Comments on: From consumers to contributors

By: Teach FOSS with Fun « Linux Philippines

Teach FOSS with Fun « Linux Philippines — Mon, 25 Oct 2010 14:34:19 +0000

[...] From consumers to contributors [...]

By: My Gecko during the OSS Exhibition in Putrajaya, MALAYSIA....

My Gecko during the OSS Exhibition in Putrajaya, MALAYSIA.... — Wed, 20 Oct 2010 19:44:20 +0000

[...] I hope your efforts go well and thanks for representing the community in Malaysia! It seems that Mayalsia is a real hotspot for OSS thinking right now. Primary OS: openSUSE 11.3 Testing OS: openSUSE 11.4 oS TCT Reply With Quote [...]

By: sweemeng

sweemeng — Wed, 20 Oct 2010 09:17:03 +0000

I personally think that with repository like github or bitbucket, it should make it easier for one to share and learn

By: dindafoss

dindafoss — Tue, 19 Oct 2010 15:16:46 +0000

“there is no option to learn programming” exactly. FOSS has that built into it so while someone is learning basic computer skills they can also learn about the system they are using. There are several ‘learn programming’ applications in the educational desktop for Ubuntu that teach basic computer and programming skills even to very young learners. Teacher training is THE key to any successful deployment and the leaders I spoke to in Malaysia understand that. They are committed to success by giving their teachers the skills they need. True, we in the FOSS community need to do a better job of creating teacher training materials but those are coming.

Basic computer education, if it is conducted on proprietary systems, builds a dependence where users have to keep buying that systems software. Proprietary companies want you locked in b/c they make money off each new release. Young learners are software agnostic; they don’t care what they use as long as they have something. Teaching them that they have to buy software, or worse pirating software b/c they cannot afford the same software used by those who can afford it builds a dependence of consumerism. With FOSS, it’s the same high quality software for the same price; free. Licensing and tracking costs can then be shifted to other areas, like developing teacher training materials. Even if a proprietary company temporarily lowers the price of say an older version to free, users have no guarantee the next version will be free. Also, with FOSS, users can use the same software at school and at home with no restrictions.

By: Ken Stailey

Ken Stailey — Tue, 19 Oct 2010 11:22:26 +0000

History repeats itself. In the 70′s Bell Labs was giving away source code licenses of UNIX[TM] to Universities. Linux would not be here if they hadn’t.

By: mFaizul

mFaizul — Tue, 19 Oct 2010 08:33:57 +0000

wow! you have a vision further into the future even for our Malaysian education. great idea. thanks!

By: sweemeng

sweemeng — Tue, 19 Oct 2010 06:28:28 +0000

What the country need first before doing foss in education is, we need a computer education.

malaysia currently don’t have computer education in primary school and secondary school level. there is no option to learn programming, no learning of basic computer skill. before that happen we need teacher that know foss, which really the IT world in malaysia don’t have a whole lot of us(aka foss user).

once we have that then we can think on that. I do believe foss is a good way to teach, it just that we don’t have a environment for that…

By: Tweets that mention From consumers to contributors « Dinda's Foss Blog -- Topsy.com

Tue, 19 Oct 2010 04:58:03 +0000

[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Planet Ubuntu, Arjan Waardenburg and Zuissi, Ubuntu World Wide. Ubuntu World Wide said: #ubuntu #linux Belinda Lopez: From consumers to contributors: Last week I was honoured to give a presentation at t… http://bit.ly/cT5KfZ [...]