5 ms·

Why on earth does any large government on earth not do this?

arthur_debert 15y ago
Because it is not its core business? Look, anywhere you look, the government could, in theory step into production of X and save money. The government's version would always cost less, since you can subtract profits and the costs of features / expenditure to support other customers. Why doesn't the US gov just create a telco? Or any large supplier, really? This sounds good in theory, but in practice it tends to put the state machinery in charge of managing things it's largely incapable of. I'd much rather the government would show support either by donations (and let Apache Foundation / whomever manage their own thing), or just creating stimulus plans with the money saved (say, for example to make sure computers did not costs 3x as much in Brazil as they do in the US). The public sector has many restrictions (elections every few years changing management, very much subject to political pressures, larger bureaucracy etc) that make it a bad competitor in a number of business.
- jules 15y ago
  Why are computers so expensive in Brazil? A Big Mac is also relatively expensive. Is it just an expensive country in general?
  - Cofor 15y ago
    Largely because of taxes. Brazilian taxes are extremely high. http://www.quantocustaobrasil.com.br/site/downloads/impostos_quantocustaobrasil.pdf http://www.quantocustaobrasil.com.br/site/downloads/impostos... This table is in Portuguese but it's easy to understand. The second column means the tax percentage of certain product / service. It's published by the union of Ministry of Finance's workers.
    - arthur_debert 15y ago
      Those are not for imports. In the case of computers, since we do not produce them, the taxes are much higher. Pretty much all eletronics cost between 2 to 3x as much as they would in the US.
      - juliano_q 15y ago
        Yes. If we want to buy an Amazon Kindle that will cost exactly 2x times the original price. It is the most expensive Kindle in the world (the second is India, with around 1.3x the original price). It is ridiculous.
        lzm 15y ago
        Factor in the average income of a Brazilian family and you'll wonder how on Earth electronic gadgets get sold here at all.
        juliano_q 15y ago
        Yesterday I was walking in front of an operator store (Vivo) and saw the first Samsung Galaxy (i7500) for sale. Unfortunately I had one i7500 a few years ago. The price: 899 BRL (around 578 dollars).
    - lzm 15y ago
      Taxes are so high, yet we have little to no infrastructure. It's a shame, I really with I was born somewhere else.
- rbanffy 15y ago
  I fail to see where the article implies Brazilan government would try to control either office suite. What I read was they would work together and support. If they hire a dozen developers (and, from my experience with FLOSS within the Brazilian government, they would be very clever people) we should be happy, right? I also see this commitment would go a long way in creating and documenting the means to support OOo an LO in very large installations, helping develop the technologies companies would use to deploy them.
  - arthur_debert 15y ago
    The language of the letter is pretty vague, it mentions "creation of a collaboration group to develop" which can be pretty munch anything (or nothing at all, actually). I am not sure the Brazilian gov hiring developers is the best course of action. I'd much rather have it fund Apache Soft, Mozilla, or any other organization that knows how to do it. In my experience, pretty much ever govt software I've interacted with (imposto de renda, nota fiscal paulista, the portal brasil fluke?) is incredibly bad. I fail to see the hand on clever people in them.
- tokenadult 15y ago
  The government's version would always cost less, since you can subtract profits and the costs of features / expenditure to support other customers. Aren't there already counterexamples of government products costing more to end users than privately produced products, even in the world of software. Certainly there is no general principle in economics that that which is done by state actors is less expensive than that which is done by private actors. Often the situation is exactly the other way around, with government services being much more expensive than privately delivered services.
praptak 15y ago
Mostly because their voters aren't HN readers.
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]
santimt 15y ago
Isn't Brazil a large government? From a neighbour country, trust me that it is.
- loup-vaillant 15y ago
  You sound like you misinterpreted va_coder. He remarked that a number of large governments do not do this. He did not say that no large government at all do this.
known 15y ago
Writing software (GNU) != Selling software (Microsoft) != Selling gadgets (Apple) != Selling advertisements (Google) != Selling consulting (Accenture)

