For more than six months the world has watched helplessly as the Israeli military bombed mercilessly and now the result is more than two million starving Palestinians. It is clear to most of the world that what is happening in Gaza is ethnic cleansing and genocide. But what are we to do here?
Just as South Africa was eventually forced to abandon its apartheid policies by economic boycotts, which increasingly isolated it, the same could be done for Israel. While it may seem that countries like Bangladesh already have very little direct trade with Israel, our consumers continue to support the huge Israeli IT sector by using products developed for American companies.
উদাহরণস্বরূপ, ইসরায়েলে মাইক্রোসফ্টের বিশাল বিনিয়োগ রয়েছে। উইন্ডোজ ডিফেন্ডার, এমএস উইন্ডোজ অপারেটিং সিস্টেমের সাম্প্রতিক সংস্করণে তৈরি অ্যান্টি-ভাইরাস ইসরায়েলে ব্যাপকভাবে তৈরি হয়েছে বলে জানা গেছে। সাইবার নিরাপত্তাসহ ইসরায়েলি রাষ্ট্রের নিরলসভাবে নিজের নিরাপত্তার ওপর ফোকাস করা এবং প্রাসঙ্গিক প্রযুক্তিগত দক্ষতার বিকাশের ফলাফল যা শেষ পর্যন্ত মাইক্রোসফ্টের মতো আমেরিকান কোম্পানিগুলো থেকে বিনিয়োগ আকর্ষণ করেছে।
Virtually all computers in Bangladesh run Microsoft Windows, which means that a portion of the Windows license fee of $50-100 per computer is ultimately paid to Israel. The average computer user probably invests in it repeatedly, because they see no alternative: but it’s easy to change. Since 2009, my company Qazi Farms has over 1000 computers running the free open source Ubuntu Linux operating system. It provides a Windows-like graphical interface and includes the free Firefox web browser and the free LibreOffice word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation software. Since LibreOfficeis similar to MS Office and can read and edit almost all MS Office files, so Microsoft Linuxis very easy to replace with . It will also save Bangladesh a huge amount of foreign currency, which is now used to pay for Microsoft licenses. Our experience at Qazi Farms is that it takes only 10 minutes for the average Windows user to learn how to use Linux.
Linux includes free/open source alternatives to the most popular Adobe software. Like Photoshop GimpPhotos can be edited in InkscapeGraphics can be drawn much like Illustrator. Desktop publishing is similar to InDesign Scribus can be done with Journalists at Kazi Farms’ associated television station, Deepta TV, replaced PremierePro KDEnliveEdited news videos on Kazi Farms and Deepta TV have saved Microsoft and Adobe millions of dollars in license fees by using Linux.
Microsoft’s investments in Israel may inspire wealthy consumers to think that buying Apple products is a more ethical option, but this is simply not true. The M1 chips inside modern Macs are designed in Israel. So Linux is the only truly ethical computing option.
All of the software included in Linux is open source, meaning that it has been developed jointly by international teams of programmers over the Internet to meet their own computing needs. Fortunately for countries like Bangladesh, open source software can meet most of our needs for free. Linux is the best and cheapest way to stop software piracy and that will inevitably decrease, as US trade authorities stop looking the other way.
So why don’t more organizations use Linux? The short answer is advertising. Companies like Microsoft and Adobe have huge marketing budgets to establish their brands. Free software like Linux has no one to advertise and relies on word of mouth to spread it. But countries like China have already moved at least four million computers from Microsoft to their own versions of Linux (including OpenKylin, a modified Ubuntu) in an effort to become more technologically independent from the United States.
The responsibility is ours. Migrating to Linux is an initiative that should be joined by all who oppose Israel’s brutality against Palestinians.
the writer: Managing Director, Cisnova; Director Kazi Media.
দ্রষ্টব্য: অভিমত-এ প্রকাশিত পুরো মতামত লেখকের নিজস্ব। এর সঙ্গে ডিজিটাল বাংলা মিডিয়া কর্তৃপক্ষের কোনো সংশ্লিষ্টতা নেই। বহুমতের প্রতিফলন গণমাধ্যমের অন্যতম সূচক হিসেবে নীতিগত কোনো সম্পাদনা ছাড়াই এই লেখা প্রকাশ করা হয়। এতে কেউ সংক্ষুবদ্ধ বা উদ্বেলিত হলে তা তার একান্ত ব্যক্তিগত বিষয়।
