EU Will Not Divulge Microsoft Contracts

Elektroschock writes "Marco Cappato, a Liberal member of the European Parliament, wanted to inspect the EU's contracts with Microsoft. His request was denied. '...the [divulging] of [this] information could jeopardize the protection of commercial interest of Microsoft.' Apparently the European Council sees no clear public interest in the release of such contractual material, and so 'the Secretariat general concludes that the protection of Microsoft's commercial interests, being one of the commercial partners of the European institutions, prevails on the [divulging] for the public interest.'"

Comments

Well that's just a load of BS, lemme tell you...

[tobiah]

[Blocked] It has been determined that the contents of this comment do not serve the public interest.
-The Secretariate General-

What Rights?

[andersh]

I don't really see the problem here, granted some of us might have wanted to know more about the contracts. However it is the right of governments to decide what they make public and not. And for my American friends remember that we have a different view on things like this, usually European governments are MORE open than the US.

I wonder how this "discussion" will develop..

Re:What Rights?

[rbanffy]

Anything that involves public money and is not a matter of national (or continental, in this case) security should be open to scrutiny.

Re:What Rights?

[blowdart]

Nor is this a Microsoft issue; even if that's the only way to get it onto slashdot. Generally no contractual information like this is ever revealed; the UK government (for example) always refuses requests like this, even when people try to find out how much failed systems, or failed buildings cost.

Re:What Rights?

[jellomizer]

The US government is actually quite open, more open then you realize. Only when it comes to military/security information US is quite about it. Just tune to CSPAN 1,2,3,4,5... and you can watch most everything that is happening with the legislative area of our federal government, and every law passed or failed. Know what the debate was etc... It is that most of us are to lazy to actually look at the information and say it is a closed government. No they won't tell the general public about their brand new airplanes that can fire a laser at a top secret satellite to have it bounce back and kill a target half way around the world. But for the laws that get passed there is actually good transparency and I bet if you needed to you can find out how much they are paying Microsoft for their licenses.

Re:What Rights?

[stocke2]

The problem is this is public money being spent, and they should be willing to divulge this information to clear up any ideas people might get concerning government collusion with a large corporation. They are free to use whomever the please, but the practices they use in determining who to contract with should be a matter of publicly available policy.

They need to protect businesses equally, and if it appears they may be protecting a certain business over others, it does make it look as if there might be a conflict of intrests with the public good.

I am not saying that is the case, just that they should make it clear that it is not the case.

Re:What Rights?

[Chandon Seldon]

However it is the right of governments to decide what they make public and not. And for my American friends remember that we have a different view on things like this, usually European governments are MORE open than the US.

The idea that governments have rights is absurd. People have rights. The people have delegated certain tasks to government for their own convenience, and have accepted limits on some minimal subset of their rights so that society can best protect the rest. Note that "society" is not the same as "the government"; the government is just a mechanism used by society to accomplish certain specific things.

Re:What Rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't really see the problem here, granted some of us might have wanted to know more about the contracts. However it is the right of governments to decide what they make public and not.

It's my right as a citizen to have access to this information. The parliament could go home otherwise.

And for my American friends remember that we have a different view on things like this, usually European governments are MORE open than the US.

Yes we do have different views on many things as Americans, and also among ourselves. Perhaps we should celebrate that and see how we can improve ourselves.

I wonder how this "discussion" will develop..

If nobody else turns it into an America vs Europe pissing contest it might develop quite nicely.

Re:What Rights?

[Spatial]

I don't really see the problem here, granted some of us might have wanted to know more about the contracts. However it is the right of governments to decide what they make public and not.

They define those rights. "There is no problem because we say so" is not a justification.

And I don't see how the differing views of Americans warrants bearing anything special in mind. I'm from the EU, and outside opinions are just as relevant and welcome as anyone else's. If not more so.

Re:What Rights?

[Ifandbut]

Then they could make the excuse that the contracts are a matter of economic security and if your economy turns to crap then so will your national security.

Re:What Rights?

[orielbean]

Rights of governments? The people give rights to the government in order to serve the people, not the paternalistic other way around. Government exists to serve the people. Where do you think the money to pay MS comes from? It's like your dad taking money from your trust fund, giving it to you, then telling you that it is your allowance that you earned! The money is the public's money. We agree to let the government protect us from harm and so we allow state secrets to exist in order that our common enemies do not use that information to avoid detection. Everything else that does not fall into that narrow category should be exposed to sunlight and competition. This is a simple paternalistic monopoly protection scheme for MS.

Re:What Rights?

[MarkvW]

Thank you, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, for your authoritative declaration of the way things MUST be!

Re:What Rights?

[Adrian Lopez]

However it is the right of governments to decide what they make public and not.

So, in theory, a government that keeps its people in the dark about everything it does is just exercising its "right" to decide what not to make public?

Re:What Rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

Parent is right. It's my money, I need the information to make sound decisions.

Since they're not disclosing it, there must be something fishy there.

Re:What Rights?

[cyber-dragon.net]

Very good argument, I wish politicians thought like that... unfortunately if they admit to what they paid someone could find the trail of kickbacks.

Don't think Microsoft buys politicians? I was in the room during a campaign when they tried.

Re:What Rights?

[srussia]

I'm with MarkvW. Hey, Jean-Jacques, I think you forgot to forward me a copy of that contract so I can read it over and sign it.

Re:What Rights?

[thetoadwarrior]

Unless of course said government is trying to make a case against MS to make them pay out more money while at the same time being run by people too dim to use Linux and don't want to expose their hypocrisy. MS won't divulge the info either to prove the EU to be a bunch of hypocrites because they get a huge chunk of money from them.

While I can appreciate the EU "sticking it to the man" which can help some of us, in the grand scheme of things using MS products while attacking MS makes them look like hypocrites and strengthens MS' case.

Re:What Rights?

[zappepcs]

The subtitle of this story is: "How much Microsoft was paid to put a backdoor into MS Windows for the EU to use."

Re:What Rights?

[Blue Stone]

'Commercial sensitivity' trumps democratic accountability. That's not right, is it?

Re:What Rights?

[ccady]

??? Governments do not have rights. People have rights.

Re:What Rights?

[jcnnghm]

And for my American friends remember that we have a different view on things like this, usually European governments are MORE open than the US.

I wonder how this "discussion" will develop..

Hooray for the increased openness of socialism. It's so effective people actually believe it's the governments "right" to decide what to make public.

Re:What Rights?

[LateArthurDent]

However it is the right of governments to decide what they make public and not.

Why? I mean, if the government is feudalism you might justify that by saying that the nobles were more important than the rabble. In a democracy, the government works for the people not the other way around. That means the government doesn't have the "right" to do anything against the wishes of the people.

And for my American friends remember that we have a different view on things like this, usually European governments are MORE open than the US.

Something you apparently don't value, because you think the government should be allowed to be less open if it decides to. Lack of openness in the US government is a problem that needs to be rectified, it's not a goal you should aim for.

Re:What Rights?

[The Dancing Panda]

Not exactly, as it's horribly unfair to Microsoft. Think about it, if the contract was released, then all of Microsoft's competitors know just how much they need to undercut Microsoft's price to make the sale on a huge (HUGE) contract. You're putting Microsoft at a competitive disadvantage. This is why most (if not all) government contracts are sealed in this manner.

