[NTLUG:Discuss] Help with schools

[Chris Cox]

On 02/11/2011 10:20 PM, Greg Edwards wrote:
> Fred James wrote:
>> Greg Edwards wrote:
> 
>>> me off list and I'll get your information to her. I don't think the
>>> folks that are working with the colleges would be relevant to what
>>> happens at the public school level.
>>>
>>> greg at nas-inet.com
>>>
>>> TIA,
>> Your pardon, please ... I have not done, nor am I currently involved in
>> any such undertaking. Nor am I an "interested" or "invested" party. But
>> if possible, I should out of personal curiosity be very interested in
>> hearing about the process/progress, please. Off list if need be, but
>> interested none the less. I thank you for your kind consideration, and
>> of course, I should understand if you choose not to include me in the
>> "listening audience".
>> Regards
>> Fred James
>>
> 
> Fred,
> 
> No slight intended, but upper education and public school districts are
> very different animals.  Her goal is to try and convince the school that
> things like OpenOffice, for example, at $0 is a better option than MS
> Office at $300+ each for the 70+ computers in her school.  She's not
> going to be teaching OSS, she wants to change the culture and impact the
> bottom line.
> 
> She'd like to talk to as many people as possible who might have already
> dealt with the brick walls that she needs to overcome.  If you think
> that the road you've traveled and the lessons you've learned would be
> helpful, she'd be happy to pick your brain.

Actually for a school, the cost for MS Office is probably going to be $25 or
less per computer.  So, the difference is more like $0 vs. $25.  Which to mosts
schools, just isn't going to be enough of savings given the incompatibilities.
If your schools is paying more than $25... you need to talk to your Microsoft rep.

Even in corporate America, as long as you don't mind being a "Microsoft" shop,
the cost is pretty low.... Microsoft competitors (e.g. IBM) pay FULL price
though (to avoid the "relationship") and so cheaper things work quite well there
(but that's VERY unusual).  In IBM's case of course, they have their own closed
source proprietary office suite.... that is "free".

So.. why choose FOSS?  DO NOT ... NOT!!... for the price... because, closed
source companies KNOW FOSS and know how to discount to get around that issue...
in fact, so well, that it's a NO BRAINER to them... and they win at least 99% of
the time in "price" issues (rarely does price matter to them).

Choose FOSS for the same reason that you might by an EV or Hybrid car... because
it's the RIGHT thing to do.  And you might just have a chance of getting
features and functionality that avoid "cost sprawl" ... a hidden cost of
choosing non-FOSS software.  "Cost sprawl" is the price you pay BECAUSE you have
bought into a particular proprietary software package.  It's the extras that you
are forced to pay for with regards to add-ons, extras, integration, etc.

Inside of a school, you choose FOSS because students just might LEARN something
useful.  That is, choose FOSS so that students can add/change code, etc.

Unfortunately,  MOST schools are BRICK WALLS... learning is lost....

It helps if the people inside the school see the FEATURE benefits of FOSS... if
they are already a Microsoft shop (i.e. the "I don't hafta think" to run it
crowd), then I'm afraid the school is a brick wall... and IMHO, probably NOT a
very good school (sadly, that's most of them though).