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India President hosts free software guru

"Ethical issues" around proprietary software?

By Dinesh C Sharma

Published: 2 February 2004 07:55 GMT

Richard Stallman, founder of the Free Software Foundation, met with Indian President APJ Abdul Kalam on Thursday to discuss "the ethical issues related to the use of proprietary software", according to the Free Software Foundation of India.

Stallman also met officials in the state of Kerala to discuss the use of non-proprietary software in government initiatives. Last year, Kalam spoke out in favour of open source software following a meeting with Microsoft chairman Bill Gates.

A number of governments around the world have been looking at the prospect of adopting Linux and other open source software as an alternative to Microsoft's proprietary Windows operating system and other applications. Microsoft may be moving to counter that trend in India, and other places, by offering to let government agencies get a look at the inner workings of Windows.

Dinesh C Sharma writes for CNET News.com.

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