Stanford Center for Internet and Society

Since going open source with software has potential benefits for South Africa it is time to consider a policy shift towards Open Knowledge for South African education. Many universities are already involved in Open Knowledge Projects but much greater opportunities are opening up for education.

Government has the chance to adopt general policies which encourage this generally. This post considers only one of these possible policies; licensing textbooks under Creative Commons licences.

Insisting on the licensing of all text books bought by South Africa’s public educational institutions under Creative Commons would ensure that textbooks do not go out of print. In addition to other distribution methods the textbooks could be put on-line for anyone to download, print, and use. Educational institutions like schools could also lawfully make as many copies of the books or parts of the books as they need to.

The South African government has adopted a policy to use open source software as far as possible

As a result there will be increased opportunities for local developers, and government will no longer be dependant on proprietary software.

BUT with an open source policy if one software developer raises its prices too high, or doesn’t provide efficient service government can simply contract with another. This would not be as easy with a dependence on a proprietary software vendor who would own the code government was using, so that if government switched vendors it would have to discontinue use of that program, buy a new set of licences, install all new software and re-train everybody. Open source avoids that because any developer can simply work on the existing program.

Andrew Rens, obtained BA and subsequently LLB
(equivalent of JD) degrees from the
University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg,
before working as a lawyer in private practise.
His next real job was for the Commission for
Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration during the
start up of this independent government agency for the
resolution of labour disputes. He left the CCMA to
engage in teaching and human rights litigation as an
attorney at the
Wits Law Clinic while he completed his Master of

According to the Mail and Guardian, Earthlife Africa, an evironmental group, has been prohibited by a court order from making public the contents of an Eskom risk assesment.

Earthlife Africa is currently engaged in protracted litigation with Eskom, South Africa's incumbent power utility, and back in June Eskoms attorney apparently gave the document to Earthlife by mistake.

The strange thing is that the application apparently took place last Friday (2 September), even though the disclosure of the document took place in June. Nogal late on Friday.

On 27 May 2005 the Constitutional Court of South Africa handed down judgment in the case of
Laugh It Off Promotions CC v South African Breweries International (Finance) B.V. T/A Sabmark International.

The judgment is significant since it is the South African Constitutional Court's first foray into the freedom of expression issues raised by parody and satire. It also affirms that no area of South African law remains sealed off from the Constitution and its values.

The case arose from a conflict between South African Breweries and Laugh It Off CC (LIO), a tiny operation run by social commentator Justin Nurse.

Telkom, South Africa’s incumbent telecommunications operator has dropped its case against the creators of Hellkom, a satirical site dedicated to protesting the high tariffs and poor service of Telkom. Telkom alleged defamation and copyright infringement. The copyright infringement claim referred to use of an artistic work, the phone logo used by Telkom.

The Freedom of Expression Institute suggests in its statement on the case that “that the company is attempting to curry favour with South African telephone users ahead of pending competition from the Second National Operator.” Perhaps it’s natural that media specialists would explain the decision in media driven terms.