Peter Quinn Explains his Resignation

JSBiff writes "Peter Quinn, former CIO of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, has given an interview to Pamela Jones over at Groklaw, regarding the people, companies, and events surrounding his resignation. He spins an interesting tale of Microsoft, money, and the politics of technology." From the article: "Now the folks that have say here do not know me from a hole in the wall and the funds were for projects that were totally unrelated to ITD. I clearly had set the priorities for the Bond but this funding is for projects like a new Taxpayers System, new Registry of Motor Vehicles system, etc., all projects desperately needed by the citizens of the Commonwealth. Eric Kriss and I always had a goal of making IT 'a'political and now it was rapidily becoming a political football of the highest magnitude. I took this job in the hopes of making meaningful and institutionalized IT reform. All the previous efforts were about to be for naught as political payback." We discussed Quinn's resignation last month.

Comments

For or Against?

[XMilkProject]

Remind me, are we for or against this guy!? :)

I'll give him alot of credit for his perceived honesty in the interview. He seems to have come clean on why he was unable to be successful in his goals, and on the surface he seems to have noble intentions.

Re:For or Against?

[AuMatar]

He wasn't forcing you to use OO. He was forcing you to use Open Document Format, a format agreed on by *multiple* word processor companies that is royalty free and usable by any company who wishes to implement it, no hooks. That includes MS, should they so choose. This would change the current system, where only people who buy MS software are ensured of interoperability with government published documents. In other words, he was *increasing* choice, not decreasing it.

Re:For or Against?

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh ffs... I'll bite

The point is not to dictate what software use, but to adopt a policy that ensure that official documents can be opened, edited and converted without fuzz in the future.

Microsoft does not like this so they refuse to support OpenDocument in Word, while others seems to be more positive to interoperability (Koffice, Abiword, StarOffice for instance).

Re:For or Against?

[iabervon]

He specifically avoided making any requirements on documents submitted to his department. The policy explicitly states that you can use whatever you want, and they'll do their best to deal with it. His mandate included making recommendations for what people in general use, and he decided that the correct thing to do was to tell people to continue using the software and formats they were already using. The policy only applies to the documents the executive department produces, and says that they should be in a standard format, not whatever the person preparing them feels like.

If you really want the choice of what format documents are in, why don't you demand that Slashdot post their stories in DOC format, too? Slashdot is forcing you to use HTML right now.

For that matter, the normal thing will be for them to use ODF documents internally, but send out PDFs, since they aren't trying to make the documents they publish easy to edit. So use you be complaining that Slashdot's back end doesn't store their stories in DOC.

Re:For or Against?

[Xtifr]

> He wasn't forcing you to use OO. He was forcing you to use Open Document Format

Actually, he wasn't trying to force YOU to use anything! He was trying to force the Mass. gov't to use open, cross-platform, multi-vendor formats for their public documents! (Note the plural in "formats"--pdf and html are also on the list.) Private citizens creating their own documents would be free to continue using XYWrite or VisiCalc or whatever other stupid, proprietary formats they want their data to become obsolete in.

Re:For or Against?

[Omnifarious]

First, OpenOffice's support of Microsoft Word documents is not perfect, and it never will be because Microsoft will ensure they never have enough information to make it perfect. And that matters. I get Microsoft Word forms reasonably often, and OpenOffice doesn't really handle them all that well. And, there are a number of word processing programs (Abiword being an example) that handle Microsoft Word documents very poorly but handle ODF just fine. So, really, it was increasing choice, not decreasing it.

HTML and CSV are completely inadequate for office documents. HTML is an mediocre display format, and a lousy format for editing.

The question is, who owns the data? When the data is in a Microsoft proprietary format, Microsoft effectively owns the data. You either stay locked in the past forever (not really an option) or pay Microsoft whatever they ask for new software and the ability to read your old data.

It is beyond unacceptable for a government to be in this position. It basically sacrifices sovereignty to Microsoft. What law will Microsoft demand as a price for an upgrade? How much will people have to pay Microsoft in order to send the government a document their software can understand?

Already the deleterious effect of giving Microsoft so much control can be felt in the enormous political wrangling over this. Microsoft has been able to effectively force this guy to resign. It's utterly ridiculous.

Re:For or Against?

[AuMatar]

Last I checked, which was right now, OpenOffice.org supports exporting to Microsoft Word documents.

It contains reverse engineered support, which is imperfect and can be yanked out at any time by one law from congress. Or by MS deciding to put an encryption on next years data model (making reverse engineering a DMCA violation).

Or, even better, he could have simply not mandated any format at all. Why should any specific format be mandated? As long as someone can read it, does it matter what the format is? Just because you have some personal hangup about using Microsoft Office doesn't mean that the government should forcibly exclude it.

Because the rule forces the *government* to release all documents in the ODF format. Previously, the government released it in any format it chose, which most likely was MS Office. Meaning if you don't shell out money for office, you won't be able to read governemnt forms and documents. The state of Massachusettes was forcing people to buy MS products in order to interact with it. Since ODF is a free format (as in beer), that means ANYONE with a computer can now open government documents, where previously only people who bought MS software could. This is the way things should be- government documents should be open to ALL citizens.

