Open source and Free Software need more exposure

Well, from my previous posts from last week, readers may have seen that there is quite a lot of
Open Source and Free Software stuff going on in the university. It's quite interesting to see how much
importance is being given to it and I like it. I hope things keep growing and that the fire doesn't die.

Today was an interesting day: there was an Open Source seminar down in school from the
Computer Science and Software Engineering department. There were quite a number of students
present: that was the good part I think. But somehow, I felt really sad when I found out that there
is a staggering number of people who have basically no idea and I mean NO IDEA what Open Source
and Free software is all about. But hey, that is why there are seminars and so son to talk about it
and give it more exposure right?

But the worse was to find out that many of the students had no idea that there are other
alternatives apart from Microsoft software. And I am not solely talking about OS and Free
software here but I am talking about Apple's OS X, FreeBSD and so on: it was amazing.

During half of the seminar, I kept on screaming in my head, "ooh my Goodness! This is not real!".
But I think this is also the fault of how other platforms advertise themselves and fight for better exposure.
I mean it's like being in the Matrix: what happens to you when you live in a world where you have no idea
that there is another, better parallel world to yours? Answer: you just don't bother.

So there is a new mission here, whether Microsoft likes it or not: GET PEOPLE TO BOTHER. GET PEOPLE
TO ASK QUESTIONS ABOUT ALTERNATIVES and most importantly, let people know about Open Source
and Free Software: this is what I'd call "a mission critical" mission. ;-D

It will take a while, but it is my firm belief that we will get there and get people to know about all this stuff
as well as to experience it.