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Taiwanese Parliament votes Against Microsoft

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the most-likely-not-binding dept.

linumax writes "Taiwan's parliament has voted to end its dependence on Microsoft software, demanding that the government reduce purchases from the software giant by 25 percent this year. The resolution, passed on Friday, is an attempt by the island's law-making body to end the near monopoly Microsoft has with local government offices, a legislative aide said. Local newspaper Commercial Times said however that the resolution may not be binding because it runs against fair trade regulations in Taiwan. Officials at Taiwan's Fair Trade Commission declined to comment."

2 of 139 comments (clear)

  1. OSS is gaining momentum by l0ungeb0y · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Way to go Taiwan! I expect many more Countries to move their Government IT infrastructures over to OSS in the year ahead.

    I'm sure I am not the only one snickering at the irony at the comment about potential Fair Trade violation -- against MS, which is an Internationally convicted Monopolist.

    Which begs the question, are Taiwanese Lawmakers so stupid to make laws that prevent their Governemnt from having a real choice for purchases, or are MS's lobbyists also very active over at the WTO?

  2. Two Part Strategy For Dealing With The MS Problem by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This sounds like the common strategy to deal with the Microsoft problem:

    1) Draw a box around all existing Microsoft software infesting the government or company in question. Forbid the growth of any Microsoft software outside this box.

    2) Once the Microsoft infestation has been contained and growth halted, slowly start purging the existing Microsoft software and formats with clean and open solutions like OpenOffice, OpenDocument, Apache, Linux, BSD, XML, etc...