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More on Massachusetts' Push for Open Source

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the uphill-battle dept.

pbaumgar writes "With more than $32 billion in sales last year, Microsoft Corp. doesn't usually worry about losing one customer. But this one may be different. In a memo sent last month, Massachusetts Administration and Finance Secretary Eric Kriss instructed the state's chief technology officer to adopt a policy of 'open standards, open source' for all future spending on information technology." Follow-up to this story.

2 of 310 comments (clear)

  1. simplistic by littlerubberfeet · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Most of the article is no-shit, no-brainer stuff, but a quote interested me: "The momentum is unstoppable at this point," said Scott Handy, vice president of Linux strategy and market development at IBM. I think this is what scares Redmond the most, is the momentum and speed with which Linux is spreading. Major companies are likely to follow suite (no pun intended) if the goverment starts to switch. And some foreign governments seem eager not to be dependent on an American company. Aside from starting the sentance with "and", this is another good point, with a growing mistrust of the US abroad, many foreign governments are likely to adopt open-sourced alternatives. The is that cost factor too. Namibia defineatly cannot afford $300,000 in MS software to run the already poor and corrupt goverment. The can afford two people to impliment Linux though. "Politically, there are only pros, but in terms of government employee productivity there are quite a few cons," said Schadler, the Forrester researcher. I must agree on some levels. Until my iMac and AOL grandomther can use Linux, it won't be widely implimented. Not everyone "gets" technology, or has a BS in comp sci, or even knows the difference between AOL and the internet.

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  2. not the only issue by Spetiam · · Score: 5, Insightful

    cost analysis isn't the only issue. the MA reasoning may be that they want OSS for the freedom of information quality. think about it, if the gov't is using closed source software, for instance, to tally votes, and someone files a FOIA request, they can't exactly get the propriety information (ie, source code).

    it almost seems that OSS is absolutely necessary in order for a gov't to be able to comply with the FOIA.