Richard Stallman, President and Founder of the Free Software Foundation, speaks during the International Conference on Communication and Technologies in Havana on Wednesday.
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HAVANA -- Cuba's communist government is trying to shake off the yoke of at least one capitalist empire -- Microsoft Corp. -- by joining with socialist Venezuela in converting its computers to open-source software.
Both governments say they are trying to wean state agencies from Microsoft's proprietary Windows to the open-source Linux operating system, which is developed by a global community of programmers who freely share their code.
"It's basically a problem of technological sovereignty, a problem of ideology," said Hector Rodriguez, who oversees a Cuban university department of 1,000 students developing open-source programs.
Cuban officials, ever focused on U.S. threats, also see it as a matter of national security. Communications Minister Ramiro Valdés, an old comrade of President Fidel Castro, raised suspicions about Microsoft's cooperation with U.S. military and intelligence agencies as he opened a technology conference this week.
He called the World's information systems a "battlefield" where Cuba is fighting against imperialism.
Microsoft did not return calls seeking comment. Cuba imports computers preloaded with Windows and also buys software in countries such as China, Mexico or Panama.
The conference's biggest splash was made by paunchy, wild-haired Richard Stallman, whose Free Software Foundation created the license in many open-source programs, Linux included.
Middle-aged bureaucrats and ponytailed young Cuban programmers clapped as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology computer scientist insisted that copyright laws violate basic morality, like laws that would threaten people with jail for sharing or modifying kitchen recipes.
Stallman also warned that proprietary software is a security threat because without examining the code, users can't know what "backdoor" holes might be left open for future entry.
Cuba also has trouble keeping proprietary software current. Its sluggish satellite link to the Outside World makes downloads of updates agonizingly slow. Cubans put software updates on a server on the island to fix the problem, but many computers stay unpatched and vulnerable.
Cuba's Cabinet also urges a shift from proprietary software. The customs service has gone to Linux and the ministries of culture, higher education and communications are planning to do so, Rodríguez said.
And students in his own department are cooking up a Linux version called Nova. The Higher Education Ministry is making its own.
Cuba is training tens of thousands of software and hardware engineers across the country; few have home computers. Most Cubans depend on government Internet cafes or schools.
Rodríguez shied away from saying how long converting Cuba to Linux would take: "It would be tough for me to say that we would migrate half the public administration in three years."
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