The television show, called Go_Open, has been produced with the help of the Shuttleworth Foundation, which promotes the use of open-source software in South African schools. The programme featured success stories, interviews with local and international open-source pioneers and news from the open-source world.
Thomas Black, a programme manager at the Shuttleworth Foundation who helped plan the programme, said the show is aimed at non-technical end users who may not have heard of open-source software before.
"It's really aimed at non-technical people -- we're not trying to preach to the converted," said Black. "We're trying to speak to the end user, particularly younger users, and to encourage them to try open-source software and to get involved in the open-source community."
The first episode of the show included an interview with Richard Stallman, the founder of the Free Software Foundation, and Robin Rowe, the founding partner of MovieEditor, which provides advice to Hollywood Studios on how to maximise their use of Linux in special effects and animation. It also included a feature on Pick and Pay, one of the largest retailers in South African, which runs Linux on the majority of its infrastructure and is starting to switch its till points to Linux.
Black said that the show has already experienced an encouraging response, with more than 1,000 people entering the show competition within one hour of the show finishing, and high volumes of Web traffic on the site accompanying the show.
As for future shows, Black said it has a number of open-source luminaries lined up, including Bruce Perens and Eric Raymond, the co-founders of the Open Source Initiative, which promotes Linux and open-source software to businesses. It is also hoping to get Linux creator Linus Torvalds to speak on the show, but this has not been confirmed yet, said Black.
The television show has not been cheap to produce, with the sponsors paying for the airtime on the channel and the production of the show. Black said that production costs were five million South African rand (about £450,000).
The show is sponsored by the Shuttleworth Foundation, Hewlett-Packard South Africa, African research institution CSIR and Canonical, the open-source company that sponsors the Ubuntu Linux distribution.
Go_Open will be broadcast on the South African television channel SABC 2 every Saturday at 5:30 p.m., but will soon be available for viewing on the Web site accompanying the series.
Talkback
Just one correction, Richard Stallman is responsible for the Free Software Foundation and thus GNU, but not Linux, Linux is GNU based but not engineered by Stallman.
Go-Open SABC 2 Saturdays 5:30pm
Go Open is a ground breaking television show, in fact it is the only show of its kind world wide and it is locally made. Go Open is solely dedicated to spreading the message of open source technology. What is open source you ask? Great question! Essentially open source is a software network that is taking the world of information technology by storm. As the name suggests "OPEN" the technology is freely available with the "SOURCE" code open for you to view. More often than not you can download the software over the net for free in a host of different applications to suite your needs.
Big business and technical industries sat up and took notice of open source for years ago due to its versatility which made it easy to customise to their exact needs without paying a fortune. A great example is the internet, the biggest IT platform around, open source is the software of choice for over 75% of internet sites currently running on the net.
Modern Times the company contracted to produce the 13 part series in association with the Shuttleworth Foundation and various other partners share the goal of bringing open source to the masses in South Africa. One example would be open office an operating system developed by open source programmers to compete with microsofts Office packages like XP. Open office has all the functions XP has for example a word processor, e-mail and internet browsers, image manipulation software and so on, the only difference is you have to pay for XP and you can not customise it at all as the source code is a closely guarded secret. Open office is free to download and fully customisable, if you live in South Africa there are even volunteers who will come to you and install it for you for free. all you need to do is go to the website www.go-opensource.org to order your free software cd and request someone to help you install it should you need assistance.
For a developing country like South Africa the benefits of open source are enormous, this initiative will bring computer literacy to thousands of people who would never have had the opportunity with proprietry software like XP. The open office system can even be customised into all of South Africas official native languages making it even easier for people to make the transition into using computers.
The television show has a cool informative air about it with presenter John Vlisamas adding his usual comedic spin on a topic often regarded as boring by non technical people. The show was designed to showcase how open source is changing lives and creating opportunities in this country and world wide. The parties involved wanted the show to be easy to watch and understand, judging by its popularity that goal is being achieved. The sixth episode aired last weekend and the viewership is continually increasing. We have had large amounts of positive feedback that the show has sparked off some new initiatives and helped kick start an open source revolution in South Africa.
The website has a host information and you can order the dvd set at the end of the series if you missed the first half of the episodes. Go Open is a half an hour show well worth watching for anyone who works with computers or wants to start learning how to use a computer. Don't miss it on SABC 2 Saturdays 5:30pm.
You can contact Brendon Cilliers for anymore information:
brendon@modern.co.za (011)787 4776 or 082 330 8140