Mike_IronFist
October 21st, 2009, 08:49 PM
So my friend, a physics major and general lover of all things unique, took a look at my Compiz desktop cube when I was messing about with it in a dorm room. This suddenly got him interested in Ubuntu - eye candy can go a long way - and I began to, like I usually do, blabber about the cool things you can do with Linux. I told him "I keep it on a USB drive on a keychain, and I can run an entire OS off the USB drive.. or even a CD."
Later I brought him my ShipIt disc, a disc for Ubuntu 9.04 (which, as you know by now, you can run the OS off of without an install). Now, these days, we "young folk" are tech savvy enough to keep around blank discs for copying stuff, legitimately or not, and my friend wanted to make a copy, so he asked me if it would be alright to borrow my disc for when he goes back home this weekend to get to his CD-R's. It occured to me that he figured I bought the disc and was concerned about losing it. I hadn't realized that he, like so many other people, had never heard of free and open source, and didn't know that, even if he lost the disc, that didn't mean I wouldn't be able to make use of Ubuntu.
Thus I instructed him to read the back of the case (the section that reads "Ubuntu is software libre" and explains that Ubuntu is free to be copied and distributed however anyone wishes) and he made this funny face - combination of surprise and awe. It was like hearing about Free and Open Source software for the first time, again.
It made me realize, not enough people know about Free and Open Source stuff. We really live in a proprietary software world, and that's something that needs to change. The good news is, as far as I can tell, people like free software, and if this experience is any indication, those who learn of it will appreciate its benefits far more than us "seasoned FOSS users" could ever imagine.
It's funny, in a way. You'd think that you'd need an open source education and an activist sort of mind to appreciate what FOSS does, but those who have never heard of it in the first place are impacted by its most obvious qualities (freedom and zero cost) the most. They haven't been hardened by expectations that software should be free in the first place. They haven't been "spoiled".
What do you think?
Share your experiences with helping reveal FOSS to others/promoting Ubuntu, if you like.
Later I brought him my ShipIt disc, a disc for Ubuntu 9.04 (which, as you know by now, you can run the OS off of without an install). Now, these days, we "young folk" are tech savvy enough to keep around blank discs for copying stuff, legitimately or not, and my friend wanted to make a copy, so he asked me if it would be alright to borrow my disc for when he goes back home this weekend to get to his CD-R's. It occured to me that he figured I bought the disc and was concerned about losing it. I hadn't realized that he, like so many other people, had never heard of free and open source, and didn't know that, even if he lost the disc, that didn't mean I wouldn't be able to make use of Ubuntu.
Thus I instructed him to read the back of the case (the section that reads "Ubuntu is software libre" and explains that Ubuntu is free to be copied and distributed however anyone wishes) and he made this funny face - combination of surprise and awe. It was like hearing about Free and Open Source software for the first time, again.
It made me realize, not enough people know about Free and Open Source stuff. We really live in a proprietary software world, and that's something that needs to change. The good news is, as far as I can tell, people like free software, and if this experience is any indication, those who learn of it will appreciate its benefits far more than us "seasoned FOSS users" could ever imagine.
It's funny, in a way. You'd think that you'd need an open source education and an activist sort of mind to appreciate what FOSS does, but those who have never heard of it in the first place are impacted by its most obvious qualities (freedom and zero cost) the most. They haven't been hardened by expectations that software should be free in the first place. They haven't been "spoiled".
What do you think?
Share your experiences with helping reveal FOSS to others/promoting Ubuntu, if you like.