the incredibly well argued response to Microsoft's objections was published online. Now, the Associated Press is looking in more detail at the proposed law and what effect it might have on the country. The argument from the sponsor of the bill is that it will help stimulate technology adoption in the country. Many people and companies (and even the government) are finding it nearly impossible to pay the various software licenses they owe (mainly, of course, to Microsoft), and that makes it difficult for anyone to adopt the technology that the country needs to be using. By forcing the public sector to adopt open source technologies, it takes away the licensing expense, and makes it easier for other companies to start using open source software as well. Microsoft, of course, plans to fight the law as hard as they possibly can.

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