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eGovOS 3 Announced
A reader writes:"German Minister Otto Schily and at least 2 other ministers will be keynoting
at EGOVOS 3: Open Standards and Libre Software in Government conference in
Paris, France on November 24-26, 2003. EGOVOS 3 will bring together the
largest number ever of high level government officials working in Open
Source and Free Software. In addition to the national ministers, 15 senior
politicians, government IT officials and representatives from the European
Commission, Germany, Spain, France, Italy, Hungary, Belgium, the
Netherlands, the UK, Australia, Canada, Malaysia, Mexico, Panama and the US
will being making presentations." You will find general registration is open - free, but limited seating. Additionally, press registration is open as well. I normally don't post many conference announcements, but this one should have significant impact on governmental decisions around Free/Libre/Open/Whatever Software.
How can software be free if its use is mandated by a government?
Governments have the power and resources to train thousands of admins to hack free software systems, and they could save millions by not buying you-know-who's licences. So, I hope this goes well.
Previous sponsors of EGOVOS have included UNDP, the World Bank, IBM, Oracle, Sun, Red Hat, and Dell as well as government associations and universities.
Remember folks, when people talk about Open Software and standards they are not talking about employing a bunch of bearded hackers with l33t Linux skills. They are talking about hiring the big boys, who in many ways just happen to be supporting this movement because it fits their business and selling models.
This is great to see, but lets not pretend that it isn't the big boys who are making sure the goverments play with Open Source toys.
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
Anyone know if Microsoft reps will be on hand to provide a counter-argument? I wouldn't be surprised -- while this group is all for free software, some scare tactics to try to sell licenses would be likely, considering the group ultimately decides what millions of users will run.
stuff |
So, OTOH german politicians want SW-Patents, but OTOH they talk at Free Software Conferences... hmm...
See my blog for my free opinions.
We now have two towers of evil out there...
I have no doubt that the proliferation of Free Software as a result of government promotion of it will result in a virtual awakening of people's minds to the problems that face everyone. The essential human trait is desire for liberty. Second to this is desire for security. Unfortunately these two desires are often mutually exclusive.
They complement each other when one realizes the in Freedom lies the ability to protect ones self. To build a wall of security, if you will. However, this is difficult and treacherous as one person's wall of security is hardly a match for the evils wanting to penetrate it.
So the person turns to government, an amalgamation of people dedicated to the mutual protection of each other. Security becomes an easier thing to maintain, but at the cost of individual Freedom. Enjoining any social contract means losing some Freedom.
So we have now governments interested in promoting Free Software. It is interesting because Free Software doesn't require promotion. All it requires is that it exist Freely and it will be shared with others who wish to use it.
So what sorts of benefits do the governments see in Free Software? No doubt they see the benefits that any user sees, Freedom to interact as an individual with a piece of Free Software. But from the point of view of Free Software, there are hazards.
The government is answerable to no one, especially inanimate objects like Free Software. There exists no method of redressing any violation of the Freedom of the Free Software. In essence, we are throwing the Software to the lions and hoping for the best.
I'm all for the proliferation of Free Software, but I think it is important to realize that government is the antithesis of Freedom. It exists only to usurp Freedom. Care must be taken to see that Free Software is not abused by governments.
disclaimer: UK-only view below, I do not speak for the rest of the EU
Government would be an ideal environment for open source development, because it's a highly collaborative world. Authorities get together all the time, online and off, to share information and work in partnerships. They're far, far better at collaboration than private companies - not least because of limited resources.
What stops government being open source entirely, in the UK at least, is that open source applications for government don't exist. Do a search for 'government' on SourceForge and you get back less than four active projects, mostly unsuitable for Europe. I know, I've looked. Authorities need systems that can do things like council tax, sundry debtor tracking, payroll, personnel, time recording, electoral registration, development control, building control, licensing, contract administration, GIS, records management, benefits claims, cost of works, invoicing, BACS, asset management, inventory management, architectural works, flexitime monitoring, enforcement notices recording, dog warden control, callout control, grant awarding and tracking, sampling storage and results monitoring and so on. That's an extract from one authority I worked for, and it only employs 300 people. Local government is hugely multifunctional.
The only OSS work I know in that list is in the area of GIS and it's not that advanced. I'd be happy to be proven wrong. Believe it or not, authorities don't want x300 PHP/MySQL content management systems or yet another webserver, which is what SourceForge consists of on a bad day.
If open source does gain a bigger foothold in government, it'll only be on the desktop and in OpenOffice. Maybe Apache. But it'll never displace proprietary systems from government unless it expands beyond the developer-centric to include the kind of back office systems we use here. I think after that little list it'll come to a screeching halt due to lack of apps.