Signed
Someone who works for a government contractor

Re:What Rights?

[Curate]

Anything that involves public money and is not a matter of national (or continental, in this case) security should be open to scrutiny.

Really? So the public should be able to view your tax returns?

Re:What Rights?

[Sir_Lewk]

If you prefer not having rights, then move to fucking china and stay out of our way already.

Re:What Rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

just because its the norm doesn't make it right

Re:What Rights?

[jonaskoelker]

However it is the right of governments to decide what they make public and not.

Have free citizens who let themselves be governed really accepted to give their money to a group of people who don't have to tell the citizenry what they spend it on?

I bet my cousins would do some really great contracting work of an undisclosed nature for me. Send me a check, please.

Re:What Rights?

[Sir_Lewk]

Couldn't have said it better myself. The mere fact that so many people have a reversed understanding of who works for who when it comes to government is scary.

Re:What Rights?

[Ethanol-fueled]

Agreed, given the EU's past hostility to Microsoft in the form of Antitrust enforcement. At least they have the balls to step up and fine Microsoft.

The secrecy may or may not be a bad thing but I doubt that it's there because of some ultra-shady backroom deal, but after the OOXML fiasco, who knows...

Re:What Rights?

[lennier]

It was in the EULA at the hospital when you were born. Don't come crying to *me* because you didn't read it. Well, you were crying, but for other reasons.

Darn n00borns.

Re:What Rights?

[jopsen]

EU what?
I'm sorry but exactly what kind of enforcement agencies those the EU have?

AFAIK the only intelligence agency is Europol, and all it's investigation are performed by member nations it has no executive rights anywhere as far as I know...

My guess is that EU got a really dirt cheap deal for some software... And promised not to tell others... Like everybody else...

Re:What Rights?

[forkazoo]

Not exactly, as it's horribly unfair to Microsoft. Think about it, if the contract was released, then all of Microsoft's competitors know just how much they need to undercut Microsoft's price to make the sale on a huge (HUGE) contract. You're putting Microsoft at a competitive disadvantage. This is why most (if not all) government contracts are sealed in this manner.

Signed
Someone who works for a government contractor

Yes, good god. Just imagine if players in the market were permitted to know current market rates for specific services. It'd be chaos. It'd be terrible. It'd allow vendors to compete on price for government contracts, and result in government potentially picking a less expensive option for using taxpayer money. Heaven forbid. At least we all know that picking Microsoft is the best possible example for slashdotters of a company that should never be put at a competitive disadvantage!

Re:What Rights?

[Ecuador]

I live in the US, so I think you are referring to a whole different country. I won't even attempt to describe what I see/hear every day to which you seem oblivious, maybe I will just post a link to yesterday's news

their brand new airplanes that can fire a laser at a top secret satellite to have it bounce back and kill a target half way around the world.

Not only you don't have a clue at what is going on with the US government, you also watch too much (bad) sci-fi.

Re:What Rights?

[uassholes]

Where do you live, China? You obviously do not believe in democracy.

it is the right of governments to decide what they make public and not

Re:What Rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

However it is the right of governments...

Orwellian nonsense.

Governments don't have rights, the people do!

Re:What Rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

Isn't the big deal here is that the EU was probing Microsoft for anit-trust issues...and maybe the contracts value are close to the lately imposed fines...so why not release the information?

Re:What Rights?

[Keeper]

Yup, instead of coming up with a bid that represents their "best" price, they would only need to come up with a bid that is slightly better than the competition. Brilliant! Oh, wait, that's the opposite of what you're after...

Re:What Rights?

[ardle]

Not exactly, as it's horribly unfair to Microsoft.

I don't think GP was suggesting that Microsoft should be treated differently to any other (potential) government contractor. If someone wins a contract and produces crap, they are liable (depending on terms of contract, I suppose), get a bad reputation and are not hired again. "The market sorting it out", wouldn't you say?
Also, forcing government to make contracts more open should also force them to understand their own systems better: if it is known to all that they are stuck in an expensive contract simply because of vendor lock-in, that won't help popularity.

if the contract was released, then all of Microsoft's competitors know just how much they need to undercut Microsoft's price to make the sale on a huge (HUGE) contract.

Once. If this is a problem, then I suggest that the cause is the:

• huge
• contract

;-)

You're putting Microsoft at a competitive disadvantage. This is why most (if not all) government contracts are sealed in this manner.

I know what you meant, but it's possible to infer from what you said that the procedure is set-up to protect Microsoft and not, in fact, any holder of a government contract.

Signed

Someone who used to work for a government contractor

Re:What Rights?

[EdIII]

That's not the same thing. What he meant by "anything" was "any expenditures". The government should only have income from the taxation of it's citizens. We all "know" it's coming from us, so tax returns do not have to be disclosed to everyone.

ALL expenditures not DIRECTLY related to national security MUST be open to scrutiny. To do otherwise invites corruption into the system.

Re:What Rights?

[deraj123]

There's a big difference between bids being sealed during the bidding process, and them being opened after the deadline has passed. The first practice prevents the situation you're describing, while the second practice provides for public knowledge of how tax money is spent.

Re:What Rights?

[erroneus]

*THAT* is likely to be the correct answer. Microsoft plays very fast and very lose with their pricing when threats to their monopoly are encountered. My guess is that their prices dipped to near-zero while they were being prosecuted in European courts in order to help influence opinion about Microsoft... and/or possibly fluctuations may be observed around the time that OOXML was up for ISO vote as well.

Re:What Rights?

[digitig]

I don't think GP was suggesting that Microsoft should be treated differently to any other (potential) government contractor. If someone wins a contract and produces crap, they are liable (depending on terms of contract, I suppose)

Yep. Although it's so expensive to hold them to that liability that it's hardly ever done.

get a bad reputation and are not hired again

Nope. When I was assessing bids under EU contract rules I had to do it according to a strict points scheme, and was specifically not allowed to take past performance of the company into account. I was only permitted to assess the bid based on the actual contents of the bid. That was a few years ago now, but I don't think it's changed.

Re:What Rights?

[blair1q]

Sure. That's what we thought we were getting. But we made some assumptions based on the zeitgeist. The Constitution is way too short to ensure that it comes out right. And for the past eight years, we've seen every loophole abused or filled with mud.

Re:What Rights?

[Shivetya]

Blame public education. Somehow in the US (at least in the area where I am at) they have managed to convince many kids that the Constitution grants people rights. Even the most recent election featured many politicians openly stating that the Constitution granted rights to people when it did nothing of the sort. They would then extend this line of thought and talk about how they were going to "give more rights to the people".

It is this ignorance of the US Constitution which politicians rely on. The Constitution granted rights to the government and held all rights not granted specifically to those of the people. Trouble is people don't know it and assume otherwise. How else do we explain the mess we have now?

No wonder both parties want to ignore it, it would handcuff them both if they truly adhered to it. Yet how is anyone going to understand what it truly means if the education system, government, and the press, both say otherwise?

Re:What Rights?

[blair1q]

It isn't a right, it's a policy. And in a democracy or a democratic republic, it takes time and a few million friends to change the policy. You can't do it just by saying you interpret the founding fathers a different way.

Re:What Rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed, given the EU's past hostility to Microsoft in the form of Antitrust enforcement [zdnet.com]. At least they have the balls to step up and fine Microsoft.

