Bonum Certa Men Certa

Cablegate: “42 Percent of Argentine Firms Use Linux on at Least Some of Their Computers”

Cablegate



Summary: In a cable marked "sensitive", US diplomats look at the digital state which Argentina is in

TECHRIGHTS covered Argentina several times over the years. Argentina, being a south American nation, has been quite GNU/Linux-friendly. Here are some posts that may be relevant to today's Cablegate cable on "BRIDGING ARGENTINA'S DIGITAL DIVIDE":





According to the following cable (€¶11), "Linux is popular in Argentina due to its low cost, and 42 percent of Argentine firms use Linux on at least some of their computers." Here is the cable in full:








ZCZCXRO9151 RR RUEHRG DE RUEHBU #0748/01 0901858 ZNR UUUUU ZZH R 311858Z MAR 06 FM AMEMBASSY BUENOS AIRES TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 4016 INFO RUEHAC/AMEMBASSY ASUNCION 5452 RUEHBR/AMEMBASSY BRASILIA 5254 RUEHCV/AMEMBASSY CARACAS 0887 RUEHLP/AMEMBASSY LA PAZ 4068 RUEHMN/AMEMBASSY MONTEVIDEO 5453 RUEHSG/AMEMBASSY SANTIAGO 5058 RUEHSJ/AMEMBASSY SAN JOSE 0428 RUEHRG/AMCONSUL RECIFE 0137 RUEHRI/AMCONSUL RIO DE JANEIRO 1940 RUEHSO/AMCONSUL SAO PAULO 2842 RUEATRS/DEPT OF TREASURY WASHDC RUCPDOC/USDOC WASHDC RHEBAAA/USDOE WASHDC RHMFISS/HQ USSOUTHCOM MIAMI FL

