Open source may not work (Score 2)

More than 10 years ago, in South Africa, there was a noble and concerted effort by the open source comunity to expose computing to children in under-developed schools. Ubuntu, with its strong connection to South Africa through Mark Shuttleworth, was at the forefront of this effort. I was one of those in the vanguard and was convinced that the open source approach would give all participants a better grounding and understanding of computing. Then Microsoft made its Windows and Office software licenses available at no cost to all schools. It took literally weeks for almost everyone to switch to Microsoft. Ironically, it was only well funded private schools whose students were interested in software engineering careers that retained open source computer labs. Looking back we now understand why. Undeniably, Windows is the de-facto desktop standard in the business world. What little prior exposure eiher teachers or students might have had, it was almost certainly with Windows. Windows skills were generally more useful than Linux skills in a non-technical job market; for those whose future employment prospects are limited the choice s clear.