Free Software In Africa

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Free Software In Africa

• Wizards of OS 3
• Guido Sohne ltguido_at_sohne.netgt

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Organizations People

• Pan African (FOSSFA)
• Governments (CSIR, South Africa)
• Non profits (translate.org.za)
• Educational (SchoolNet Namibia, NetDay,
  DireqLearn, wizzy digital courier)
• Corporate (linuxsolutions Obsidian)
• Individuals (Uwe Thiem, Neil Blakeley-Milner,
  Dwayne Bailey)

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Why Free Software?

• Better Technology
• Cost Reduction
• Multiple Suppliers/Sources
• Technology Transfer
• Access to Intellectual Property
• Development of Indigenous Solutions
• Employment

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Better Technology

• Largest adoption of free software is driven by a
  few applications in particular domains
• Sendmail / qmail / postfix cheap and reliable
  mail servers (ISPs)
• MySQL cheap, reliable database server (web
  developers, software developers, ISPs)
• BIND standard for domain name resolution (ISPs)
• Apache cheap, reliable, ubiquitous web server
  (ISPs, web developers)
• PHP simple, low barrier to entry scripting
  (ISPs, web developers)

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Better Technology

• Most use of free software is solely on servers.
• Windows servers / development machines are
  preferred by most developers. MySQL, PHP, Apache
  are most often run on Windows.
• Build on Windows. Deploy on Linux.
• Linux on the desktop is relatively rare, even
  amongst developers.
• Application advantages and availability drive
  choice (people use what gets the job done easiest
  and fastest)

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Cost Reduction

• Source License Fees and GDP/capita, Rishab Aiyer
  Ghosh
• Ghana 269 GDP/capita 73,442 effective price
  (Windows/Office XP)24.98 months of GDP/capita
• South Africa2620 GDP/capita7,541 effective
  price (Windows/Office XP)2.57 months of
  GDP/capita
• From the above data, it would seem obvious that
  free software has enormous benefits and
  advantages when compared to proprietary software.

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Cost Reduction

• Effective price of proprietary software 0
• Given high and unrealistic prices for software,
  illegal copying becomes part of the culture of
  computing.
• Sharing of software (but the software is not
  free)
• GPL like behavior on non-GPL software
• All web developers have Dreamweaver, Fireworks,
  Photoshop, MySQL, PHP, Apache
• Less than 1 have paid for the proprietary bits
• It therefore becomes clear that both proprietary
  and free software have equivalent cost reduction
  characteristics!

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Multiple Suppliers Sources

• A touted advantage of free software is the
  availability of a multitude of suppliers and
  sources that reduce or avoid vendor lock in.
• Distributions like RedHat, SuSE, Mandrake,
  Debian, Gentoo each build on common ground yet
  find ways to differentiate their offerings.
• On the other hand, companies like Microsoft,
  Oracle, Sun, SAP etc each build a different
  product that has little in common with the
  competing products. The best scenario is that
  data import/export from one product to another is
  possible.

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Multiple Suppliers Sources

• The situation in Africa?
• Technology is something that comes in a box, not
  something that you build yourself
• Little to no presence of the Linux/OSS companies
  and distributors in sub-Saharan Africa
• Many companies sell the same proprietary products
• Antivirus software is especially popular. The
  market clearly sees the demand for such software,
  though this is again, massively copied.
• For the average, under-informed and
  budget-challenged decision maker, it appears that
  proprietary software has more suppliers and more
  choice than free software.

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Technology Transfer

• Free software can help African developers learn
  faster and better.
• Challenges Bandwidth, cost of computing devices
  and peripherals, availability of books and
  learning materials
• Problems Very few African developers, whether
  free or proprietary generally low level of skill
  due to environmental challenges

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Challenges

• Bandwidth costs a lot. 400/month to share 32k
  pipe with four other people. 0.66 per hour for
  café access.
• Hardware markup is typically 100-200. What
  costs 500 euro here costs 1000 euro there.
• No credit card. No Amazon. No books.
• Due to credit card fraud, sellers wont ship to
  the sub-region.
• Learning and technology transfer are impeded.

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Problems

• Poor educational base University of Ghana has 6
  PCs for 300 computer science students. 100 PCs
  for 12,000 students.
• 40 literacy rate. For basic literacy. This is
  not advanced literacy.
• By the time most people reach the age of 14, more
  than half of the potential developer pool has
  been lost poor teaching and education, drop
  outs to sell dog chains by the traffic light,
  etc.
• The few who reach university (total intake of
  15,000 per year max out of population of 20
  million) get to face the computers in
  universities problem.

