Hola, me llega esto que quiero compartir con ustedes... ESOP has just made available two studies with a focus on the retail oligopoly dominating laptop sales. The artificial exclusion of Linux-based laptops amounts to 3 to 5 Million Euros in direct impacts in the Portuguese economy. Indirect impacts may be much higher. The first study analyses the national economic impacts of introducing a series of locally-assembled laptops with an Open Source system and applications. This study measures the effects on GDP, employment, trade balance and discretionary income. The idea had a previous successful try-out in a government project called e.iniciativas, where the debuting Linux laptop achieved a 10% market share. Later on, despite several attempts, Portuguese retailers were altogether unwilling to supply identical laptop solutions, when the e.iniciativas experience had clearly established that such products would be in demand. The second study analyses this market behaviour, which is typical of retail oligopolies. The analysis derives a probability model for retail markets and addresses several malfunctioning phenomena in the frame of the existing European legislation for competition. This model can be applied to other markets where the imbalance between production and distribution control is felt and where distribution is highly concentrated. The theoretical basis allows for the identification of two critical issues: 1) a small number of intervening parties holds the power to choose which products become available for millions of citizens 2) different degrees of decision-coupling between parties may show within an oligopoly This matter has been neglected by our national Competition Authority and apparently not corrected by European institutions. Its origins are now duly explained, with scientific methodology and simple principles. The direct financial impacts are significant, even if they are only the tip of iceberg compared to software public spending [1]. The indirect impacts – shall we say network effects – are much harder to calculate. One can estimate they are an order of magnitude greater, given the diminished consumer awareness they help maintain. Both studies can be freely accessed at: http://esop.pt/retail ESOP would like to appeal to every intervening party in the market, that they become aware of their role as liaison between producer and consumer and as mediating agents in commercial transactions with major effects in the macro- economic indicators. ESOP would also like to appeal to the regulators, that they pay special attention to any practises leading to market stagnation and hindering local innovation. Finally, ESOP would like to invite all national assemblers to collaborate in finding laptop solutions with pre-installed Linux. There is a number of local companies whose technical expertise and experience in consumer support may prove vital for the success of these projects. References [1] – http://esop.pt/documentos Saludos -- Agustín Benito Bethencourt Profile: http://es.linkedin.com/in/toscalix Twitter/identi.ca: @toscalix