[FC-discuss] Yale switching to Google Apps / Gmail

[Alex Kozak]

I'd love to have a conversation about this at the conference... would be
interesting to hear everyone's perspective. I think this is a great debate
to have.

John you know I agree with the ideals of free software, but I think I have a
more pragmatic view when it comes to Google. Does the increased risk to
"corporate interference" and  reduced autonomy outweigh the potential
benefits of these technologies? For a school without any collaboration
systems, and little capacity to deploy one, the Google option would clearly
be a net win for education and the university's mission to educate. And it
would be a win for free culture in that the capabilities for collaboration
and learning presented by the internet are being harnessed by the
institutions who could most benefit from their use.

I definitely agree that other things being equal a floss solution is
preferable over Google. And think it's even inevitable that free software
will compete with Google apps-like services. But in the meantime should
schools not be encouraging the use of new technology until the floss
solution is as optimal as Google?

- Alex

On Wed, Feb 10, 2010 at 12:20 PM, John Sullivan <john at wjsullivan.net> wrote:

> Adi Kamdar <adikamdar at gmail.com> writes:
>
> > Hey folks,
> >
> > The Yale Daily News ran an article today about how there's
> almost-definite
> > talk about Yale switching to Google Apps for Education and using Google
> > servers/software to host our email.
> >
> >
> http://www.yaledailynews.com/news/university-news/2010/02/09/google-run-yale-e-mail/
> >
> > I was wondering if you guys had any thoughts or good literature on the
> > issues with this (re privacy, data, costs, security, tech, law, etc.).
> For
> > the most part, the students are overjoyed about this since our old email
> > system is painful to use, so it'd be nice to address usability issues as
> > well.
>
> People in this thread have commented on the Gmail aspect, but if the
> university is using the rest of the Google Apps, then that opens up the
> Google Docs issue as well -- where the free software arguments seem much
> clearer.
>
> http://www.google.com/a/help/intl/en/edu/university.html has a map
> showing other schools that have already made the switch. (BTW, this
> animated map with testimonials / case studies is really cool and
> something we should do with free software adoption and free culture
> program highlights.)
>
> I don't see how this solves any RIAA problems -- your university
> administrators still have access to your email via the Google Apps
> administrative account. Google only requires that the university publish
> some kind of policy to their users, not much (or anything) about the
> content of that policy.
>
> It seems like a net loss to me -- regardless of whether Gmail is an
> ethical problem for free software or not, it's still clearly preferable
> that a university run its mail system and document
> production/collaboration using free software (or contract to someone who
> does). It means more autonomy, less risk of corporate interference in
> education, more educational opportunities for students, faculty and
> employees, and supporting the growth of an approach to software that is
> consistent with advancing any university's founding mission.
>
> --
> -John Sullivan
> -http://wjsullivan.net
> -GPG Key: AE8600B6
>
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>



-- 
Alex Kozak
akozak at berkeley.edu
916.225.2718
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