NewsForge: Saudi Arabia: Linux Advocates in White Robes

“The U.S. popular image of Saudi Arabia has gone downhill over
the last 50 years, from one of romantic horsemen riding free over
the desert to one of oil-bloated sheiks who use their wealth to
support terrorists. The reality here is, of course, as different
from that stereotype image as the reality of the U.S. is from the
stereotype the rest of the world gets from TV. You never see
mainstream TV programs talking about U.S. Linux developers, for
example. You never see Arabian Linux developers on TV, either, but
they are here, wearing white robes and headdresses, proudly showing
off their new (GPL) software to visitors, lobbying the government
to adopt more Linux, and working to build businesses based on open
source.

“I’m typing this in the Riyadh Sheraton. I am here primarily to
speak at a National IT Plan conference, as a guest of the Saudi
Linux Users Group and the Saudi Computer Society. I will be
speaking about how to make money with open source and free
software, a popular topic in a country whose de facto ruler, Prince
Abdullah, has decreed that the IT sector will become an important
economic factor within the next decade…”

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