Home
| Calendar
| Mail Lists
| List Archives
| Desktop SIG
| Hardware Hacking SIG
Wiki | Flickr | PicasaWeb | Video | Maps & Directions | Installfests | Keysignings Linux Cafe | Meeting Notes | Linux Links | Bling | About BLU |
Patrick R. McManus wrote: > Linux is an international phenomenon. We owe the industry around it to > the amazing open cooperation of its developers and the fact that bits > seem to see physical boundaries as less important than people do. ... > We (americans) are not independent of the world. And I don't want to > be. When the computer industry resorts to protectionism for its > workforce is when it gets remarkably uninteresting and its time > to question what we're doing. You have a point. Globalism is something you can rail against and protest all you want, but in the end the commerce and jobs will eventually find the most cost-efficient locale. Ironically it is the Internet and long-distance network pioneered by Americans which has enabled companies to shed their international boundaries and enabled them to utilize workforces overseas. Also ironically it is these media which have led to increased incentives for schoolchildren everywhere to learn English and the use of American technology from an early age. What made America great in the past, and can in the future, is ongoing innovation. If we collectively rest on our laurels and permit the rest of the world to "catch up" in adopting American technology developed in the past, then of course the jobs will flow ever outward. Protectionism, while it may stem losses for a while, won't create new jobs for American technology workers. Only innovation can. To me that has been obvious my whole life. -rich
BLU is a member of BostonUserGroups | |
We also thank MIT for the use of their facilities. |