Because it is not its core business? Look, anywhere you look, the government could, in theory step into production of X and save money. The government's version would always cost less, since you can subtract profits and the costs of features / expenditure to support other customers. Why doesn't the US gov just create a telco? Or any large supplier, really? This sounds good in theory, but in practice it tends to put the state machinery in charge of managing things it's largely incapable of. I'd much rather the government would show support either by donations (and let Apache Foundation / whomever manage their own thing), or just creating stimulus plans with the money saved (say, for example to make sure computers did not costs 3x as much in Brazil as they do in the US). The public sector has many restrictions (elections every few years changing management, very much subject to political pressures, larger bureaucracy etc) that make it a bad competitor in a number of business.

jules 15y ago
Why are computers so expensive in Brazil? A Big Mac is also relatively expensive. Is it just an expensive country in general?
- Cofor 15y ago
  Largely because of taxes. Brazilian taxes are extremely high. http://www.quantocustaobrasil.com.br/site/downloads/impostos_quantocustaobrasil.pdf http://www.quantocustaobrasil.com.br/site/downloads/impostos... This table is in Portuguese but it's easy to understand. The second column means the tax percentage of certain product / service. It's published by the union of Ministry of Finance's workers.
  - arthur_debert 15y ago
    Those are not for imports. In the case of computers, since we do not produce them, the taxes are much higher. Pretty much all eletronics cost between 2 to 3x as much as they would in the US.
    - juliano_q 15y ago
      Yes. If we want to buy an Amazon Kindle that will cost exactly 2x times the original price. It is the most expensive Kindle in the world (the second is India, with around 1.3x the original price). It is ridiculous.
      - lzm 15y ago
        Factor in the average income of a Brazilian family and you'll wonder how on Earth electronic gadgets get sold here at all.
        juliano_q 15y ago
        Yesterday I was walking in front of an operator store (Vivo) and saw the first Samsung Galaxy (i7500) for sale. Unfortunately I had one i7500 a few years ago. The price: 899 BRL (around 578 dollars).
  - lzm 15y ago
    Taxes are so high, yet we have little to no infrastructure. It's a shame, I really with I was born somewhere else.
rbanffy 15y ago
I fail to see where the article implies Brazilan government would try to control either office suite. What I read was they would work together and support. If they hire a dozen developers (and, from my experience with FLOSS within the Brazilian government, they would be very clever people) we should be happy, right? I also see this commitment would go a long way in creating and documenting the means to support OOo an LO in very large installations, helping develop the technologies companies would use to deploy them.
- arthur_debert 15y ago
  The language of the letter is pretty vague, it mentions "creation of a collaboration group to develop" which can be pretty munch anything (or nothing at all, actually). I am not sure the Brazilian gov hiring developers is the best course of action. I'd much rather have it fund Apache Soft, Mozilla, or any other organization that knows how to do it. In my experience, pretty much ever govt software I've interacted with (imposto de renda, nota fiscal paulista, the portal brasil fluke?) is incredibly bad. I fail to see the hand on clever people in them.
tokenadult 15y ago
The government's version would always cost less, since you can subtract profits and the costs of features / expenditure to support other customers. Aren't there already counterexamples of government products costing more to end users than privately produced products, even in the world of software. Certainly there is no general principle in economics that that which is done by state actors is less expensive than that which is done by private actors. Often the situation is exactly the other way around, with government services being much more expensive than privately delivered services.

praptak 15y ago

Mostly because their voters aren't HN readers.

deleted 15y ago
[deleted]

santimt 15y ago

Isn't Brazil a large government? From a neighbour country, trust me that it is.

loup-vaillant 15y ago
You sound like you misinterpreted va_coder. He remarked that a number of large governments do not do this. He did not say that no large government at all do this.

known 15y ago

Writing software (GNU) != Selling software (Microsoft) != Selling gadgets (Apple) != Selling advertisements (Google) != Selling consulting (Accenture)