The Business Software Alliance (BSA), an organization backed by some of software’s biggest names such as Microsoft, Apple and Adobe, has turned up the heat on cracking down on piracy. Regional offices have been setup in specific target countries to induce institutions who use unlicensed operating systems and applications to pay up for a switch. It seems that the strategy is to enlist the support of the masses by paying very handsomely for it. In the Philippines, the bounty for telling on a company suspected of running fakes on computers can go up to one million pesos (around US$19,500 at present exchange rates). This pales in comparison to international rates which have just gone up from US$50,000 to US$200,000.
Stern blanket warning letters have been sent out to all known institutions in Manila. This has caused a boom in the demand for Ubuntu, a free Linux-based open source operating system. Universities are leading the way in shifting, which means that the young professionals and programmers of the future are now being conditioned to push Linux into the mainstream. The Ubuntu OS may have even united users of PCs and Apple computers under one universal non-paying banner since it can run on both types of machines.
So it seems that the BSA has now created some strangely ironic tipping point that has rescued Linux from the fringes of the Philippine mindscape. Not surprisingly, this is happening elsewhere. Check out the heated conversation going on at Slashdot (where all conversations are heated): http://ask.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/02/27/2047245
Could this be considered as a backfire? Judging from how popular Ubuntu has become, it’s rather obvious that there are reasons behind the BSA’s actions. But were there alternatives?
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