That is a strange choice of words. Is enforcing the law now deemed to be an act of hostility when a large corporation is the object of the enforcement action?

Re:What Rights?

[mabhatter654]

last I checked Microsoft is a near monopoly with upwards of 85% of the desktop market. (note they tried to keep Google from getting that amount in search with Yahoo) How is discussing contract terms that represent 85% of the market not competitive. Unless Microsoft is using large contracts sold cheaply to sway other people that can't choose, network effects.

In houses or cars bidding is sealed during sales, but you legally have to post the sale value when you register the property. Then you can see what a similar property sold for at one time from just viewing the property.

What people REALLY want is to see the terms of the deal. The overall cost can be figured out, but what did Microsoft sell? How many copies? what support? Upgrades? what is the license? When the state buys a bridge or automobile those are spelled out explicitly, and publicly bid on with no side deals allowed. That allows anybody to bid on even ground. In software's case we can't even know what the terms are. I'd be like granting a road contract but not disclosing terms of warranty or number of miles and materials to be used... and would never be allowed. But software gets away with having secret terms.

Companies want a fair shot. Current software contracts are like specifying that I want Caterpillar brand equipment to build my road... not how much road or warranty or when it will be done. People want to see honest sealed-bid deals that specify business functions to cover (email, accounting, security) and how many users/machines to be licensed. Then stick to the winner of the bid!!! It's not fair that Microsoft gets to see another company win a contract like in Germany, then come in and make "donations" to cover part of the cost so they can remove items from the contract.

Re:What Rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

The people have delegated certain tasks to government for their own convenience

You could say that the people delegated the task of deciding if access to some information is more important than the business' need to keep it secret. Perhaps there are details in the contract that expose some sensitive trade secrets, and releasing it wouldn't only feed general curiousity.

Re:What Rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

In Sweden contractual information has to be made public when dealing with the government, punsihable by criminal law.

Sucks to live in the UK.

Re:What Rights?

[Ethanol-fueled]

Please consult the definition of the word hostility.

1. A hostile state, condition, or attitude; enmity; antagonism; unfriendliness.
2. A hostile act.
3. An opposition or resistance to an idea, plan, project, etc.
4. War, acts of warfare.

I see what you're trying to say, but to use a very hypothetical analogy, God may be hostile towards Satan even though God is doing the Right Thing(tm) while Satan is not.

Re:What Rights?

[mabhatter654]

the REAL issue is what was sold. How many copies, for what terms? What upgrade and support rights?

When the public buys a road they specify how many miles, material, warranty, and when to complete the task.. then offer those terms for public bid. Where is the detailed public bid for Microsoft's contract with enough info to make a value determined by the market.. say from CDW prices.

Re:What Rights?

[startling]

This is the first time I've thought, 'where are those mod points when I need them?'
Hey, buddies, can you spare me a point? And mod parent up?

Re:What Rights?

[stocke2]

I am sure it was no accident that when they were on trial for abusing monopoly power they suddenly started spending tons of money on lobbying congress.

At least we know that they did, and it was not hidden from view.

Re:What Rights?

[jopsen]

My guess is that their prices dipped to near-zero while they were being prosecuted in European courts in order to help influence opinion about Microsoft...

Are you insinuating that there're any links what so ever between what the European court and the contracts the EU counsel have to buy software?

The judges who convicted MS in the antitrust case were not politicians and they were not publicly elected!
To insinuate that the European court could be bribed by offering cheap contracts to EU counsel is absurd.

(I assume the contracts we're talking about is the software delivery contracts Microsoft has with EU, where EU is a customer).

The real reason it interesting is because the European Union probably did a study as to whether or not an opensource solution would be better. And they probably found that Microsoft suddenly would offer their software for close to nothing... And then the politicians decides that they'll get Microsoft since the price is not that much different... Only problem he doesn't see is the lockin... :)

Re:What Rights?

[HiThere]

That's a possibility, but MS has denied that the NSA KEY had anything to do with the NSA, and you've got to trust them.

(You really don't have any choice, if you use their software. Not that trusting them is sane, but if you use their software you have no choice.)

Re:What Rights?

[HiThere]

No only do the citizens not have a meaningful opportunity to criticize legislation before it is approved, it is also not uncommon that the legislators don't read the bills before they vote on them, and it's not unknown for there not to be any time for anyone on their staff to read them. How many legislators do you think read the DMCA before it was voted on? The answer is NONE! It was written by special interests, the damn thing is over 2000 pages long (that may be hyperbole...I haven't seen a written copy), and they voted it through within a week after it was presented to them. I believe the process is called "railroading".

Also, in many significant votes it's impossible to determine how your Representative or Senator voted. I'll grant that this isn't always true, but it's true when they want to pass something that they feel the people back home wouldn't approve of. In fact I believe that most votes AREN'T roll-call votes. (Admittedly I haven't kept current.)

Re:What Rights?

[rohan972]

Anything that involves public money and is not a matter of national (or continental, in this case) security should be open to scrutiny.
Really? So the public should be able to view your tax returns?

That's not public money until after they have it. The total amount of various taxes collected should indeed be public information.

Re:What Rights?

[mongrol]

I can't believe you just said lose instead of loose! IS THERE NO GOD?!?!

Re:What Rights?

[Ihmhi]

Yes, it would be unfair to Microsoft. But to be fair, they're not really used to that little thing called competition.

If a company can do the job just as well (or better) for less money, isn't it in the interest of, well, everyone (sans the corps who lose bidding) for that to happen?

Re:What Rights?

[Ihmhi]

General government stuff is open, yes, but the Bush administration has been wearing down "CLASSIFIED" rubber stamps by the case. That's one of many ways that we are not as "open" as we used to be.

Even back in the day, it might have been like:

"General government [redacted] is open, yes, but the [redacted] administration has been wearing down [redacted] by the case. That's one of many [redacted] that we are not as [redacted] as we used to be."

No longer - now it's Classified So We Can Get The Terrorists And Save America by God's Grace (TM).

Re:What Rights?

[awpoopy]

Not exactly, as it's horribly unfair to Microsoft. Think about it, if the contract was released, then all of Microsoft's competitors know just how much they need to undercut Microsoft's price to make the sale on a huge (HUGE) contract. You're putting Microsoft at a competitive disadvantage. This is why most (if not all) government contracts are sealed in this manner. Signed Someone who works for a government contractor

Unless of course the competition is FREE - as in Ubuntu.

Re:What Rights?

[nog_lorp]

"it is the right of governments to decide what they make public and not"

That is insane - the exact opposite of every advance that has been made in government since the Enlightenment. If you give the government the right to total obscurity, that is tantamount to total lack of accountability, and they will use it to hide their corruption completely. In no time at all you will have a dictatorship.

Re:What Rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Only when it comes to military/security information US is quite about it."
Problem is what a huge part of the budget that IS...

Re:What Rights?

[Chandon Seldon]

Perhaps there are details in the contract that expose some sensitive trade secrets, and releasing it wouldn't only feed general curiousity.

If that's true, they should have thought of that before they put those trade secrets in what should be a public document then. When a government keeps secrets, that government is obviously betraying the interests of the people it was intended to serve. The sole exception to this - active strategic or tactical information being held by a military in a time of war - doesn't apply unless there's a (real and winnable soon) war going on.

