Being involved in Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) has enriched
my life. Sharing FOSS especially to young students has been one of my
favourite avenues to do my advocacy.
The usual feedbacks we get are like - "Wow! Parang Windows! Libre pa!"
(Wow, it's like Windows! It's free too!) "Ma'am nakakatuwa 'di lang pala puro Windows!" (Ma'am, it's so fun to know that there are other OS too, not only Windows!) "Ma'am ang galing!" (Ma'am, it's great!) For
me it's more than that - it's opening the youth to more (and free)
choices in using and developing software. Better? That's for them to
decide.
But I personally believe that open source software
is more powerful for customization and collaboration. It is through this
sharing that the community grows more. Improvements are quicker, since
many are involved for the betterment of the software. Not only that, the
community also learns together (albeit separately, since we're looking
at the codes in the comfort of our homes, and we choose to customize
whatever we can, heh.) through collaboration.
Below is a video produced by Pregient in 2007 for Software Freedom Day shared by Jerome Gotangco. This video explains the current status of FOSS in the Philippines during that time, and also explains the different uses of FOSS for different sectors in our society like Education, Enterprise, Health, etc.
The Usbong Project, which I have been involved
recently, believe in the power of open source - many heads are better
than one. We hope that through this project, we can help people in different sectors of the society. The usage of this project is quite vast, that it's currently involved in Health and Education in the Philippines.
For non-technical users, they can create their own mobile software to fit their own needs.
For
technical people, we hope that through contributing to the project,
they learn more about mobile development, and also maybe, instil the
value of cooperation and collaboration - values that we have been
picking up, and still learning from.
Personally, I hope that we are helping on improving
the FOSS status in the Philippines - that more people realize the
advantages of FOSS for enriching the ICT industry in our country. We
need it especially now that more people are leaning towards mobile
usage.
Diane (Editor/Evangelist, Usbong)
