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The Economist on Open Source in Government

Posted by michael on from the birds-eye-view dept.

locarecords.com writes "The Economist has an excellent article about Microsoft attempting to undermine the Open Source and Free Software movements. Particularly interesting are the issues relating to proprietary software and government and how other countries are mandating free software in government software projects."

9 of 331 comments (clear)

  1. Think about the probelms by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Some foreign national cyber-terrorist could include malicious code in our govermental code. Think of the security implications. Plus, we'd be indirectly supporting the effort of another, possibly communist country. The majority of Microsoft's money comes from the US government, their biggest client. To paraphrase Harry S. Truman, "What's good for Microsoft is good for the United States."

    1. Re:Think about the probelms by Agent+Deepshit · · Score: 5, Funny

      Darrell McBride, we know thats you...Quit it.

  2. Re: Notice this Zealots by Black+Parrot · · Score: 5, Funny


    > > That said, open-source is no panacea, and there are many areas where proprietary products are still far superior.

    > I wish the zealots would at least concede that much before blasting the horrible , horrible, evil, closed, proprietary software.

    OK, consider it conceded. Now can we please get on with the blasting?

    --
    Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
  3. Re:Think about the problems by Pig+Hogger · · Score: 2, Funny
    Some foreign national cyber-terrorist could include malicious code in our govermental code.
    Don't forget to think of the children, too!!!
  4. Phew by tarquin_fim_bim · · Score: 5, Funny

    "Politicians in India have called on its vast army of programmers to develop open-source products for the same reasons."

    All you MS developers are safe now. There'll be no outsourcing there any more.

  5. It wasn't Truman by Jeremy+Erwin · · Score: 4, Funny

    "What is good for the country is good for General Motors, and what's good for General Motors is good for the country." -- Former GM President Charles Erwin Wilson, 1952.

    Wilson later became Eisenhower's Secretary of Defense (1953-57). Sometimes a good quotation gets in the way of good history.

    1. Re:It wasn't Truman by Anonymous+Struct · · Score: 2, Funny

      And don't forget, everybody has a share :)

  6. Governments Are Wise by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    It's obviously a good thing that governments are mandating the use of OSS. Thus, OSS must be superior. Consider, for example, some technologies that the US government has mandated:

    - Ada over all other programming languages
    - ISO OSI protocols over the TCP/IP suite
    - Interlaced HDTV

    An official government stamp of approval on Linux can only be viewed as evidence that it's the best technical solution available.

  7. Excellent article by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    The Economist has an excellent article about Microsoft attempting to undermine the Open Source and Free Software movements.

    And by "excellent" you mean pro-open source.