If you wish to use MS products, you still can- either convince MS to support ODF, or convert the ODF files to .doc and edit them in word. If you need to return it for some reason, convert back. Or just use any of the many free office suites that support ODF. See, now you have a choice, instead of having to use MS Word.

Re:For or Against?

[kilodelta]

I'm definitely for the guy. He states it plainly that MS uses its legislative influence to try to derail any plans that would decrease the overall revenue stream of MS.

Maybe the Globe should be investigating those representatives, senators and general officers that tried to kill ODF. But they won't. Money talks and bullshit walks.

Despite the globe article

[Anonymous Coward]

Despite the globe articles making it seem like he resigned for bring a crook, this story is a very very interesting one about the power of money / lobbey in politics.

You had comittees and senators and groups who had never paid attention for a second to this space going absolutely crazy about it. One of the hearings it was quinn and his lawyer and like 8 people opposed to him.

Also, politics is irrational. They proposed doing things they had lectured people not to do before.

I suspect it drives out good folks (federall and national) when you get so much political influence, and all that are left in beuracracies are real beauracrats, who just want the job.

Facinating.

Re:German has it best

[smittyoneeach]

Leo seems to indicate the 'Rat' is something more abstract, like council, than mammalian.
Or maybe the 'F' in front was silent for so long as to fall off the word.

As a citizen of Massachusetts

[Peter Simpson]

I applaud Quinn for trying to straighten out the IT mess that is state government. There may come a time where professional competence trumps political maneuvering here, but apparently, that time is still far in the future.

It seems to this user that the pace of Microsoft releases is increasing (to once a year), and support time for the older formats is decreasing. While I understand that it might be fun to embed Java objects and streaming voice and video in Word documents, it really has no relevence to me, and I doubt to many (most?) users. Certainly not at the state government level, where tables, charts and images are about all you need, and these were handled perfectly well in Word'97 (as they are in OpenOffice). Now, given a choice between paying annually for a new revision of MS Office, and paying a competent Unix/Linux IT guy to administer a bunch of Linux desktops, I'd vote for the latter. I'm thinking I'd get more for my tax dollar.

Shocked

[Kohath]

I'm shocked that politics is involved in government decisions. Shocked!

---

The key is to have the government do as little as possible. Then you can make your decisions, and I can make mine. When you decide for yourself, it's a personal question, not a political one. When the government decides, it's always going to be political.

This is the same issue as "decency" filters on (government) library computers. Politics decided that one too.

The only way everyone gets what they want is by taking it out of government hands.

Re:Shocked

[elpapacito]

The key is helping you find your brain. The dude was looking after an OPEN standard that would have given you MORE choice..as opposed to a M$ Library or M$ Swimming Pool or M$ Anything that you can damn be sure will be closed source, close standard.

Only a government as a weight big enough to impose OPEN standard without actually forcing anybody to lose money..but hey, your corrupt representative keep getting lobby money to fuck up anything that benefits the masses.

They key is corrupt politicians, not government where government does same or better then privates.

Re:Shocked

[arkanes]

There ought to be no government libraries. If people want libraries, they can build them and provide for them on a voluntary basis and choose the rules based on their whims.

Libertarian political rhetoric is retarded. You know what happens when a bunch of people work together to provide common resources and to regulate themselves as a community? You get what is called a "government".

Re:Shocked

[gad_zuki!]

>>There ought to be no government libraries

Hell, while we're throwing out the baby with the bathwater, unplug your fat DOD funded internet while youre at it.

I love my local library system, both here in the city and when I lived in the suburbs. Being a kid with no money but having access to all the best sci-fi in the world, other fiction, and non-fiction was one of the best things to ever happen to me. Back before computers were affordable it was the place where I could go to get word processing done and even play a game! Right now people without internet access depend on them for the basic information you're spoiled to have. Oh no, the horrors of "big government" (the US government is tidy compared to some of europe and scandanavia its your military thats huge) led to people getting books for free! How will big publishing survive?!?

Go back to watching southpark in your mom's basement. Thanks.

For those of you too lazy to read the TFA

[Edmund Blackadder]

It seems that Quinn was the person that wanted to introduce open document formats in Mass. What happened is that certain senators started cutting the MASS IT budget to the point where the MASS government could not spend anything on IT unless they got the ok of a special commission of senators.

Quinn felt sure that he was the reason the senators were cutting the IT budget. He felt that the whole state was being punished because of him. He believes that the state urgently needs new computer systems to take care of their records (these systems being completely unrelated to the open document controversy) and they will not get them because the senate is cutting the budget.

Since he did not want to see the state and his colleagues in IT getting screwed because of him, he decided to quit.

Re:Microsoft

[Synic]

$$$ - that's about the only reason good enough for them

Ha.

[Medievalist]

The key is to have the government do as little as possible.

And if you can figure out exactly what as little as possible translates to in the real world, you will be hailed as the greatest statesman-philosopher that ever lived.

