I'm really surprised this hasn't been posted yet, if it has and I missed the thread I apologize. I heard it on NPR this morning and it seemed pretty significant to me.
It appears that the announcment was made last year but it is actually coming to fruition more rapidly than Microshaft anticipated.
Here are a couple of relevant news links that I googled up, some with links to other stories.
The Bill Gates say, "My hold on the world's computers is weakening...Multi-billionaire powers....ACTIVATE!!!"
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
In any situation where licensing fees dominate the conversation relative to the cost of hardware, Open Source software is a decent solution. In Brazil, where the hardware is mainly donated anyway, Linux makes perfect sense -- especially for business/goverment use, where most apps are going to be custom DB functions.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
In particular upgrade costs are a burden on governments. Initial rollouts can be funded through bond issues, but ongoing expenses pretty much require taxes. The aggressive upgrade cycles encouraged by MS are not friendly to governments looking to do IT on the cheap.