Several more responses to the paper have reached me since I posted the last ones, I post them here without (initial) comment).
From: Susan Du Preez
Re: Digital Freedom Debate
Just read the email you posted from and to Uwe…. excellently answered !
I am gonna add my bit too……
Corporates locally and abroad are definitely moving towards the OpenSource world, not because of the “freedom” sadly, but because of budgets.
They are STILL trying to controll what their employees/students are doing and saying. They simply put “corporate policies” into the employee’s work contract.
No individuality is allowed, is what I am trying to say. This starts at Primary schools all the way right up to Government corporates.
The message going out to our kids sadly is, you WILL be one of the sheep in the group…… there is however a small candle light at the end of the dark tunnel for the first time ever!
Geeks are reaching out instead of hiding these days 
and as far as this Geek is concerned its about time!!!!!
From: Georgez Kaznadar
Re: comparisons between free and non-free software
Hello, I just read Uwe Thiem comparing Konqueror vs. IE.
both of them are valuable tools to browse the web, files in the
computer, and files in computers of a Windows domain. As far as I
know, Konqueror has some reacher features, for example there are
additional protocols, as the protocol fish:// which enables browsing
files in computers that you can join by a secure shell protocol : then
the communication is protected by strong cryptography.
I believe that accessing my data over the web with confidential tools is
part of my freedom.
—–
Further, Uwe Thiem compares Gperiodic and Kalzium to other anonymous(?)
teaching tools for chemistry.
I believe that a student using Gperiodic and Kalzium has more freedom
than with other programs. First of all, (s)he can redistribute these
programs without being an outlaw. Students are not majoritarily skillful
enough to patch programs like Gperiodic or Kalzium. However, if they
want add some resources to them, they can. Gperiodic has a feature
allowing to link web pages of your choice to any element in the table.
These pages may have been authored by you, or just visited, then linked
by you. On the contrary, enrichments I see in some “commercial” websites
about the periodic table of elements are mostly incitements to buy
something or to visit some webshop… see for example a page about
Niobium at
http://www.webelements.com/webelements/elements/text/Nb/key.html
Kalzium has a few photos linked to elements: it is easy to
enrich this pool of documents. Then again the question: enriching a
non-free software with a photo is possible… However if you contribute
to a software with a GPL license like Kalzium, your name will be cited
in the copies and derivatives of the modified version you made.
Best regards, Georges.
From: Odile Bénassy
Re: Have you heard about Celestin Freinet?
INTRODUCTION
Underachievement in education. Academic success. Changing attitudes
towards learning. Raising educational standards. Learning difficulties.
Low expectations. Violent behaviour. Back to basics. Citizenship. Moral
values. Gap between school and enterprise.
In the United Kingdom as in France, public opinion is concerned with
educational matters. Everyone is looking for concrete and effective
-and preferrably inexpensive- solutions. Could it be that with a
little more punishment and a better selection …
Is hard pedagogy the only way?
What if soft pedagogy could give us a hand?
Could the 3R’s (Reading, wRiting and aRithmetics) progress to the 5 R’s
(… Re-discovering and Re-creating)?
For several decades an educational movement has inspired the practice
of numerous teachers in Europe, Africa and America. In France, this
cooperative pedagogy has gained official recognition and is used by
state primary school teachers in a class practice which must comply
with the requirements of both the national curriculum and the
inspectors of education.
This movement, which is virtually unknown in the United Kingdom, is the
Freinet movement, named after its founder Célestin Freinet (1896-1966).
Freinet regarded learning as a form of work, and developed active
methods making use of techniques and tools: a journal written and
printed by children, le texte libre (free writing), correspondence
between schools, a weekly work plan, self-assessment, la classe
promenade (field trip), presentations based on enquiries, a pupils’
council and a school cooperative.
And today the teachers in the Freinet movement use the Internet.
This approach to learning, which is both rational and optimistic, seeks
to create the conditions for an experience that will overcome what John
Dewey called the Eithers Ors, the false opposites. Between democracy
and discipline, behaviour and learning, knowledge and realization,
individual activities and collective tasks, artistic creation and
scientific trial and error, play and work, effort and joy.
But does it work?
On 6 and 7 June 1997, the Cultural Department of the French Embassy,
the French Institute and the Alliance Française in London organized an
International Seminar dedicated to the Cooperative Pedagogy of Célestin
Freinet. About fifteen researchers and practitioners from Belgium,
Brazil, Canada, the United States, France, Great Britain, Ireland,
Japan and Poland examined the relevance and effectiveness of this
practical theory founded on the curiosity and need for action of the
human animal and careful not to under-estimate the natural abilities of
children. Such theory aims at teaching young individuals to deliberate,
solve problems, and live creatively together in a democratic place.
(http://ecolesdifferentes.info/FREINETLONDRES.htm)
more on
http://ecolesdifferentes.free.fr/STARKEY.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freinet
Take care
