France Considers Open Source

joestar writes "Reuters today announced that the French Government is considering Open Source Software adoption as an excellent alternative to reduce their IT costs. A cost reduction of several hundred millions dollars is planned by replacing proprietary licenses by Open-Source solutions. 'Microsoft must return to being one supplier to the state among others', declared a government Minister. France's culture, agriculture and finance ministries had already signed deals with Mandrakesoft for first Linux deployment tests. After Munich's new move in Germany, it seems that Open Source Software is currently a major movement in old Europe."

Comments

Well, shoot.

[BitwizeGHC]

Now that the french have got their mitts on it... I propose we rename it to "Freedom Source"! ... What? Too Stallman-esque?

Re:Well, shoot.

[kfg]

There's always "Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite the Source," which is quite a mouthful, so we'll just call it "LEFtS" for short, but that might be a bit too Dantonesque for some.

KFG

Heh

[Anonymous Coward]

I can see the headline on CNN next month -

"Richard M. Stallman goes to France. France surrenders."

Then again, with his BO, he'd probably fit right in...

We shall call it...

[NanoGator]

... freedom source!

Ouvrez la source? - Mon Dieu!

[pauly_thumbs]

Je jette le gant - Prepare to taste cold steel Monsieur Gates!

France Surrenders!

[FortKnox]

I woulda titled this article "France Surrenders to Open Source Software!"

But that's just me.

Re:I think France got it

[kevlar]

Why you have problem with France? We aid in world war deux and we aid in NATO.

We french persons are good people!!

Re:I think France got it

[kevlar]

SELECT `DorkFactor` FROM `users` WHERE `userid`=138474;

MySql returned 1 row(s):
[DorkFactor]
99.99

Re:Go Mandrakesoft!

[ErichTheWebGuy]

You can NEVER say, on slashdot, "I, for one" without welcoming some type of new overlord.

For example:

I, for one, welcome our new open-source overlords.
I, for one, welcome our new penguin overlords.

There. Now you know, hopefully you won't make the same mistake again :)

More info here

What will French geeks be like I wonder?

[The Ultimate Fartkno]

Qu'est-que c'est 'command line'?

Apres moi, le r00t!

Je pense, donc je hax0r.

Bonjour, mademoiselle. Parlez-vous php?

Le b0x. Les b0xen?

BSOD? MERDE!

Re:I'm not surprised by this.

[jalet]

> Are these the same "slimy no-good French" who
> helped you win your revolutionary war against the
> british? Without who's help you would have never
> won?

Yes, I agree 100%.

If the French wouldn't have helped you, you certainely would still be speaking english at this time !

Fortunately, they came to help you.

Re:I'm not surprised by this.

[jalet]

> France is just pissed off that they are no longer
> the center of the world's culture

Well, by listening to your president talking, I'm pretty confident that the USA are not either.

Save a Franc or two?

[Stonent1]

Don't you mean Euro?

Re:Open as in source.

[GypC]

Really? I always thought it "open as in beer" like, you open a beer, right? Just like you open up your source code... they both go "FSSSHHH" and have that wonderful yeasty aroma.

MMMMM. Nothing like a tall, cold glass of source code after mowing the lawn on a hot day.

And after hearing this news

[Cnik70]

Microsoft canceled plans for it's latest product: Microsoft Surrender Suite. Freshmeat.net was soon overwhelmed with new releases of kSurrender, gtk-surrender, and gSurrender. Mirrors should be available for all French citizens to download the latest releases.

Shocking

[RoboRay]

France will even retreat from Microsoft!

Re:Make a project

[killjoe]

Wow. If I was a developer and I was unable to install Kdevelop I would be ashamed to admit it. You apprently are proud enough of your failure to broadcast it to the world.