Food for thought, via IP Watch:

“Gen Kenai, business developer for the open-source company Mozilla, spoke about the difficulty of expanding the open source movement into Asia. Technology news service CNet asked in January 2008 “where is Asia’s contribution to open source?” said Kenai, and added that when Linus Torvald, who started the open source operating system Linux, was interviewed about Asia, he listed the major barriers to participation as culture, language, and economic ability to participate.

Culturally, said Kenai, the style of confrontation inherent to open source software development in the West is a less common mode of interaction in Asia. Second, the de facto language in most open source projects is English. Lastly, Kenai said, the depth of participation is more difficult when you have a population that may not have the economic means to purchase their own computers or the freedom to choose the kinds of software they use. For example, in Korea, all secure transactions must run on Microsoft Windows and be sent over Internet Explorer, so there is a huge barrier to entry for not only Mozilla but Apple and other developers as well.

However, there have been some stunning examples of success, most notably Dzongkha Linux, an operating system developed for the country Bhutan, in the local language of Bhutanese. The system was built in 13 months with only $80,000 US dollars, said Kenai, and as such is an example of the power and potential of non-proprietary software systems to personalise development in poorer countries or for smaller markets.”