Re:What Rights?

[Raenex]

the damn thing is over 2000 pages long (that may be hyperbole...I haven't seen a written copy)

Indeed. I just downloaded a PDF version and it's 59 pages.

Re:What Rights?

[gronofer]

Government exists to serve the people.

I don't think history supports that statement.

It's like saying that criminal organisations exist to serve the people. I'm sure they do serve some of the people some of the time, but it's not their reason for existence.

Re:What Rights?

[PinkyDead]

This is true.

However, governments do have duties and it is a duty of government to ensure that private interests are protected in dealings with said government - which basically puts the same thing a different way.

There must, of course, be oversight on those dealings.

Re:What Rights?

[Weedlekin]

"The problem is this is public money being spent, and they should be willing to divulge this information to clear up any ideas people might get concerning government collusion with a large corporation."

1) The EU does not directly receive any money from the public, so it has no obligation to tell the public about how it spends its money. It's the governments who supply the EU with public money that the EU is obliged to give information to, so Brown, Sarkozy, etc. can have a look at those contracts with MS if they want to, but you can be pretty sure that they won't tell us what they see.

2) The EU isn't a government, so it's pointless saying what governments should or should not do when discussing matters pertaining to the EU itself.

"They need to protect businesses equally, and if it appears they may be protecting a certain business over others"

They don't reveal the details of _any_ contracts with suppliers of goods or services to the public, so MS are being treated just like everyone else.

"it does make it look as if there might be a conflict of intrests with the public good"

The EU isn't elected by the public and doesn't pretend to represent the public, so its decisions aren't motivated by the opinions or needs of the public. It was originally a trade organisation, and although its role has been expanded over the years, much of what it does is still concerned with business and commerce, and its laws and practices reflect this.

Re:What Rights?

[Weedlekin]

"Unless of course said government is trying to make a case against MS to make them pay out more money while at the same time being run by people too dim to use Linux and don't want to expose their hypocrisy."

What government would this be, perchance? It can't be the EU, because the EU isn't a government, so what government are you talking about?

Re:What Rights?

[Weedlekin]

"Hooray for the increased openness of socialism. It's so effective people actually believe it's the governments "right" to decide what to make public."

And hooray for Americans like you who don't let their ignorance of the fact that the EU isn't a government prevent them from showing their even greater ignorance of socialism.

NB: the fact that you're on Slashdot means you're also on the Internet, where you can access massive amounts of information about both the EU and socialism, so there's no excuse for repeating what you've read in Sarah Palin's Big Book Of Geography And Lefty Politics.

Re:What Rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

Or maybe they're responding to the attempt at being undercut by FOSS?

Re:What Rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

Having worked with government contracts, I can attest that just like any other contract, you don't compete on price. You compete on service, quality, polish and speed of delivery amongst other things. As usual, volume dictates per-unit price, so it varies from contract to contract.

However, additional rules apply when dealing with government contracts:

There's the issue of government funding mechanisms. Usually when a government department spends less than their allocated budget for a year, their funding is cut for the following year, hence vendors are also privy to certain benefits regarding pricing. So much more often than not, governments will try to max out their budjet, you have to spend the whole budjet if you want to keep the same budjet the year after.

That's why you don't see all that much Linux adoption in governments. They don't want that drastic of a cut to their funding. Especially if you tale in mind the whole, sure you can roll out your own changes, updates and fixes, but what's that going to cost in terms of manhours for development, testing, debugging, deployment and training? What's that? Your budget was cut and you're fucked for the year? Sorry, should have payed the vendor a support contract so they could do it for you, eh?

Now, as far as regular contracts are concerned, it's because it's basic business sense. You charge what the market is willing to bare (and as such compete in other areas), nobody involverd wants to trigger an undercutting war, because ultimately it inevitably becomes a downward spiral and destroys competition as vendors drop prices, and cut costs just to get contracts and eventually just can no longer remain neither competative, nor profitable, and start dropping out of the market one by one.

Competing on price is only a viable tactic if all other things are equal. They usually, aren't, and so companies compete in the other areas. resorting to undercutting is the business equivalent of resorting to nuclear warfare, short term advantage, but everyone loses in the long term, and most parties involves have the equivalent of no first use clauses.

Competing on price alone is just so very messy. And ultimately, the market is still subject to supply and demand as well as effort vs. return. Okay, so you've undercutting your way to the last man standing. You're getting 5x more contracts, wonderful. Except it dons upon you than because you've cut your costs and profit margins so low to get here, you actually need 15x the work to reach the same profits you did before the undercutting spiral. You're getting more contracts, but the demand hasn't actually increased, but the supply has dropped. You need to hire more workers to get all the contracts done, but they need to get payed, and they need equipment to work on. You can't afford it on your flimsy profits, though. Now you start raising your prices again, because you realise it just isn't worth it, and the industry gradually rebuilds itself.

It happened in the print industry in the '80s and '90s. Lots of people got layed off, anbd lots of companies went under. Everyone learned their lesson, and now we compete on other areas.

That's why you don't bloody compete on price.

Re:What Rights?

[Elektroschock]

This was interestingly the case he, Capatto asked whether also about the open source study that was withdrawn. The Council says it had no copy and he should rather go to the historic archives in Luxembourg. That is odd.

"...has not keep any copy of the Study. The Secretariat general suggests to ask a copy to the interistututional committee on informatics' archives."

Marco Capatto is also pro-Free Software

And other MEPs are asking questions as well: Georgios Papastamkos (PPE-DE) to the Commission: Commission's procurement of computer software

Re:What Rights?

[Elektroschock]

It is a public contract. And public procurement works in the way that the authority says it wants x and suppliers a, b, c show up and offer a price and meet a deadline. There is no point in not seeing the deal of the winner and in particular the specific terms and conditions, the number for the Commission is 30 Million EUR afaik. Quite cheap. Public procurement works like reversed eBay.

Re:What Rights?

[Elektroschock]

Same in the EU:
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:32001R1049:EN:HTML

Re:What Rights?

[Elektroschock]

http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:32001R1049:EN:HTML

Article 255
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:12002E255:EN:HTML

Article 255

1. Any citizen of the Union, and any natural or legal person residing or having its registered office in a Member State, shall have a right of access to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents, subject to the principles and the conditions to be defined in accordance with paragraphs 2 and 3.

2. General principles and limits on grounds of public or private interest governing this right of access to documents shall be determined by the Council, acting in accordance with the procedure referred to in Article 251 within two years of the entry into force of the Treaty of Amsterdam.

3. Each institution referred to above shall elaborate in its own Rules of Procedure specific provisions regarding access to its documents.

Re:What Rights?

[Elektroschock]

Another branch.

Re:What Rights?

[Elektroschock]

the right of governments to decide what they make public and not

No, it is not.

http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:32001R1049:EN:HTML
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:12002E255:EN:HTML

Re:What Rights?

[jcnnghm]

EU isn't a government

Your right, a political and economic union of member states is so much different than a government. Wait a second, that almost sounds like a federation of independent states got together, and created a ruling body to oversee and coordinate them. We did that here, and we called it the United States Federal Government. If it makes you feel better to not call a spade a spade, go for it, but the fact of the matter is they are still using your money to contract on your behalf without being held accountable by you. That's all right though, because mere mortals should have no say in government anyway. There should only be the ruling class, and everyone else. Congratulations, you are well on your way.