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 BUENOS AIRES 000748 SIPDIS SENSITIVE SIPDIS SOUTHCOM FOR POLAD AND J5 FOR JUAN RENTA USDOC FOR 4322/MAC/OLAC/BASTIAN/PEACHER E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: ECON [Economic Conditions], EIND [Industry and Manufacturing], AR [Argentina] SUBJECT: BRIDGING ARGENTINA'S DIGITAL DIVIDE €¶1. (U) Sensitive but unclassified. Not for Internet distribution. ------- Summary ------- €¶2. (U) Argentina's IT industry is the third largest in Latin America. Argentina's IT industry enjoys many advantages and is growing quickly. IT companies expect continued rapid growth and are investing heavily in Argentina. There has been a boom in the number of small U.S. hardware and software companies in Argentina in the past two years. The growth in Argentina's IT industry has left many Argentines behind. The GOA has instituted a number of projects with mixed results to combat this digital divide. Private companies are also sponsoring programs to bridge the digital divide, and strong competition in both the hardware and software sectors is driving prices down. The private sector will likely prove more able than the GOA to bridge Argentina's digital divide. End summary. -------- Overview -------- €¶3. (SBU) Argentina's IT industry is the third largest in Latin America. Total IT production amounted to USD 1.3 billion in 2005, of which USD 250 million were exports. The IT industry is responsible for one percent of Argentine GDP, and employs over 48,000 Argentines, or 1.44 percent of the total labor force. The largest IT consumers within Argentina are the financial, government, telecom, oil, and manufacturing industries. IBM, which is the largest IT company in Argentina in terms of both sales and employment, has 3,500 Argentine employees. IBM and EDS provide services to many Latin American clients from Argentina. Intel will soon begin its first production in South America with a software development facility in Cordoba. Microsoft maintains a presence in Argentina only for public relations and marketing purposes. Smaller domestic and foreign firms produce software, hardware, and services for mostly local clients. ------------ Rapid Growth ------------ €¶4. (U) Argentina's IT industry enjoys many advantages. Argentine workers are comparatively well educated. Since the 2002 devaluation of the peso, Argentine skilled labor has been competitively priced. The relatively large domestic market allows firms to gain experience in the local market before exporting, while the predominance of the Spanish language gives Argentine companies access to important export markets. €¶5. (U) Argentina's IT sector is growing quickly. IT grew 29.3 percent in 2005, roughly triple the rate of the Argentine economy as a whole, and generated 20,000 new jobs. Domestic and export sales contributed equally to this growth as exports increased 30 percent in 2005. Revenues from hardware grew 37.6 percent, while revenues from software grew 22 percent and revenues from services grew 20 percent in 2005. €¶6. (SBU) IT companies expect continued rapid growth and are investing heavily in Argentina. IBM added 750 employees in 2005 and expects to add 500 employees per year over the next four years. IBM would like to double this number of new employees, but it is limited by the number of qualified graduates, its ability to develop new managers to supervise these new employees, and available office space. IBM is currently looking for a local company to build and lease a BUENOS AIR 00000748 002 OF 003 large new office building to house its new employees. Intel recently began work on a multimillion-dollar facility in Cordoba for 450 employees. ---------------------------------------- Explosive Growth of Small U.S. Companies ---------------------------------------- €¶7. (U) There has been a boom in the number of small U.S. hardware and software companies in the Buenos Aires neighborhoods of Palermo, Palermo Chico and Palermo Hollywood during the past two years, according to industry sources. Most of the firms are subsidiaries of U.S. companies that are based in Silicon Valley, California, Austin, Texas, and Raleigh, North Carolina. They generally employ 50 to 100 people and maintain a relatively low profile. This expansion is also being felt in the provinces. For example, a government official in the province of Salta recently told the Economic Counselor about a former Argentine employee of a U.S. software company who now operates a company in Salta providing software for U.S. companies. This is one of several such companies in that province. U.S. firms move operations or outsource to Argentina to take advantage of Argentina's relatively high educational levels and low labor costs. -------------- Digital Divide -------------- €¶8. (U) The rapid growth in Argentina's IT industry has left many Argentines behind. The population of Internet users grew 40 percent in 2005, but computer use in Argentina is still limited to the middle and upper classes. Only ten million Argentines, or roughly a fourth of the population, have regular access to the Internet. The vast majority of these computer users are concentrated in the nation's largest cities, according to a survey by Microsoft. Approximately 20 percent of the population does not have an equal opportunity to access the Internet because broadband has not reached their poorer neighborhoods. €¶9. (U) The GOA has instituted a number of projects with mixed results to combat this digital divide. Argentina's Ministry of Education together with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology launched "One Laptop Per Child" in 2005. This program intends to distribute between 500,000 and 1 million low-cost laptops to poor children in Argentina. Another Ministry of Education plan launched in 2005 intends to distribute 100,000 computers to 12,000 schools. The GOA also partly revived a plan to establish Community Technological Centers (CTCs) after abandoning it during the recession of 1999-2002. There are now 1,350 CTCs in Argentina. A lack of funding and training hampers these programs, according to the director of the Argentine Telework Association and the director of projects for the educ.ar program. An estimated 71 percent of Argentine educators have never used the Internet, and only 3 percent of Argentine Internet users regularly access the Internet from an educational institution. By contrast, 60 percent of Internet users go online in cybercafs, 41 percent go online at home, and 14 percent go online at work, with many having more than one mode of Internet access. €¶10. (U) Private companies are also sponsoring programs to bridge the digital divide. The "My PC Program," jointly funded by 40 mostly Argentine firms, is designed to bridge the digital divide by providing low-cost PCs to the nation's poor. Seven of the eight largest supporters are U.S. firms, including Intel, Microsoft, and HP. The eighth firm is South Korean. The program sold more than 20,000 PCs for approximately USD 800 per unit in April 2005. Other programs, such as Intel's "Quality in Teaching" program and BUENOS AIR 00000748 003 OF 003 Microsoft's "Alliance for Education Program" are also bringing Internet access to the nation's poor. €¶11. (U) Strong competition in both the hardware and software sectors is driving prices down. The hardware market in Argentina is extremely competitive and offers low profit margins. The number of PC manufacturers with sales and service networks in Argentina has increased from four to 17 in recent years. The software market is also competitive. Linux is popular in Argentina due to its low cost, and 42 percent of Argentine firms use Linux on at least some of their computers. Microsoft released a Spanish- language Windows XP "starter edition" to compete with Linux, further reducing the cost of a new Internet-ready PC. The impact of this competition is clear. Sales of PCs for home use increased 93 percent to reach over one million units in 2005. ------- Comment ------- €¶12. (U) The results of GOA programs to bridge the digital divide have so far been disappointing. The private sector will likely prove more successful in this area. End Comment. €¶13. (U) To see more Buenos Aires reporting, visit our classified website at: http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/wha/buenosaires







A 2009 survey in Italy showed that OpenOffice.org usage in the country is 50% among companies, with GNU/Linux at 63%. Just how understated is the impact of Free software as viewed from the States? A lot of the English-speaking news comes from there, pushing aside other claims and measurements, thus establishing a biased consensus.

Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts

Slopwatch: LinuxSecurity, UbuntuPIT, and Google News
We've also just noticed more slop from UbuntuPIT
Microsoft Windows is No Longer an Operating System, It's Surveillance Project
Why is this even legal to preload on PCs outside the US?
 
