Let us just say that we hate IM-speak and Webby abbreviations, but being that this is a family-friendly publication, a simple "WTF" will have to suffice for our reaction on this one.

Our minds are really blown by this:

A middle school teacher, Karen, had a mini-meltdown when she spotted a student showing off the capabilities of his Linux-powered laptop and handing out Linux discs provided by HeliOS, a organization dedicated to putting low-cost, Linux-powered PC in the hands of under-privileged children. She confiscated the CDs and set out to make sure the evil man behind this free software was prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

When she landed on Ken Starks, founder of HeliOS, she sent him a tersely worded e-mail. Here are some of the absurd highlights:

"I am not sure what you are doing is legal. No software is free and spreading that misconception is harmful."

"I will research this as time allows and I want to assure you, if you are doing anything illegal, I will pursue charges as the law allows."

"I admire your attempts in getting computers in the hands of disadvantaged people but putting Linux on these machines is holding our kids back."

"I am sure if you contacted Microsoft, they would be more than happy to supply you with copies of an older version of Windows and that way, your computers would actually be of service to those receiving them..."

When it comes to productivity software, it's hard to cover all the bases better than Microsoft's Office suite. It handles writing letters, tracking numbers in spreadsheets, making presentations, and even creating simple databases for archiving large amounts of data. It's the worldwide standard -- but it isn't cheap. A full copy with all the bells and whistles can set you back nearly $700 (unless you're a student, in which case hellooooo discount), a pretty big ask when the competition does all that too and does it for free. OpenOffice.org is that competition, and a new release, 3.0, is set to release today.

OpenOffice.org includes five separate applications for handling written documents, spreadsheets, presentations, drawings, and databases. The new release provides some usability enhancements for all the tools, adds some support for more languages, fixes a slew of bugs, and, perhaps most importantly, adds the ability to read in files produced by Microsoft's latest Office: 2007. That means this free online software sets up nicely against the decidedly not-so-free alternative, giving those who lack the funds, or who are just looking for something different, a legal and comprehensive alternative. Hey, even the launch party for the release is free and open to anyone -- anyone who happens to be in Paris on Monday night, that is. [From: Yahoo!]

Those of you who have been out of school for a while may not realize just how expensive college textbooks have become. Truth is, most college students could probably feed themselves fillet mignon for a year with what they pay for textbooks.

The costly textbook market is starting to come under pressure from both the academics who author the texts and groups who believe knowledge and information should be free and available to all. They're taking inspiration from a number of Internet phenomena such as peer-to-peer file sharing, Wikipedia, and the open source movement.

Professor R. Preston McAfee, from Cal Tech, has authored an introductory tome on economics that he has made available online for free. The book is also being offered in print from multiple outlets for a fraction of the price of normal textbooks -- $11 at its cheapest. The book, 'Introduction to Economic Analysis,' is even being used at Harvard.

But McAfee's free e-text book is just the beginning. Connexions is a tool for making what amount to textbook mash-ups. Authors can submit full length texts of individual sections (called modules) that can than be edited, mixed and mashed, as long as the original author is credited according to the Creative Commons license.

Connexions is just one way in which the open source movement is influencing the education market. Perhaps even more impressive is MIT's OpenCourseWare, which since being announced in 2001 has made lectures, assignments, and reading material for over 1,800 classes available online to the general public.

Textbook publishers are now rushing to join the 21st century before they can be blindsided and replaced (as record stores and printed encyclopedias have been) by these new Internet-powered movements. CourseSmart was formed by a consortium of academic publishers who have made over 4,000 textbooks available online or as digital downloads for less than their print options. But even these discounted offerings are pricey and lack flexibility, offering students the option to either download, or read online, not both.

These new free and community based educational offerings are quite a ways from deposing the academic publishing powerhouses, but they will likely find a niche amongst the more technologically savvy and experimental professors and students. [From: The New York Times]

The popular Linux distribution Ubuntu is making gains in some pretty important places, namely the French military police force National Gendarmerie. The government-run organization is planing to migrate all of its desktop PCs to Ubuntu by 2014, leaving the world of Microsoft behind it. The French National Assembly already switched all its PCs to Ubuntu in 2007, but its 1,200 desktops pales in comparison to the scope of the Gendarmerie's conversion of 70,000 machines.

