My New Year’s resolution for 2009 is to stop using Microsoft products, and to encourage LSCs of Chicago Public Schools to do the same in their schools.
Bill Gates has created a virtual monopoly in our schools (and, of course, everywhere else) for Windows and other Microsoft products. He gets billions of our money and assures his company of the next generation of users in our schoolchildren. Then he gives some of the money back, but only if we use it in the specific ways that he allows us to use it.
Why don’t we just eliminate the middleman and get back to making our own decisions for our schools and communities? There are free products out there that work far better than Microsoft, which is only reliable in breaking down on a regular basis.
Beginning tomorrow I will be weaning myself off of Windows and onto the free Linux operating system (I don’t think cold turkey will work).
I will also be giving up my 15-year relationship with Word Perfect (which doesn’t work in Linux) in favor of Open Office Writer, another free software program that comes with a lot of other good products in the free Open Office line.
I’ll let you know how it goes. But this is a serious challenge – it’s time we freed ourselves and our schools from Microsoft and Bill Gates.
This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 31st, 2008 at 4:24 am	and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.