The Slop Song
The train wreck marches on
LLM Slop/Advanced Plagiarism Flooding the Zone With Capital That Does Not Exist
Many publishers out there still participate in this bubble instead of calling it what it is
Links 09/10/2025: Sacked Microsoft Workers Make "Sackbird", IBM Taps CockroachDB for PostgreSQL
Links for the day
"Happy Hacking Day" Richard Stallman Talk This Afternoon (From 14:00 to 16:00) at Haaga-Helia University in Pasila
Richard Stallman in Helsinki, Finland
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, October 08, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, October 08, 2025
Links 09/10/2025: Impact of Microsoft Layoffs, More Data Breaches
Links for the day
Gemini Links 09/10/2025: Autumn Blues and C IRC Bot
Links for the day
Slopwatch Appreciated by Real Authors of GNU/Linux Articles
We do try to keep on top of those things
Upgraded R.R.R.R.R.R. Today
The Web of 2025 is full of garbage, not limited to slopfarms
Freedom From Proprietary Prisons
Forking always an option
IBM's Watson Died in 1956, Now Watson Dies Again
IBM is becoming just a reseller of GAFAM and other stuff
Microsoft Says That Constant Mass Layoffs Are Success, the Media Isn't Buying This Microsoft Narrative Anymore
If people in the media feel an obligation to repeat whatever lies Microsoft tells, what point will there be to the media?
Links 08/10/2025: "Mali Puts Free Speech on Trial" And Apple Enforces Dictatorship
Links for the day
Links 08/10/2025: ‘Death to Spotify’ and Law to Ban Loud Commercials on Streaming (Dis)Services
Links for the day
Links 08/10/2025: Real Innovation and Nina.chat is Dead
Links for the day
Links 08/10/2025: Y2K38 Bug is a Vulnerability, Chat Control in Europe a Threat
Links for the day
How and Why Once-Legitimate Sites Turn Into Slopfarms
Many sites will go offline and many social control networks will shut down once they realise or even openly admit they spend money and time gardening a bunch of bots and slop
UbuntuPIT Became a Slopfarm and Gnoppix Tarnishes Its Own Brand With Slop
It fits all the characteristics of mildly-edited (if at all) slop
Slopwatch: Linux Journal and Other Slopfarms
GAFAM needs to go the way of the dodo
Gemini Links 08/10/2025: "Seek Seek Revolution" and Gradient Backgrounds
Links for the day
Qualcomm Arduino Takes Aim at Raspberry Pi
Qualcomm is a Microsoft partner
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, October 07, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, October 07, 2025
Stagnation of the Economy and What Free Software Can (or Could) Do For It
If your economic model is based on a pyramid of lies, it won't last very long
Social Control Media is Sinking
it would rightly seem like the era of centralised "social" sites (they're not social, they're about controlling the users) is ending, not overnight but gradually
Participation in Cancel Culture Detrimental to One's Career
A cautionary tale
Passion Wins
we've increased the number of birds we feed to 100+
How Solderpunk and Sean Conner Started Gemini Protocol (and, Collectively, Geminispace) Back in 2019
Based on the "official" history
Arduino is Now a Patent Bully (Qualcomm)
Qualcomm has just bought Arduino
Many Years of Microsoft Cancellations and Faked (Acquired) Revenue "Growth"
XBox is basically the "next Skype"
The Comment TheLayoff.com Has Just Censored for Criticising a Ridiculous Puff Piece of IBM Management
If comments get censored for their "style" rather than their substance, then society will be worse off
The Power of Writing Down Facts
The more we write and publish, the more people will know what happened
Microsoft's Non-Denying Denial About XBox's Death is Already Being Shattered to Pieces
Like Microsoft's 'open' 'hey hi', heralding meaningless non-committing agreements with AMD is little more than vapourware
Slopwatch: UbuntuPIT Joins the Slopfarms Club
Slopfarms gonna slop
Links 07/10/2025: Privacy at Risk, GAFAM Remains Off the Hook
Links for the day
Gemini Links 07/10/2025: Modern Retro Console Idea and Batch vs Bash
Links for the day
Links 07/10/2025: International Criminal Court (ICC) Convicts Ali Kushayb; Moroccan Imprisoned for 'Offensive' Shirt
Links for the day
Links 07/10/2025: EU' Chat Control is Back, US Cracks Down on Democracy
Links for the day
Techrights Pursues Justice and Truth Because, Without Those, Society Descends Into Chaos
most people reject dogma and pseudoscience
Upcoming Talks by Richard Stallman in Helsinki, Göteborg, and Rome
Join with him and share the software
Something Bad is Happening in the Open Source Initiative (OSI)
The latest OSI blog post is from a Microsoft operative and a few weeks ago the Executive Director left
TLS 1.3 Dominates Geminispace (99% of Known Capsules)
it's nowadays safe to assume almost every capsule can handle TLS 1.3
Why soylentnews.org Has Been Having Technical Difficulties Lately
The network has been going up and down quite a lot this past week
A Statement Against Violence
The facts are on our side
They've Run Out of Things to Rebrand or Label as "AI"
The next few years will be interesting because if Microsoft lays off tens of thousands of workers each year, there won't be much left except mountains of debt and dying brands
The Register MS is Still Being Paid to Participate in the "AI" Ponzi Scheme Which Will Crash the Economy
The Register MS is hoping to get lucky by tricking people into a scam
Richard Stallman Confirms His Talk in Göteborg This Coming Friday
"The hosts say that the list will not be given to the state"
Most of the "Linux" Results This Morning in Google News Are LLM Slop From the Same Slopfarm, Plagiarising Phoronix
The main question is, does Google even care at this point?
Gemini Links 07/10/2025: Civil War and "Goodbye Web"
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, October 06, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, October 06, 2025