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U.S. Governments Advised to Use Open Source
An anonymous reader writes "LinuxDevices is reporting that non-profit public policy research group, Committee for Economic Development, has released a 72-page report that takes a look at open standards, open source software, and 'open innovation.' From the article: 'The report concludes that openness should be promoted as a matter of public policy, in order to foster innovation and economic growth in the U.S. and world economies.' The full text [PDF] of the report is also available for download from the CED site."
From LinuxDevices' summary: And directly from the report (boldface mine): It's fortunate that LinuxDevices included a link to the PDF so we could read it in its entirity (plus, although the report is 72 pages long, only 44 of those pages are the actual report).
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~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
The problem is that US legislators are often unduly influenced [bought] by campaign contributions. This will tip the scale. I give you the Sunny Bono Copyright Extention Act of 1996 as evidence.
I always wondered why governments cannot see the benefits without the help of any study.
Perhaps it's because the guys in control of the purse string and those making the grand decisions are honest enough to say "I don't know about this, let's get an experts opinion. On the way maybe they can answer a few questions for us." That's my guess. It's a far better system than the airchair engineers here on Slashdot who think that they have some grand insight into the workings of the universe even tho they're normally just self-titled "geeks" who think that a 30 minute show on the Discovery Channel makes them qualified to make sweeping statements on any given topic instead of asking questions on what they think they know.
It reminds me of a recent story from my brother; He sent my 14 year old nephew out to start the car on a cold day to let it warm up as he got ready to go someplace. My nephew returned after starting the car and said that he now knows how to drive... It's a sad statement but there are a ton of people out there who think this way. While I'm not saying that someone's ideas should be discounted if they don't have a masters in some field of study at the same time we should be honest enough to admit that there are areas we know little about. Admitting to that shouldn't make the confessor a target of bad jokes, it should be a sign that they're willing to learn from those who know more.
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
What I find curious, amazing, confounding is this whole thing seems to be full circle for what I remember the government doing a LONG time ago! And, it is and was one of the fundamental original underpinnings of some of the Microsoft shenanigans in the early 1990s.
I worked on some government contracts circa 1985, and I remember a movement in the government contracting to require new contracts for computer services to be POSIX compliant. I also remember thinking how cool of an approach that was, especially considering it was a government initiative. Anyway, lots of fun programming, lots of fun (and hard) work and all on a Unix (SunOS) platform... yeah, it was even fun though we were using SunView (look it up).
Enter Microsoft, late 1980s, and 1990 on. They sorely wanted to get into the big government contract business, and as one of their boasts for their new and improved OS (NT), they talked loud and long about NT being a POSIX OS (not an OS with a POSIX subsystem, a POSIX OS). Heck they even convinced me to come work for them for a while, until in a closed door presentation, the project manager for the POSIX subsystem prefaced her notes by saying (and I'm paraphrasing, but it's close to a quote), "Before we start, I just want to point out that we don't care about this subsystem, we don't intend to use it, and we don't intend to support it. It's just a check-box for government contracts."
And, now the government is back to recommending Open Source and "open innovation". I only wonder if this has any impact on Microsoft this time. It didn't before, I'm guessing it won't now. Sigh.
I note the digital connections council is headed by someone from IBM and features a number of companies from pro-open source companies and institutions such as universities and Nokia as well as lots of companies that would benefit from open source. If a report came and featured a council comprosed of the equilivant anti-OSS people (ie headed by a microsoft spokesperson) people here would be screaming bloody murder.
It doesn't matter how we spend the money, only that it gets spent on something, and as long as that something came from inside the country.
Wow. I can see consumerist education has really taken root. Believe it or not, it is not your public duty to buy more stuff.
Suppose the government spent all of its money paying people to dig holes and fill them back in. It's spending, and its certainly spending within this country, but it clearly isn't good for the economy. Why do you think that is?
Spending doesn't boost an economy. Useful production does. Spending only has a positive effect on the economy to the extend that it promotes useful production. For more information on this, look up Opportunity Costs. Also, if you are concerned about spending money on American goods as opposed to others, may I suggest that you read up on the Ricardian theory of International Trade.
I don't see how using open source would help the economy. In order to boost an economy, people need to buy things, and last time I checked, free open source software was *free*. Free means it doesn't cost money, and if it doesn't cost money, no one is buying it. If enough people switch to free software, the economy will be hurt rather than helped.
This is why Econ-101 is mandatory for most 4 year degrees. Most software is tools. That is to say, most is infrastructure cost for a business or individual. There are a few exceptions, like games where it is an end product. People, companies, and organizations buy tools to accomplish other tasks. Take automobiles, for example. Businesses and individuals use them to get from place to place and to transport things. They are tools. Suppose all of a sudden some buddhist monk has a revelation. Energy and matter exist only in the mind so using this simple technique you can instantly transport yourself and everything you are carrying anywhere you want. *Poof* the world is a very different place. Free transportation takes the world by storm. All the auto companies that don't sell recreational vehicles go under. What a huge loss to the economy right? All those billions aren't being spent building cars and selling cars and buying cars. Hundreds of thousands of auto workers, salesmen, and managers need to find new jobs. Other industries take a huge hit as well, like insurance, gas, and steel. It's a disaster.
But wait, lets think about this just a little bit more. Most of the people in the US still have jobs and now they all have eliminated a huge expense from their budget. They don't have to buy a car, insurance, or gas. What do all these people do with the money? Well, they certainly vacation a lot more, since travel is now so cheap. They buy bigger houses. They buy more clothes. They invest and they spend. And all those companies that used to buy trucks for freight? Now they have fewer expenses. They can lower their prices or invest in R&D or expansion.
There are a whole lot of things wrong with my previous example. Learning how to teleport using our minds would be much, much more disruptive than widespread adoption of free software. The point I hope it illustrates is that making tools more efficiently (the shared cost of open source with little or no overhead is much less than the cost of buying closed source software that does the same. It is like the ultimate price cut. Pay only for what you need that no one else has already paid for. Everyone saves a big expense, an expense that exists solely due to an inefficient production and distribution system. It does not take money out of the economy, it merely shifts that money around to production of end-user products rather than intermediate tools.
In any case it is a mistake to believe open source software is free. If you get a new car for helping someone build a house is the car free? It cost no money. Open source software is similar. You pay by agreeing to the terms of the license. Your payment for downloading a copy of OpenOffice is that you agree if you make any changes to the code and distribute that code, you let everyone else who agrees to the license have it too. Some would call this very cheap. Others would disagree, but I don't think it is possible to say it is free as in beer.
What it is is very, very efficient. Since it costs basically nothing to make a copy, you pay only for changes you want made and you pay that cost for everyone after you. Looking back at the auto industry, a man came up with a way to build cars faster and cheaper. His name was Ford and he applied the assembly line to the auto industry. Now fewer people could make more cars, faster, with less training. It did not ruin the economy it made a huge positive impact. Similarly, the availability to everyone of code and binaries to accomplish most any task will not ruin the computer industry, rather it will make it more efficient and benefit all.
Given the efficiency of this method, it is almost certai