Re: [sheflug] Government open source policy

[(Ted Harding) <Ted.Harding [at] xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On 14-Mar-06 Richard Ibbotson wrote:
> David 
> 
>>Does anyone know what the relationship is between government policy
>> and a public body's duties to it. I'm thinking specifically of the
>> two below
> 
> You'll be very lucky if you get a sensbile reply to any of your 
> questions.
> 
>> website CMS. They like the open source options but in the next few
>> months the preferred provider for the Building Schools for the
>> Future scheme's going to be announced and there doesn't seem to be
>> any mention of open source at all. My MP hasn't replied yet.
> 
> There won't be any mention of open source or Free software.  It's all 
> carefully spun up/ spun together / spin / double talk.  Who is your 
> MP ?  Just out of curiosity.
> 
> My MP replies but we think that it's because I've raised so many 
> questions over the doings of this Government at a Euro level that 
> they feel they have to answer my questions.  The answers I get are 
> carefully manufactured by a civil servant who doesn't know what 
> he/she is doing.  What they've done is read the FSF.org pages and 
> copy the words from there in the hope that I'm stupid enough to 
> believe what they tell me.

And, following on Richard's comments, see what is written in the
Introduction of the Open Source Policy document (as referenced in
David Willington's mail):

  "The software industry is very fast moving and frequently
   throws up new developments that initially promise to make
   great changes in the marketplace, and which ultimately fail
   to live up to their initial press hype. OSS is indeed the
   start of a fundamental change in the software infrastructure
   marketplace and UK Government must take cognisance of that fact."

Decidedly ambiguous to my eyes.

It could mean that the Govt consider that, amongst all the stuff
most of which gets nowhere, OSS may exceptionally be the real thing.

Or it could be interpreted that the Govt feel obliged to pay
attention to OSS but really think it is another flash in the pan.

Nice that they have the option to interpret it either way at
some future date.

Or am I just being paranoically cynical?

Best wishes to all,
Ted.

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Date: 14-Mar-06                                       Time: 10:36:13
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