[Fsf-friends] MS' influence in academia

[Praveen A]

> >
> >All of you might know allready about program called PROJECT SHIKSHA which is being promoted by MS. Even MS is writing curriuculum for PRIMARY, SECONDARY and HIGH SCHOOL.
> >
> >GoI has sold the Education System to MNC called MS. We need to stop this also.
> >
> >Even some STATE Govts. in INDIA have signed MOU with MS for this PROJECT SHIKSHA.
> >
> >MS in the name of PHILONTHRAPHY is buying their way into EDUCAION SYSTEMS in INDIA.
> >
> >Even some Govt. colleges and Some Universities are offering courses only in MS products.
> >
> >I will post some articles related to this in my next posting.
> >
> >We all need to think how we can stop this MS mania !!!
> >
> 
> Strange but true...
> Nagpur University has M$ .Net and ASP included in their syllabus..
> I am ready to fight with the university officials but then I do not have
> enough authority..
> An application on a plane paper and an application on gnu letterhead.
> The two will definitely have substantial difference.
> 
> Any thoughts?
> 

Atul Chitnis sings about Redmond's influence in Schools
http://atulchitnis.net/music/trick.php
<quote>

Another Trick in the Hall


We don't need that kind of "education"
And we don't need your mind control
No shameless hardsell in our classrooms
Redmond, leave our schools alone

Hey! Redmond! Leave our schools alone!

All in all you're just another Trick in the Hall

All in all you're just another Trick in the Hall

With due apologies to Pink Floyd for this
adaptation of their "Another Brick in the Wall"
	

Some background:
I performed this song at Linux Bangalore/2002 at the end of the event.
This caused a bit of controversy, given my usual attitude of
"Pro-Linux does not mean Anti-anything", so a few words of explanation
should be in order:

While this appears to be (and is) a rant against Microsoft, it isn't
for reasons of my being a Linux and OpenSource supporter. When this
"mutation" was originally written, it had "Vendors" in place of
"Redmond".

Over the past few years, I have watched vendors (with MS leading the
pack) pushing their products into schools and colleges, and actually
getting the institutions' curriculum changed to include the compulsory
"study" of these products, calling it "education".

I would be against this even if I wasn't a Linux/OpenSource guy - I
believe people should be taught technologies and how to apply them
generically, instead of making the *product* the technology or the
be-all/end-all of education.

These kinds of tactics (teaching products) are shameless hardsell,
aimed at conditioning students early on to perceive computing as being
the use of that vendor's products.

Can you imagine what it would be like if suddenly the definition of
Geography or History was changed to mean the study of the Encyclopedia
Britannica?

(By popular demand, here is the MP3 http://atulchitnis.net/music/trick.zip  ) 
</quote>

-- 
            "There is no system but GNU, and Linux is one of its kernels."
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