LinuxWorld.au: Gates Addresses Italian Senate Amid Protest

“Bill Gates outlined his optimistic vision of the coming digital
decade in a speech to the Italian Senate Friday as open source
advocates in penguin suits protested his visit and called on the
Italian government to legislate in favor of the use of open-source
software by the state administration as an alternative to
Microsoft’s ubiquitous operating systems.

“Gates demonstrated a Hewlett-Packard Tablet PC for an invited
audience of Italian politicians including Technological Innovation
Minister Lucio Stanca and Communications Minister Maurizio
Gasparri. Wristwatch computers five times more powerful than the
first IBM personal computers would be on the market by next year,
he predicted, saying they would offer real time access to sports,
weather and stock market data…

“Meanwhile, open source software advocates mounted a
protest.

“‘We are here to promote free information technology,’ said
Raffaele Calvelli, a computer programmer from Florence, as he
donned a penguin suit in front of the Senate building…”

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