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Those Who Make It

• The few who manage to learn how to write software
  are marked more by the fact that they survived
  the system than anything else.
• It is a miracle that they exist. They are not
  supposed to exist?
• Few job choices. Exploitative employers. Low
  salaries (save 100 salary for fifteen years and
  you can afford to buy a car. House? 100 years)
• African developers are extremely busy trying to
  make a living. They have no free time and no wish
  to share code, however are willing to steal
  code.
• Deep seated need to make money and proprietary
  software development is the only way now.

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Economic Freedom

• Can one be said to be free if 100 of the time,
  one is concerned about survival?
• Freedom is on different levels political
  freedom, economic freedom, intellectual freedom.
• Africa gained political freedom starting from
  1957 (Ghana).
• Within 25 years, export commodity prices dropped
  from around 2000 GBP per tonne to 800 GBP per
  tonne
• Within this same time, the population grew by 25
• Within this same time, five military governments
  violently overthrew the previous government
• Africa keeps getting poorer and poorer

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Roots of Poverty

• Where does this poverty come from?
• Near factors Instability, poor governance,
  disease, war, famine
• Far factors Legacy bequeathed by Western
  intervention, greed and sheer callousness
• Story starts with the exploration of Africa by
  Europe

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First Encounters

• When Europe first encountered Africa, there were
  institutions of learning, renowned in those days
  such as Timbuktu
• In order to trade, a game was played. You versus
  your enemies, we help you, you help us.
• Seeds of internal conflict. Seeds of current wars
  and ethnic divisions.
• Some collaborators made war on others, and sold
  these others into slavery.
• Africa lost the best and the strongest, those who
  went to defend their people.
• Today, America has some of the world best
  athletes. The best and strongest bred true.

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People To Resources

• Somewhere in the 1800s?, not far from here,
  Europe met to decide how to share the resources
  of Africa.
• The Partitioning of Africa
• Africa was of course not consulted to determine
  what her voice would be.
• Today, we have the G8. Africa is still not
  consulted though her leaders go to beg for money
  or negotiate for better terms.
• Fundamentally, there is no negotiation going on.

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Use of Resources

• Primary goods only bought from Africa.
• Raw materials. Unprocessed agricultural goods.
  Crude oil. Tree trunks.
• Taken to feed the industries and factories of
  Europe
• Converted into finished goods.
• Exported to the rest of the world.
• Some material returns to Africa. 100 markup by
  local merchants added.

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Division of People

• Result of partitioning of Africa and colonialism?
• Language barriers and language divides
• Several small, borderline viable countries.
• Few large countries, wracked by war for
  resources.
• Most importantly, natural forces keep these
  nations from ever joining together.
• France does not favor collaboration within West
  Africa, since this would dilute its power.
• Unspoken but this is a reality.

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Result?

• Poverty. Lack of resources. Struggling to
  survive. 1000 PCs for 12,000 students.
• Political freedom but no economic freedom.
• No time to think. No time to relax and debate.
• No social security. No health insurance. No
  safety net.
• No Free Software.
• The wealth and success of the West is
  inextricably linked to the poverty and failure of
  Africa.

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What Can Be Done?

• Long term Redistribute wealth and opportunity
  more fairly. Be fair and not greedy.
• Medium term Free software, representing the
  force for change for the better, the force
  removing the unreasonable greed, must win its
  struggle.
• Short term Developer by developer, we grow the
  community one at a time.

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Programmers Without Frontiers

• This was an idea that was proposed earlier at the
  WSIS proceedings.
• Needs support, funding, membership and energy of
  lots of developers.
• Should mentor young African developers, help them
  improve skills
• Help them learn the right path, the free path,
  the only path where they may have a future chance
  of prosperity.

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AfricanIntelligence

• This was proposed at the first ever African
  developers meeting.
• Aims to find the African developers and network
  them.
• Aims to improve their quality of life and income
  by building the El-Dorado the Project Pipeline
• Needs formal support, needs to gain developer
  interest.
• We have a vision.
• We have the desire to increase developer numbers
  and skills
• We want to enhance employment and employability.
• We also have a logo. And not much else

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