Oh, and in the UK we emphatically do not call it Libre Software. Methinks that's the French up to their linguistic nationalism again. It's continental Europe that doesn't call it free software - those of us from the country that gave the world English actually use the English word :-)
"This is why men never share their feelings; because women always remember." -Just Shoot Me.
Better still, don't moderate them at all. Leave them in AC `Score:0' land. Eventually they'll get bored (well, we can hope, right?)
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Do you think the Germans and French would be so concerned about "Free" software if Microsoft were a German or French company? This is pure politics folks, nothing to be proud about here.
Oh well, not like we are going to miss them anyway.
No, even the US should be able to hit a country the size of germany.
According to research at an English university, England is part of Europe only in spirit.
I hope they put quite some stress and effort in the "open standard" parts. I don't care which software is being used. The government will have a good reason why they take it (and I hope this reason is a mixture of cost, support, easy to use, scalability, lifetime,...). If it possible using Open Source, why not. If a product and support from a company are better, sorry, but you have to be reasonable (and that is MY tax money they are using :)).
As long as the documents and data that are stored in the systems are stored in an easy accessible format, and not some closed standard, I'm a happy person. If the government want to switch software, they should be able to do so with little problems.
Also, it's quite disturbing to notice (again and again) that you can download all the documents you need do something administrative, but find out that it is in the latest crappy MS DOC format which is unreadable/badly formatted by my word processor... I even got auto-reply mail with only a doc file attached.
Politicans dont have any opinion on software patents here in Germany. But there is high unemployment and the (mostly american) software companies are making claims that software patens will help economy, create jobs, enlarge you penis,... (you get the idea).
So Politicians are in a situation where press and opposition grabs these claims and claim they arent doing anything against recession.
Until now, most simply choose to support the patents because they heard only voices supporting them. But the latest protest seem to have changed some opinions.
HI O WISE PRINCE. WHT TOOK U SO DAM LONG?
And no document ought to be encrypted.
I say "libre" from time to time, and speak what I call English.
I agree with the comment about the lack of large aplications for government and local government mentioned but I feel more optimistic about it.
In terms of progression through classes of program, an idea that is through and through the Open Source/FLOSS literature, I'd say that governmental systems come late after the operating systems and backend systems, and after desktops.
I'd also say that a great deal of what a local government does is not greatly different from things other organisations do, and therefore the benefit is there to be had before the main purpose-built systems are tackled.
In fact, it specifically makes allowances for the usurpation of the Freedom of the Software.
The only OSS work I know in that list is in the area of GIS
OT and just out of interest, what OSS GIS apps are people in Government using? GRASS? I was under the impression that ArcInfo/View and MapInfo using (expensive) OS data was the norm?
--
This sig is inoffensive.
Sorry, to clarify - I didn't say the app was actually used, I just meant that GIS was the only area where any open-source effort has even begun. I wasn't trying to say it had taken root anywhere.
And yes, Uni_Form Spacial, ArcView, MapInfo (and GGP) are commonplace in government.
"This is why men never share their feelings; because women always remember." -Just Shoot Me.
Maybe where you live, but I live in a democracy where the government is answerable to the people. Not only on elections, but in the daily running of the government there are zillions of checks and balances.
They'll still manage to nuke a few of their own states as part of the collatoral damage.
Authorities need systems that can do things like council tax, sundry debtor tracking, payroll, personnel, ...
I'm not working in your field, but I expect that the software authorities need is so specialized, that it is usually developed on demand (I assume, most software is developed on demand or in house, anyway). Therefore, it would be possible for a government, to pay developers to develop the software under a free license. It's just a matter of how the request for software development is formulated. Unfortunately, we were taught for a long time, that software comes without source. Maybe such conference helps to open the eyes of some authorities that it is possible that a free software license can be made a requirement, if new software is developed on demand.
Not everywhere you need a customized applications. 90% of time I look over the counter I see MS Word or Excel open on the screen of the clerk.
If you look over here or on my shameless plug, you'll see that saving money in on government level with OSS *is* possible.
...in the new economy that we strive to be the world's leading nation in IT and attempt doing so by using the most crappy american operating system we can lay hands on."--[can't remeber the german official who said that]
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
I agree that there is a definite lack of business orientation in (most of) the open source community. Most of these applications, however, are not available as shrinkwrapware from the proprietory software sector either. They are almost always constructed from the ground up by a service house to meet a specific set of requirements. After all, only the German government needs a tax tracking system that incorporates their rules and laws. Even something that appears as straightforward as an invoicing system usually has enough backend interconnections so as to make most of it special case.
Great minds think alike; fools seldom differ.
