Spreading the FOSS message the Gandhian way

Sam Varghese
Tuesday, 03 February 2009 03:21

IT Industry - Market

There are some among the FOSS community who pay lip service to Mahatma Gandhi when talking about this genre of software. There are others who actually put Gandhi's methods into practice to spread the message.


Four young men from the south Indian state of Kerala recently followed the example of the Mahatma - who undertook a famous march in 1930 against the tax on salt, to defy the British colonial rulers of India - and walked from one end of the state to the other , meeting people along the way, to spread the message of free software.

The journey took 44 days - from October 2 to November 14 last year - and covered 1231 kilometres. During the course of their walk, the quartet visited all 14 districts of the state. The maximum distance covered in a day was 42 kilometres; the minimum was 10. The journey was made entirely on foot.

Anoop John, one of the four, says the idea originated during a discussion between him and another friend (Anand Narayanan, a roommate during his student days at Pennsylvania State University) on figuring out ways to really reach out and mobilise people at the grassroots-level.

"I really liked the idea and perceived the impact and reach of such a program and made up my mind to walk, no matter what," John told iTWire. "I shared this idea with Cherry Mathew, co-founder of Zyxware (a company in Kerala which produces FOSS) and he decided to walk with me. I announced my decision publicly and the remaining two members of the community - Prasad S. R. and Sooraj K. - decided to join us."

He said the campaign was organised by utilising the traditional strengths of the FOSS community - working efficiently in a distributed fashion.

"There was no real central organisation or NOCs set up, although the Zyxware office and team worked on keeping the site and the content on the site updated. Other than this, the organisation of the walk in terms of figuring out places to stay, figuring out routes to take, organising talks, negotiating with institutions, connecting with media etc were done by the local communities in each of these districts.

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