The Gendarmerie has been moving towards open source slowly over the past few years, first ditching Microsoft Office in favor of the free Open Office as a replacement for Powerpoint, Excel, and Word. Then the organization left Internet Explorer and Outlook for Mozilla's Firefox browser and its lesser known sister application the Thunderbird E-mail client.

According to the Gendarmerie, moving to Linux will have 3 major benefits. One, it will allow it to diversify its suppliers instead of relying on one company. Two, the nature of open source puts the operating system in complete control of the police force, allowing it to tailor the software to its needs. And three, the cost. Ubuntu is free, as are most other Linux distributions. And that should make the tax payers happy.

From Yahoo! News

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The Linux revolution is making a run for the smart phone market. This isn't exactly new news. In fact, Linux started taking off in the cell phone market in about 2003. Major companies from NEC to Samsung are shipping phones loaded with the open source OS, though primarily in China, and Motorola seems to be slowly-but-surely letting Linux take over its hand-held line up. Certain versions of the RAZR 2, the ROKR, the SCPL, and the China-only Ming all run a custom version of Linux designed by Motorola.

The problem is that all of these companies run their own customized, closed, and incompatible versions of Linux. Luckily, two companies are working on open, standardized, and in the case of OpenMoko (pictured above), completely free and open sourced versions of Linux for hand-helds. This doesn't mean much to those of us who can't program, but all those intrepid programmers and hackers out there are usually very willing to share the fruits of their labor with the rest of us.

A standardized mobile Linux would have many advantages. For one, an almost endless supply of applications are bound to pop up, and no convoluted hacking is required (as is the case with the iPhone). Additionally, the low overhead required for Linux means a much faster and more responsive device than anything out there running Windows Mobile. As for Palm OS (which has an oft-delayed Linux based successor in the works), well, it's showing its age and simply unable to compete with the capabilities of a Linux phone.

Wired writer Paul Adams ordered himself a pre-alpha (which means it's just past the conceptual stage) version of the OpenMoko Neo1973. The Neo1973 is currently intended for developers, but anyone can order it for $450. The device is small and rounded on both ends, and features a large bright touch screen. It doesn't skip on other features either, Bluetooth, GPS, MicroSD slot, and globe-hopping quad-band GSM so it can work on all five continents. In essence, these are all the goodies you've come to expect from high end smart phones. Future versions of the phone will feature Wi-Fi as well.

Sadly for Adams, and OpenMoko, the first "tussle" with the Linux-based supposed iPhone-killer was less than smooth, to put it lightly. At first, the phone wouldn't boot at all. Then Adams discovered he had to download the software separately to install on the phone. Once booted, he found the GPS only functioned through obscure text commands from the terminal, and that the phone couldn't connect to his T-Mobile network for some reason.

In the end, Adams opted to install OpenMoko's primary competitor, Trolltech's Qtopia, the more mature, but partially proprietary hand-held Linux variant. After installing Qtopia, the phone worked almost perfectly allowing Adams to send text messages and make calls.

So, OpenMoko's software platform isn't quite usable yet, so we certainly don't suggest buying one any time soon. However, the ability to simply replace the OS on the OpenMoko is certainly an attractive feature. Imagine picking up the latest LG handset, deciding you don't like preloaded interface, and simply downloading a replacement that seems more your style. That's a cell-phone future we can get behind.

From Wired

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One of the new poster children for the new social web is one most of us will probably never get our hands on. The XO laptop from the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) foundation is a low-cost, low-powered, rugged laptop aimed at developing nations.

In case you haven't been paying attention, the XO or OLPC (or $100 Laptop as it's called) is a first-of-its-kind project loaded with new technologies and innovative features. A unique display runs in both a high resolution and sunlight-readable black and white mode along with a normal color mode for indoor viewing. The laptop also has a special ultra-wide touch pad that can be used with either a finger or a stylus as a drawing pad, while a special ultra low-power mesh Wi-Fi network allows for sharing an Internet connection between several PCs. It even extends the range of a typical Wi-Fi antenna by using the laptops as repeaters.

The laptops have finally met their threshold for mass production of 3 million orders. Though the laptops have climbed in price from the original goal of $100 to roughly $175, interest is still strong. Quanta, the largest laptop manufacturer in the world (they build laptops for Dell and Apple amongst others), will begin assembling the machines in bulk shortly. Now if only the rumored commercial version would be announced soon, some of us geeks would love to get our hands on one of these.

From The BBC

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