Still, on the whole, no cost up-front is hard to beat. The software giants already concede their products have no advantages over open source products in terms of security and reliability. They hope to maintain sales based on superior service and customer service, but then again, none of the companies mentioned have a reputation for much other than arrogance when it comes to dealing with customers.. . .
Still, on the whole, no cost up-front is hard to beat. The software giants already concede their products have no advantages over open source products in terms of security and reliability. They hope to maintain sales based on superior service and customer service, but then again, none of the companies mentioned have a reputation for much other than arrogance when it comes to dealing with customers.

Furthermore, here again there is an important interaction between the emerging market of open source software, on the one hand, and the emerging market countries on the other. The high-tech low-wage countries of China and India.

"It is no accident," as the Marxists like to say, that China and India were able to work out a common agreement to implement open source software for many government systems. This is the least unlikely partnership one can conceive short of a joint venture firm named Sharon & Arafat.

According to a reliable U.S. official familiar with Chinese industrial espionage efforts, the use of Linux products by those governments is only the beginning. "The Chinese and the Indians both plan to become a hub for developing countries eager to escape from U.S. software 'hegemony,' if you will," the source said. Today, the People's Bank of China. Tomorrow, a billion desktops in India, another billion in China, and another quarter of a billion in Brazil.

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