Re:What Rights?

[Keeper]

That only makes sense in an isolated world where one contract is not related whatsoever to any other contract. The real world isn't like that.

You're really asking the wrong question ... the question isn't "how much money is the government spending on x?", rather, the question should be "what is the goverment trying to buy, and what is their criteria for selecting a winner?"

Re:What Rights?

[thetoadwarrior]

Yeah with a European Parliament, the EU creating rules to govern over its member states makes it nothing like a government.

It's a political union which if you want to be anal is not the word government but it functions exactly like the US federal government whose origins began as a union of states which is also why, in the civil war, the northern troops were union troops. They wanted to keep the union together. So yeah the EU so not a government.

Re:What Rights?

[nog_lorp]

The fact that the concept is being practiced does not mean it is not insane.

Re:What Rights?

[Weedlekin]

"Your right, a political and economic union of member states is so much different than a government."

The EU is indeed an economic union, and in some senses a political one, but only in some senses. There have been two attempts to make it into more of a political union: the first one (the EU Constitution) was rejected by citizen referendums in two countries; and the second (the Lisbon Treaty) has been rejected by an Irish referendum, and hasn't been ratified by Germany or Poland either, so it's currently in limbo because no changes to existing EU treaties can be made without being ratified by the _governments_ of all members.

"Wait a second, that almost sounds like a federation of independent states got together, and created a ruling body to oversee and coordinate them."

If the EU is a federation, then WIPO and the WTO are federations, because they also have ruling bodies to oversee and coordinate members.

"We did that here, and we called it the United States Federal Government"

The EU has nothing whatsoever in common with the US federation of states. Some notable differences between them are listed below (please note that it's by no means an exhaustive list):

1) All US states must use the same currency, which has exactly the same appearance everywhere; membership of the European currency is voluntary, and each country that elects to join has its own national version of every coin and note.

2) The EU doesn't collect taxes from individuals or companies, whereas the US federal government does.

3) Nothing remotely equivalent to the FBI, CIA, NSA, federal prisons, nor any of the other federal policy enforcement mechanisms or support systems (e.g. FBI laboratories) that exist in US are present in the EU.

4) Unlike the US, the EU has no armed forces, and it cannot declare war on anyone or end hostilities with them. Individual members on the other hand can and do have their own armed forces (with independent nuclear capabilities in some cases), can use them without the consent of other EU members or the EU itself, and may unilaterally may declare war or sign peace treaties with foreign countries.

5) The EU cannot make new treaties with non-EC governments or organisations that are binding on members without the unanimous consent of those members.

6) European laws (and the courts which arbitrate them) are entirely dependant on the willingness of member states to abide by them. Financial penalties may be applied to those who fail to comply, but there is no EU apparatus to enforce payment of those sanctions. Members may theoretically be expelled for repeated transgressions, but this (a) requires unanimous assent from member governments, and (b) has never happened despite the fact that some members have repeatedly and openly refused to abide by EC laws and / or rulings from the European Courts.

7. There is no such thing as an EU passport, nobody owes allegiance to the EU or its flag, and it's impossible to perform a treasonous act against the EU itself.

8. Membership of the EU is entirely voluntary, so members can leave it if they wish (as Greenland did in 1985). This hasn't been the case in the US since the 14th Amendment defined a US citizen to prevent a repeat of what happened in your civil war.

9. The EU hasn't got a head of state or anything equivalent to one.

"If it makes you feel better to not call a spade a spade, go for it".

It's actually a case of you classifying brooms, hoes, and rakes as spades because they all have handles. The EU has far more parallels with an exclusive club than a government: countries apply to join it, and only those who meet certain criteria will be accepted; they pay periodic membership fees in return for various benefits, and agree to abide by a common set of club rules or risk expulsion; and they may leave if they wish, at which point they cease to be bound by the rules, are no longer required to pay membership fees, and lose any benefits that membership conferred.

"the fact of the matter is

Re:What Rights?

[Weedlekin]

"eah with a European Parliament, the EU creating rules to govern over its member states makes it nothing like a government. "

The EU does not make rules to _govern_ its member states, it makes rules that its member states _agreed to abide by and implement_ as a condition of their membership.

"It's a political union which if you want to be anal is not the word government but it functions exactly like the US federal government whose origins began as a union of states which is also why, in the civil war, the northern troops were union troops."

The terms "civil war" and "union troops" highlight just one of the key differences between the EU and the US federation of states, because the EU has no armed forces, and while it's entirely possible for two or more EU member states to declare war on each other, it would not be a civil war, but a case of sovereign nations going to war with other sovereign nations. Such a situation would very likely result in the warring nations being immediately expelled from the EU until hostilities ceased (and possibly for a considerable time thereafter) because they would by definition be unable to comply with fundamental EU principles such as ensuring the free movement of goods, services, money, and people between all member states.

"They wanted to keep the union together"

Which raises another difference in that EU members may leave if they choose to without any repercussions other than a loss of the benefits that membership confers on them, as Greenland did in 1985. Furthermore, using force to "keep the union together" is not something the EU or its members would tolerate, because the idea of it was originally preventing a reoccurrence of the situations that led to two devastating wars in Europe during the 20th century, so _any_ attempt to use military force of any type by the EU itself or any members acting on its behalf against other members would result in its immediate collapse.

"So yeah the EU so not a government."

The EU isn't a government because it doesn't govern -- it has rules by which members are expected to abide, but there are no actual mechanisms for enforcing those rules beyond financial penalties (which they also have no way of enforcing) and the threat of expulsion from the EU, which has never actually happened, and would in any case mean that the expelled country was immediately freed from the requirement to abide by EU rules, including the financial penalties incurred for not abiding by the rules!

Re:What Rights?

[ak3ldama]

Only when it comes to military/security information US is quite about it.

Problem is what a huge part of the budget that IS...

Probably too late to mod parent up. That's exactly what I was thinking though.

Re:What Rights?

[thetoadwarrior]

"The EU does not make rules to _govern_ its member states, it makes rules that its member states _agreed to abide by and implement_ as a condition of their membership."

No, they EU makes rules that governments agree to. How can a group of governments not be a government? Would you call a group of African men anything other than African men? Also it's not always a case of complete agreement and the EU does try to force things on its members. Just in the case of Sweden and Snus. Snus is illegal for sale everywhere else in the EU and the EU wanted to Sweden to give it up too buy and it was not just a case of Sweden saying "no thanks." but that they had to fight it and even after the EU Okayed it there were still fights with surrounding areas and Snus. So much for their rules being so amicable.

"The terms "civil war" and "union troops" highlight just one of the key differences between the EU and the US federation of states, because the EU has no armed forces, and while it's entirely possible for two or more EU member states to declare war on each other, it would not be a civil war, but a case of sovereign nations going to war with other sovereign nations. Such a situation would very likely result in the warring nations being immediately expelled from the EU until hostilities ceased (and possibly for a considerable time thereafter) because they would by definition be unable to comply with fundamental EU principles such as ensuring the free movement of goods, services, money, and people between all member states."

