[ox-en] peruvian law
- From: Graham Seaman <graham seul.org>
- Date: Tue, 30 Apr 2002 16:16:27 -0400 (EDT)
Hi,
I translated one of the articles on the Peruvian free software bill
http://www.gnu.org.pe/resmseng.html
Its a very literal translation, which rather buries the author's nice
sense of humour, but it might still be interesting.
It's the reply of the main guy proposing the bill to Microsoft, who
wrote to him after attending a public forum to discuss it. Nearly
all the elements of the reply got included in the latest version of the
bill, but theu're explained in much more detail here than in the bill
itself. It's a kind of culmination of a series of attempts of creating
this kind of law in latin America - after learning from what went right
(and wrong) in Mexico, Brazil, and Argentina.
The main conclusion is that it's no use basing such laws on financial
costs ('free software is cheap'): you need to be able to argue from the
standpoint of freedom, both to achieve anything real if the bill is
passed, and to be able to argue effectively against Microsoft. Something
that suprised me (I didn't even notice it the first time I read this)
is that this argument then turns round and infects the state with
gpl-like elements too - eg. the argument that citizens should have the
right to read the programs that calculate their tax bills. Unfortunately
I guess that means we're not going to get a bill like this in the UK
anytime soon :-(
Graham
_______________________
http://www.oekonux.org/