Open letters to CICT chairman Ver Pena

March 2, 2005

Here are two letters we recently sent Mr. Ver Pena. I strongly believe that any decision made by the CICT should always be based on
a good understanding of the underlying technology. For example, if CICT is
to negotiate a deal with Microsoft for cheap Govt windows licenses, it
should first consider

1) Is StarOffice w/ Linux a suitable alternative to MS Office? Does
embracing Linux encourage the development of an Open Source community and
an ensuing software industry to service that community? Does the
Philippines have a good chance of being a world leader in Open Source
development?

2) Is Apple’s Appleworks w/ OS X a suitable alternative to MS Office? Is
Keynote a suitable alternative to Powerpoint? Will Panther’s Expose save
the Govt the expense of having to buy large monitors? Should the govt
attempt to negotiate a deal with Apple instead? Is the Macintosh price
competitive with those of Taiwanese clones?

3) Since we are constrained to uphold US intellectual property rights, and
since Windows is priced well beyond the reach of the average Filipino, and
since Microsoft is intent on cracking down on piracy in the Philippines,
should the Govt institute a policy to WEAN Filipinos away from Windows?
Eg - such as impose a luxury tax on any operating systems whose price is
more than - say - our average per capita income? (that is - if there’s a
petroleum tax to help encourage the use of alternative forms of energy,
maybe an OS tax is needed to remove our dependency on Microsoft?).

I’m not advocating a particular solution at this point, but what is VITAL
is that the CICT should have a good grasp of Information and
Communications Technology if it is to make good ICT decisions.

Unfortunately, I don’t think that is what happened when the CICT decided to take
control of the PH Domain - as our open letters explain.