That is a silly argument since, if you want to be technical, the early US didn't have a federal government either until deciding it was wise to not rely on militia men and actually have a federal military. Secondly, a union of states / countries doesn't have a strict definition that implies that they have to have a single military force. I'll eat my words if you can find something that strictly defines what a union of territories must have. Lastly, just like the EU, states have the freedom to do some things their own way. Hence the reason US states have different speed limits, different alcohol laws, different fireworks laws, etc. So, just like EU states, the US states have the freedom to do what they want in a lot of instances.

"Which raises another difference in that EU members may leave if they choose to without any repercussions other than a loss of the benefits that membership confers on them, as Greenland did in 1985. Furthermore, using force to "keep the union together" is not something the EU or its members would tolerate, because the idea of it was originally preventing a re-occurrence of the situations that led to two devastating wars in Europe during the 20th century, so _any_ attempt to use military force of any type by the EU itself or any members acting on its behalf against other members would result in its immediate collapse."

Comparing 1800's US to post-World war Europe is silly. No sensible European would want to be compared to Hitler and that is what would happen if they used force to keep a member state in. Saying the EU wouldn't mind to lose Germany, the UK or France is silly.

"The EU isn't a government because it doesn't govern -- it has rules by which members are expected to abide, but there are no actual mechanisms for enforcing those rules beyond financial penalties (which they also have no way of enforcing) and the threat of expulsion from the EU, which has never actually happened, and would in any case mean that the expelled country was immediately freed from the requirement to abide by EU rules, including the financial penalties incurred for not abiding by the rules!"

Uh, governing is basically setting rules for people to following. One infamous case (which luckily has been relaxed now) is the EU regulations on veg and fruit and no it's not just a case of they're saying you should only accept this fruit but you can do what you want. Otherwise there wouldn't have been public complaints that lead to the EU changing it's mind. By your logic the EU wouldn't have had to change its mind and instead the governments could have just don't what they wanted.

Re:What Rights?

[Philip Shaw]

They wanted to keep the union together

Which raises another difference in that EU members may leave if they choose to without any repercussions other than a loss of the benefits that membership confers on them, as Greenland did in 1985.

US states have this right, in the Constitution.

Re:What Rights?

[Weedlekin]

The 14th Amendment removed that right by making all citizens of member states into US citizens, giving that US citizenship primacy over state citizenship, and making it illegal for states to remove, revoke, or limit that citizenship in any way. The precise text is as follows:

"All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States..."

The reason for the amendment was to prevent (primarily southern) states from denying citizenship (or some of the rights of citizens) to non-whites after the American Civil War, but its effect is to make secession effectively impossible due to the fact that it would by its nature involve removing the US citizenship from everyone living in the seceding state.

Re:What Rights?

[Weedlekin]

"they EU makes rules that governments agree to"

Just like for example the World Trade Organisation, which also makes rules that governments agree to.

"How can a group of governments not be a government?"

You said it yourself: by being a group of governments.

"Would you call a group of African men anything other than African men?"

I would indeed call them a group of African men, but not, as you are arguing, an African man.

"Also it's not always a case of complete agreement and the EU does try to force things on its members."

And how precisely does the EU "force" members to do something if they refuse?

"Just in the case of Sweden and Snus. Snus is illegal for sale everywhere else in the EU and the EU wanted to Sweden to give it up too buy and it was not just a case of Sweden saying "no thanks." but that they had to fight it and even after the EU Okayed it there were still fights with surrounding areas and Snus."

This is a complete misrepresentation of what happened, because Sweden obtained a concession from the EU to continue selling snus domestically as part of its entry negotiations in 1994, a year before they actually joined the EU, so the EU didn't attempt to force Sweden to stop selling it at any time.

Furthermore, the only two cases that resembled a "fight" were a demand by Sweden that the cancer warnings printed on snus packaging be removed in 2001, which the EU conceded to based on new scientific evidence that was to presented to them, and a case in the ECJ where Sweden and its snus manufacturers tried (and failed) to get the EU-wide ban overturned on the grounds that it was contrary to EU law (which they lost).

"So much for their rules being so amicable."

This is straw man, because I didn't claim it was amicable, or for that matter cordial, only that it has no actual mechanisms for forcing members to comply with its rules.

"That is a silly argument since, if you want to be technical, the early US didn't have a federal government either until deciding it was wise to not rely on militia men and actually have a federal military."

What bearing does America before it had a federal government have on your claim that (quote) "it functions exactly like the US federal government"? It seems to me that you're the one who is making silly arguments here. Note though that I agree there are several parallels between the pre-federal American Union and the EU, but this doesn't mean they're functionally equivalent, and it certainly doesn't mean that your claim of it functioning

"Secondly, a union of states / countries doesn't have a strict definition that implies that they have to have a single military force. I'll eat my words if you can find something that strictly defines what a union of territories must have."

Another straw man, because you were claiming that the EU "functions exactly like the US federal government", and this was the point I was disputing, not whether it is or is not a union (it obviously is one, because its name is the "European Union").

"Lastly, just like the EU, states have the freedom to do some things their own way. Hence the reason US states have different speed limits, different alcohol laws, different fireworks laws, etc."

They do not however have the ability to maintain their own currencies, central banks, independent armed forces with nuclear capabilities, treaties with foreign governments, external territories, monarchies, passports, intelligence agencies, and many other things that the _sovereign national governments_ of EU member states have. American states used to have many of the same freedoms, but they haven't got them now.

NB: American seem to be ignorant of the fact that some EU members are themselves semi-autonomous federations of states (e.g. Spain), so Europeans do actually know what they are and how they work, and also therefore why the EU isn't one (yet!!!).

"So, just like EU states, the US states have the freedom to do what they want in a lot of instances. "

Re:What Rights?

[HiThere]

Perhaps that just makes things worse. I thought they had a good reason for not having a staff person read it. (Probably the factoid started out as "over 20,000 words...", which is bad enough, but still possible. Or possibly I have it confused with UCITA2b, which didn't pass any state in unaltered form.)

My apologies.

Re:What Rights?

[Elektroschock]

Well, it is "as expected".

The problem are not the document access rules which are very liberal, the problem is that the contract is not disclosed anyway, because the IPR protection clause of course served other objectives. The Italian MEP is an expert in document access rules, so he will surely work to improve things.

Re:What Rights?

[thetoadwarrior]

Look, the EU just smacked down France's three strikes internet piracy law. Aland has problems regarding snus too and their duck hunting has been trampled on. It clearly isn't that easy to just flout the laws. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/finland/1510554/Tiny-island-that's-ready-to-stop-Europe-in-its-tracks.html

Flouting the laws doesn't mean those laws aren't made by a government. American tax protesters have argued that income tax is illegal and won in some instances. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,94630,00.html Mind you most lose but that's the case with the EU. Some countries may ignore thing the EU but that doesn't mean everyone can.

If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck then it is a duck. This applies to governments too.

Re:What Rights?

[Weedlekin]

"Look, the EU just smacked down France's three strikes internet piracy law. "

What the EU actually smacked down was a French attempt to make their three strikes law into an EU-wide directive that would require all members to implement it, nor the French law itself, which is not affected by this decision in any way.

"Aland has problems regarding snus too and their duck hunting has been trampled on. It clearly isn't that easy to just flout the laws."

