[Fsuk-manchester] MS Windows on the OLPC

[Lucy]

Following on from yesterday's debate, what do people think of OLPC's
decision to start selling the laptops with MS Windows installed?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7402365.stm

Many governments have been asking for MS Windows to be installed and
it will undoubtedly mean that more are sold in the short term. It will
also dual boot GNU/Linux.

For those people who are not morally against proprietary software, do
you still feel that way in light of this decision? Is this just a
practical solution needed to get more laptops in the hands of children
to help them learn?

I know that yesterday I was having problems thinking that proprietary
software was immoral, although I knew it was 'bad'. Today, I think
that things are much simpler, forcing kids to use proprietary software
because 'everyone else is using it' or because 'it trains them for
business' is wrong, completely morally wrong. It scares me to see how
much influence one company has and it frustrates me that kids will be
missing out on valuable learning because of the interest of business.