Hi Folks (and apologies to anyone who receives this via more than one route),
I have just enjoyed reading a letter, described as being sent from Peruvian Congressman David Villanueva Nuñez to Microsoft Peru, in response tgo Microsoft's objections to a Peruvian Govt Bill mandating open-source software for all public bureaux.
It is at:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/05/19/ ms_in_peruvian_opensource_nightmare
(all one line; also at: http://tinyurl.com/3abgv )
In view of assorted difficulties with proprietary software recently experienced by our own august Lords and Masters,[1] perhaps it may be enjoyable reading for them too.
Enjoy. Best wishes to all, Ted.
[1] For example, the recent HMRC fiasco in which sensitive personal data of about 27,000,000 people were "lost in the post" owed much of its impact to the fact that HMRC staff were unable to extract only the data they needed from their database, unless they paid thousands (about £5,000 I think) to EDS so that EDS could provide them with a different data-selection template to what they had already. So they decided to use what they already had, which pulled out far more data than they should have pulled out.
-------------------------------------------------------------------- E-Mail: (Ted Harding) Ted.Harding@manchester.ac.uk Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 27-Dec-07 Time: 18:59:19 ------------------------------ XFMail ------------------------------
(Ted Harding) wrote:
Hi Folks (and apologies to anyone who receives this via more than one route),
I have just enjoyed reading a letter, described as being sent from Peruvian Congressman David Villanueva Nuñez to Microsoft Peru, in response tgo Microsoft's objections to a Peruvian Govt Bill mandating open-source software for all public bureaux.
It is at:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/05/19/ ms_in_peruvian_opensource_nightmare
(all one line; also at: http://tinyurl.com/3abgv )
Stunning.
Ian
On Thu, 2007-12-27 at 18:59 +0000, Ted.Harding@manchester.ac.uk wrote:
Hi Folks (and apologies to anyone who receives this via more than one route),
I have just enjoyed reading a letter, described as being sent from Peruvian Congressman David Villanueva Nuñez to Microsoft Peru, in response tgo Microsoft's objections to a Peruvian Govt Bill mandating open-source software for all public bureaux.
Interesting although am I the only person that is slightly alarmed by the authenticity of this given that the original sources seem to have vanished ? (the link in the story 404's and the frontpage of the same domain seems to be a standard cluster of random sponsored links)
Wouldn't be the first time the reg have failed to check their sources :)
On 27-Dec-07 22:19:26, Wayne Stallwood wrote:
On Thu, 2007-12-27 at 18:59 +0000, Ted.Harding@manchester.ac.uk wrote:
Hi Folks (and apologies to anyone who receives this via more than one route),
I have just enjoyed reading a letter, described as being sent from Peruvian Congressman David Villanueva Nuñez to Microsoft Peru, in response tgo Microsoft's objections to a Peruvian Govt Bill mandating open-source software for all public bureaux.
Interesting although am I the only person that is slightly alarmed by the authenticity of this given that the original sources seem to have vanished ? (the link in the story 404's and the frontpage of the same domain seems to be a standard cluster of random sponsored links)
Wouldn't be the first time the reg have failed to check their sources :)
No, you're not! (Note that I wrote "described as ... "). The Register web page itself said "purportedly from Peruvian Congressman ... ".
Nonetheless, if it was not written by a Peruvian Congressman to MicroSoft Peru, then I wish it had been! Just contemplating that possibility gives me a glow!
Cheers, Ted.
-------------------------------------------------------------------- E-Mail: (Ted Harding) Ted.Harding@manchester.ac.uk Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 27-Dec-07 Time: 22:53:16 ------------------------------ XFMail ------------------------------
On Thursday 27 December 2007 22:19, Wayne Stallwood wrote:
Interesting although am I the only person that is slightly alarmed by the authenticity of this given that the original sources seem to have vanished ? (the link in the story 404's and the frontpage of the same domain seems to be a standard cluster of random sponsored links)
(Allways up for a bit of digging) www.archive.org has managed to retain copies of the missing pages - Should point out the original article appeared back in 2002, so perhaps it is no suprise the links are no longer valid.
I found:
http://web.archive.org/web/20020508113932/www.pimientolinux.com/peru2ms/ http://web.archive.org/web/20021012234526/http://pimientolinux.com/activism/... http://web.archive.org/web/20020815150945/http://pimientolinux.com/activism/...
Regards, Paul.
-
Ian Thompson-Bell -
Paul -
Ted.Harding＠manchester.ac.uk -
Wayne Stallwood