The article in the link you provide indicates that Aland is rather successfully flouting the laws, because they're openly disobeying any they don't like, and haven't paid any of the EU court fines they've incurred for that disobedience. And some other interesting facts emerge after the reporter's massively biased rhetoric is filtred out:

1) The Alanders _voted_ to join the EU at a time when all the rules they object to were already in force, and were very easy to find out about. So it's pretty much a case of being given plenty of time and opportunity to read a contract and the clauses in it, get them looked at by lawyers, and otherwise find out how they might affect you, and then complaining about them after signing that contract because you're expected to respect the terms you agreed to.

2) The Alanders aren't, as the reporter claims, either teaching the EU a "lesson in democracy", or stopping it in its tracks, but are instead teaching Finland a lesson about the stupidity of making laws that let those who govern a community of 26,000 people blackmail the democratically elected government of Finland's other 5 million inhabitants.

"Flouting the laws doesn't mean those laws aren't made by a government. American tax protesters have argued that income tax is illegal and won in some instances."

If you'd checked further than Fox News, then you'd also know that Vernice Kuglin only managed to stay out of prison, but she still had to pay all the back taxes, which were taken directly from her wages by the IRS. So once again we have a case which actually refutes your point by highlighting the fact that the EU (a) cannot even contemplate putting anyone in prison, and (b) has no way of directly deducting fines from its members, or any other method of forcing them to pay.

"Some countries may ignore thing the EU but that doesn't mean everyone can."

Everyone has at some point, and both large and small members still do, hence the fact that the total of unpaid fines by member states is a huge and constantly growing sum of money. There is a provision for the commission to add unpaid fines to a country's annual membership fees (adopted from a British proposal), but this has happened so rarely and is subject to so many special circumstances that few members regard it as being even a potential hazard of not paying EU fines.

"If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck then it is a duck."

Then please provide some evidence that the EU walks or quacks like a duck before claiming that it is one, because everything you've provided so far is either wrong, or refutes your claims after the facts are isolated from the biased rhetoric that surrounds them.

Does that mean I finally get the first post?

[MeNotU]

Only took 7 years!

Re:Does that mean I finally get the first post?

[GerardAtJob]

Nope, you missed again...

Typical Microsoft

[Finallyjoined!!!]

Whenever they do a deal with a government agency, or education authority, they insist on a Non Disclosure. That prevents the relevant Authority disclosing that they paid next to fuck all for Windows, but a shed-load for Orofice.

Re:Typical Microsoft

[Anonymous Coward]

NDAs are irrelevant, the EU exists solely as a representative body of democratic nationaly elected parliaments.

Re:Typical Microsoft

[Anonymous Coward]

So in other words Microsoft bought the EU.

With linux and BSD out there MS shouldn't be in a position to dictate terms. Just switch and see how fast MS products become free.

Re:Typical Microsoft

[Lulfas]

It wouldn't be fast at all. Linux is mostly useless for the average person. There is no short-term advantage in switching to it for anything the size of a government.

Re:Typical Microsoft

[rohan972]

It wouldn't be fast at all. Linux is mostly useless for the average person. There is no short-term advantage in switching to it for anything the size of a government.

Linux in not at all useless for the average person. My (technophobe) mother, when shown my linux desktop (my demonstration/explanation consisted of "click here for writing documents, here to browse the internet, here to use email, etc) exclaimed "It's the same as windows". Most people get their windows box set up by someone else, if you apply the same circumstances then only to the extent that they need a particular proprietary application is linus "useless". Many people don't need such software.

As for no short-term advantage for governments to switch: security, ability to customise, ability to benefit local company rather than foreign company with expenditure (both economic and political benefit). I'm sure someone could add to these, but "no short-term advantage" has already been sufficiently addressed.

Guess I won't move to Europe

[rbanffy]

anytime soon...

What a disappointment!

I guess the request should be accompanied by a request to investigate some misconduct in order to be of clear public interest.

I think the accusation would be enough incentive to open up the contracts. If they don't, it should be considered evidence of misconduct and an attempt to cover it up.

Well WTF

[Anonymous Coward]

And here I thought the EU was supposed to represent Europeans, instead I find them protecting the commercial interest of Microsoft?

I hope people closer to this information have the same feeling as I do. Something smells fishy, and I'd like to know how much money Microsoft paid to who.

Re:Well WTF

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft has probably paid many billions of dollars to European governments. They take to form of taxes. It is in the interest of the EU to protect that revenue, and it is their duty to protect the interests of the Europeans who are employed by Microsoft.

Re:Well WTF

[Lulfas]

What about all those citizens who work for Microsoft who would be hurt by giving Microsoft's competitors its price list? Or do they not count because they work for Microsoft?

Re:Well WTF

[theaveng]

That's correct. They don't count. Governments are there to serve the People, not the corporations. Furthermore government is there to serve ALL the people (common welfare), not to protect the privileges of a few.

Furthermore governments should promote a competitive market, and releasing the price list would certainly do that. Governments should not act to protect monopolies or near-monopolies from competitors.

Pitfalls of socialism.

[jellomizer]

To much government control leads to more red tape. With more levels of red tape you have people who realize they won't get fired if they Say No, but can get fired if they say Yes. Saying No is easy and safe. If you are on records of saying no and it fails you are safe. If you say no and it succeeds anyways you are still safe. If you say Yes and it fails your are in trouble. If you say Yes and it succeeds you may get promoted. However around the middle level of Red Tape you have a lot of people who don't care to get promoted they are happy where they are. So after you get a couple levels in you get a Lot of No's.

This also happens in large companies too. However many companies have a policy of cleaning out middle management every once in a while. I am not saying other more capitalistic systems don't have pitfalls and problems, and for this request if it was a private company they would have said no way faster then the EU. However a lawsuit requesting the information may go threw much quicker in a company then with a government agency.

Re:Pitfalls of socialism.

[Anonymous Coward]

How the hell you link this to socialism is beyond my comprehension. I don't think you know what the word means.

Re:Pitfalls of socialism.

[Improv]

Many companies? Maybe many companies should, but actually doing so is almost unheard of. This has nothing to do with socialism and everything to do with embedded power and interests in social structures.

Also, try suing a company to get it to reveal its contracts with another company. There isn't even the expectation of openness there - I'm not sure where you were trying to go with your second paragraph.

Re:Pitfalls of socialism.

[Anonymous Coward]

The American way: Something Un-american coming from Europe = Socialism. Something Un-american coming from elsewhere = Terrism.

Re:Pitfalls of socialism.

[justinlee37]

Socialism necessitates a higher level of bureaucracy to regulate everything, like Communism, but to a lesser degree. If the government were more libertarian, it would be smaller, and simpler. We'd just have a defensive military reserve, a police force, and a tax authority. Even America's current Keynesian take on Capitalism has a more complicated (and therefore more bureaucratic) system; we have zoning authorities, welfare distribution, city planning commissions, a department of agriculture ... more control breeds more power, and larger size breeds more opportunities for someone to be corrupted by that power.

Re:Pitfalls of socialism.

[theaveng]

Terrism? Fear of the earth? That's a new one that I've never heard.

Re:Pitfalls of socialism.

[shutdown -p now]

Did you ever hear the term "libertarian socialist"?

If no, might want to look it up on WP and Google. You may be in for a surprise.

Of course, you'll just say it's utopian, and I'll agree with that. But libertarian capitalism is just as utopian.

Re:Well that's just a load of BS, lemme tell you..