Apolitical politics

[konstant]

I have the greatest sympathy for IT/CS people who dislike "politics" and try to avoid it in their jobs. This guy, though, had a job in the GOVERNMENT. How can he feign outrage that politics became involved?

Re:Apolitical politics

[WhiteWolf666]

How can he feign outrage that politics became involved?

You don't understand Government.

The greatest aspect, and greatest failure of our form of Democratic government is that ostensibly, government employees should be apolitical. Elected officials are political; appointed officials and government employees/workers are NOT political.

Some people even actually try to hold to this; the opposite of this, politics among the beauracrats is the purest definition of "corruption".

Look at the bright side Mr. Quinn

[digitaldc]

At least now you have the experience to work with the government, IT vendors & administrators.
You will know the ups and downs of using Office and OpenOffice and have a good idea where to turn for assistance.

Your skills will be in high demand wherever you end up, and you will probably be a lot better off mentally and financially.
Best of luck to you.

Document accessability is what matters

[cweber]

Quoting original poster: "Now, given a choice between paying annually for a new revision of MS Office, and paying a competent Unix/Linux IT guy to administer a bunch of Linux desktops, I'd vote for the latter. I'm thinking I'd get more for my tax dollar."

Cost of software is an issue, and certainly an important one.

More important, however, is accessibility and usability of government records. If important data and memos about an issue of today are locked up in a proprietary format which almost certainly won't be completely readable by the then current version of Office software in 2020 and beyond, then this is a real loss for all concerned! Moreover, citizens shouldn't have to own and use a particular piece of commercial software to be able to read documents which their own government produces. That's just plain wrong if there are simple and straightforward alternatives.

MASS IT priorities

[kevin.fowler]

Years ago there was a confrontation with my school district and the state involving contracts for Mac computers. We had always had Macs in the library, computer lab, and classrooms. When it came time to buy new computers, consultants advised our school to get PC's, as most students coud not bring projects home from the Mac lab to their PC. The state reps got rather angry, stating the amount of money they recieve from Apple, and the great discounts they get. The PC switch went ahead anyway... with a few bucks going to a separate Mac computer lab.

End result? The PC's the district could afford were outdated before they even arrived, unable to efficiently run even OEM programs provided with them. The Mac lab had few computers and a separate network, and were the only boxes that could run the grade tracking software (provided and required by the state), so the teachers were frequently on them. So hearing that good old MA (48th ranked state in School technology integration at the time of that incedent) is backwards on IT again. Hopefully within a decade or so my town records won't just be in paper form anymore.

feigned outrage ... Huh?

[KwKSilver]

Maybe I'm just stupid, but I just went back & re-read the interview. Quinn seemed cool, calm and collected. Not outraged or vengeful. Since there's no "outrage" that I could see, there was none to be feigned. I have seen a lot of feigned outrage in AC posts on this topic from MS shills, however. Basically, they seem to be saying that there is only choice, if MS is the only choice. Bye, I think I'm gonna go feign interest in MS-VISTA and Office 12. Please don't get outraged.

Re:flake?

[yar]

Sounds like you've listened to David Coursey's lines. Most of those are debunked on Groklaw. (Educating David Coursey, http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=200601060 30949216

From a government records manager and archivist point of view, his stance makes sense. Archives must be accessible in the future. Proprietrary formats are anathemas to government records and archives.

Which Senators?

[namespan]

Quinn felt sure that he was the reason the senators were cutting the IT budget. He felt that the whole state was being punished because of him. He believes that the state urgently needs new computer systems to take care of their records (these systems being completely unrelated to the open document controversy) and they will not get them because the senate is cutting the budget.

Does anyone know which Senators? I'd say they're prime candidates for replacement next election cycle, if not actually being taken to with pitchfork, torch, tar, and feather.

Re:Which Senators?

[Kadin2048]

You might find this Globe article interesting:
http://www.boston.com/business/articles/2005/10/29 /senators_question_file_storage_shift/

I can't tell you for sure who the Senators were that cut funding to Quinn's unrelated IT projects, but I've got a good suspect.

The two people who are mentioned as being probably against the ODF move are one Senator Marc Pacheco, D-Taunton, chairman of the Senate Post Audit and Oversight Committee, and Secretary of State William F. Galvin.

For those who don't want to read the linked article, it's nominally about some manufactured controversy over whether ODF would work with accessibility addons (Braille terminals, screenreaders, etc.) as well as MS Word does. Personally I find this ironic, because I know one blind person who says that the GUI was the worst thing that ever happened to sightless-accessibility in computing; interacting with a command prompt using a Braille terminal ain't no thing, but using a screenreader can be a real pain by comparison.

In my mind the article is pretty well biased against ODF: it opens by saying "Massachusetts lawmakers are questioning an effort by the Romney administration that could jettison Microsoft's popular Office software from thousands of state computers. ... The Romney administration wants documents stored in a particular format that would allow the records to be read by a variety of software packages -- except Microsoft Office." Smells like FUD in the presentation to me.