Why don't these nations look to securing basic freedom and sufficient food and other resources first?
I mean, that's the troll^Wargument everyone makes when India does anything.
In addition to the national ministers, 15 senior politicians, government IT officials and representatives from the European Commission, Germany, Spain, France, Italy, Hungary, Belgium, the Netherlands, the UK, Australia, Canada, Malaysia, Mexico, Panama and the US will being making presentations.
I like the sentiment of people coming together to agree upon free standards, free software.
But another side of me remains skeptical that such a large group of politicians can form a meaningful consensus in finite time.
Oh well, there's still probably some value in high level governmental IT people publicly expression support for this or that good free software feature. It will make it easier for their worker bees to openly justify that FOSS prototype project instead of hiding it in a dark corner of the server room.
"Provided by the management for your protection."
How can government be democratic if its systems are dictated by Someone with a big house in Redmond ?
Electronic Music Made Using Linux http://soundcloud.com/polyp
"The essential human trait is desire for liberty. Second to this is desire for security. Unfortunately these two desires are often mutually exclusive."
Really? I would have thought food, shelter etc. were a little bit higher up on the list.
This title is a disgrace. Why can't we let the title be completely in English?
EGOVOS 3: Open Standards and Libre Software in Government
Darn those French. As an American, I demand that this title eschew the admittedly useful distinction between the french words "libre" and "gratuit". The proper title should be:
EGOVOS 3: Open Standards and Free (as in Speech, not as in Beer) Software in Government
Thank you.
There are only 10 types of people: those who understand decimal, those who don't, and, uh, 8 other types I forget.
are not capable of humor. Look, my "Troll" parent postwas irony to point out how stupit it is to blame nonAmerican (Greatest Nation on Earth, God's own...) government's use of free software solutions on nationalism.
Seriously, most European companies and governments use Microsoft software today. And it sucks. It doesn't suck because it is American, but it sucks because it is proprietary expensive shit from Microsoft.
Did you know that OS/2 (IBM - American company) had a viable market share in Germany? If IBM had not quit selling OS/2 to end users, Germany would probably be OS/2 country today.
Moritz
After all, only the German government needs a tax tracking system that incorporates their rules and laws. Exactly, that is a very good reason, to use free software to reduce cost! Every government has different laws and rules, but the principles of these laws and rules are common in every country. Therefore, it is much more expensive, when each contry hires a different proprietary company to develop their own specific software, than to share the "common ground". Theirfore, the common ground can be (or in some cases already is) developed as open source and the specific national (buisness-) rules will/could be developed by each country, with their own governmental programmers. Of course, if all countries hired the same company develope their software, the effect would be the same, but every government would be dependent on that single company then and that's something governments will avoid! Software for governments and authorities is not so different from buisness software and development cost can be reduced significant. Compare it to an ERP system, the same base-system for all companies, but with a different implementation of their specific buisinessruls for each single company.
... on technology.
I can tell you that the Europeans will not interpret "Free" in the same way as the FSF and the US are trying to. "Freedom" as it is talked about in the US really is a big US concept, the rest of the world generally fails to see what the big issue is for us.
In EC terms "free" (as in free software) is being written into policy as meaning "free of the American software economy". OSS is being used as a way to allow European nations to "freely" built their own IT industries that will compete with the parts of the world that are currently dominant in that sector.
When I talk to lawmakers in Europe "Free" is not interpreted as "free from the shackles of commercial software".
So, no, it's not a paradox in the eye's of this conference or many Europeans, it is only a paradox when viewed through American eyes.
> Statistically I'd have a more than even chance of
> being right!
Maybe, but I happen to live in the other 49% of the world, so you are wrong.
Sometimes me thinks our german ministers aren't as bad as our economy tells
Open standards are great, unfortunately, having
visited the web page I don't really see anyting
going on here concerning open standards. Remember,
Open-Source does not necessarily mean conformance
to an Open-Standard. If Open-Source does not
conform to open standards, it is really just a
proprietary system.
The argument presented here is a typical libertarian critique of collectivism, but it leaves out an essential issue: that there are positive freedoms as well as negative freedoms.
In my country, as a result of collective action I have a right to healthcare at the point of need, my children have a right to be educated, if I lose my job I have the right to some financial assistance. All of these things enhance and not diminish my freedom.
Similarly, if government action were to, say, enforce an open fomat for public documents, that might diminish Bill Gates's freedom to screw me for money (he loses his negative freedom - freedom from government commercial intervention), but it certainly increases my freedom in a positive way (I now have a right to expect government documents to open on my box without buying Mr Gates's Office suite).
Alistair Campbell? Tony Blair? DubbyaBush?
I give up, who are you? ........