Embarrassing Governments Into Adopting Open Source

caitsith01 writes "An effort is currently underway to embarrass the Australian Federal Government into adopting open source software. As this story explains, the Australian Democrats have put questions on notice in Parliament that will require all government ministers to disclose how much money their departments spend on Microsoft products each year. The idea is to force open source issues to the fore by showing just how much money Microsoft receives from the government. It could be a smart approach - the average taxpayer knows little or nothing about OSS, but will rapidly form and express vocal opinions about the government wasting money. The article also mentions that a bill may be introduced to Federal Parliament to mandate the consideration of open source solutions (you may remember this story about an Australian state trying to introduce similar legislation). Some quotes from the article: "What the country doesn't need is to be tied into a profit-maximising licensing system, and the way to combat that is to get government to break out of the paradigm." On the other hand, the (right wing) Liberal Party criticises suggestions that use of open source should be compulsory as "hi-tech affirmative action.""

Comments

Liberal Party = Arch Conservatives

[Evil Pete]

The Liberal Party in Australia has morphed over the decades into something like your Republican Party only more right wing.

The Labour Party is usually considered by the Libs as a bunch a commies ... and yet they also have right wing tendencies (sometimes very).

The Democrats are made of left wing refugees from the Liberal Party and right wing refugees from the Labour Party. Sort of. Though I cried when they got rid of their leader Natasha Stott-Despoja ... a hot chick.

Re:where's the payback ?

[fatboyslack]

This is not really a true reflection of the Australian political system (Westminister system). The place where the Democrats have real power is in the Federal Senate, where they have enough power to start investigations, instigate inquiries etc. Although after the GST fiasco, "Keep the Bastards Honest" took a bit of a shellacking. They are a nice little check in the Westminister system, especially with how Labor (the party in opposition, like the Democrats in the US and Conservatives in UK) are laying down like beaten dogs at the moment. Also, in conjuncton with the Labor party, they can veto government policies.

(Amusingly, your nick' is Sad Loser and your .sig says you go for the magpies)