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh I see what you did there.

Actually...

[Penguinisto]

...the EU may be correct in this case - depending.

For public projects and the like, sure - the taxpayers have a right to know. OTOH, for military use and various secret services (I don't know if the EU has any of either, but I can see respective militaries and such among member nations pooling VLKs and the like through the EU), there's a lot of things the public doesn't necessarily have a compelling need to know about.

One question though - does the EU disclose contract and/or payment info for any other vendor, for any reason? If the answer is "no", then this request is probably par for the course.

All that said, perhaps the reason the EU denied it is because they may honestly not know. Sure, individual departments probably have a general idea, but in aggregate? Good luck with that one...

/P

Re:Actually...

[poetmatt]

I would imagine they would give a response like "please provide more specificity" if they simply felt it was too vague.

FOIA's are that way (you do realize a pretty big trade agreement is the source of all the FOIA-related bills going around country to country nowadays), that was the response I got when I FOIA'd the ACTA agreement before it hit major press coverage...it was only then that I started getting dancing answers about how we can't see that information.

What I'd love to see, is a law stating that you cannot refuse to provide information on anything requested from a FOIA, provided that it is specific enough.

Re:Actually...

[Ihmhi]

What I'd love to see, is a law stating that you cannot refuse to provide information on anything requested from a FOIA, provided that it is specific enough.

"I'd like to have the location of all nuclear missile silos within 25 miles of New York City."

Yeah, that idea needs a bit of work.

Re:Actually...

[poetmatt]

You see though, the problem wouldn't be the FOIA, the problem would be that somehow we are supposedly safer without that information. You think someone can't just find that stuff on the web?

If I google "locations of new york missile silos" you find enough that I'm sure you could dig info on where they are located.

Thus, it's the same viewpoint: not that private citizens should be bound to this, merely our government.

Is the left hand even connected to the right hand?

[Hotawa Hawk-eye]

So let me make sure I understand ... this is basically the EU equivalent of a United States Senator [Marco Cappato, a Liberal member of the European Parliament] asking the House of Representatives [the European Council] for a contract the House negotiated on behalf of the government and getting denied?

Nothing new on the EUSSR front.

[muuh-gnu]

Not even half a lifetime after getting rid of one sowiet union, we're getting another.

I dont know, every time I read how the EU managed to get away another piece of our rights I wonder, why do these oligarchist fucks cling on to calling their bueraucratic regime a "democracy" at all? Why dont they just proclaim a open dictatorship so I can move to Switzerland finally? How did the swiss manage to be the ONLY nation on earth where the people control their politicians and not vice versa and keep defending their rights from being taken away piece by piece like in all their neighbour states?

Re:Nothing new on the EUSSR front.

[Anonymous Coward]

Nobody claims the EU is a democracy, as far as I know.

Re:Nothing new on the EUSSR front.

[theaveng]

The Swiss have guns? The politicians are afraid?

Re:European Parliament

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm italian, and I agree :P

Nothing to see here

[symbolset]

(waves hand) These are not the contracts you're looking for. Move along.

Not in their interest?

[HangingChad]

It's not in the public interest to know how much public money MSFT is getting and for what? It's a certainty MSFT doesn't want it getting out how much of a discount government agencies are getting, and what other inducements they're tossing in to sweeten the deal. If it gets out gov agencies are paying $50/seat for Windows, every other enterprise customer will want that deal. I'm not sure how keeping that secret is in the public interest...unless they're worried MS will raise the price if it gets out.

If it were up to me...if the taxpayer buys it, the taxpayer owns it. And that would be true for software, or at least for the licenses. Imagine if the federal government could negotiate for government wide enterprise license deals. If the Navy closed a program, they could take the software licenses they don't need and transfer them to the Marines or another gov agency. I always thought it should be that way. What's MS going to do about it? Not sell to the government? Yeah, that would be smart, drive gov adoption of open source.

Re:Not in their interest?

[pclminion]

It's not in the public interest to know how much public money MSFT is getting and for what?

That's not what is being claimed. The information IS in the public interest -- the argument is that Microsoft's commercial interest is MORE IMPORTANT than the public interest. Which I think is even worse-sounding that what you said.

Re:Not in their interest?

[CSHARP123]

I think everybody knows there are discounts involved in the licenses. At a govt client site for Share point server, we needed CALs for about 15K laptops and 45K desktops. The total cost without discount would have been approx. $2000000. with the discount it came to about approx $420,000. I think this is common with private enterprises too.

Re:Not in their interest?

[blair1q]

It's in the public's interest to know that the people who brokered your end of the deal were trustworthy and capable of striking a fair bargain.

It's not in the public's interest to abuse that negotiator's view into a company's proprietary information.

Companies will simply stop selling your government the things it needs to be more efficient, or will insist on huge fees to compensate for loss of intellectual property.

Re:Not in their interest?

[blair1q]

No, it's still in the government's interest not to scare Microsoft away from ever bidding on government business because the government can't keep to an NDA.

Re:Not in their interest?

[Anonymous Coward]

Pity you see this as a Microsoft issue when it's like this for most contracts. Yay for blind zealotry!

Re:Not in their interest?

[mabhatter654]

why was that sale not bid out to other software vendors after you wrote up the specs for the system? That's the problem. You did not choose a lower priced tool, but a common and expensive one. Nobody will know because the total amount of money paid to Microsoft will never be revealed for anybody to contest.

Re:Not in their interest?

[Anonymous Coward]

I think this is common with private enterprises too.

Yes, it is... I head the company I work for pays about 35€ per seat for MS Office and MS Windows. Posting anonymous for obvious reasons. It's probably not even a good deal.

Re:Not in their interest?

[rohan972]

No, it's still in the government's interest not to scare Microsoft away from ever bidding on government business because the government can't keep to an NDA.

The government has no business agreeing the NDA's over public expenditure on software.

Re:Not in their interest?

[denobug]

What if the spec was simply "MS WORD, EXCEL, POWERPOINT, AND access? Oh while we're at it, please make sure the OS is compatible with every software that has been written for the Windows OS system.

Jokes aside I don't think EU did not weight the cost of developing and putting everything on the Open Source platform and compare it with Micorsoft's offer. Afterall any big contract will have to go through at least a bidding process in some form or fashion. Both Apple and Microsoft had been giving heavy discount to government and education users since day one of their business model. It provides saving for the public agencies and provide a common platform for average users. I for one see it as beneficial to the government and saves public money.

Every vendor's nightmare is when their customer bring a quote from another customer and ask for more discount. For that reason the quotes and bids are usually confidential. This would also be the main reason for MS not wanting to disclose the figure and have it showing up on news paper's headline (or on slashdot's parent posting) is to prevent the governments around the world to "shop" the contract price with a quote from another country. I.E. Chinese government Using the quote negotiated for EU to get a even "lower" number. It can be simple as "If you want to continue to do business in China and being viewed favorablly, you need to give me a bigger discount than you gave EU". This unavoidably starts a negative pricing cycle for MS in which it cannot win. Keep in mind MS not only does business in demobratic countries that have well regulated commercial system but also doing lots of business with public and private entities in countries with either totalitarian rules or countries with weakly regulated systems which any business can easily be taken advantage upon, or countries under both conditions. In a perfect world It would be nice to have the figure disclosed as public information, but the world is far from being perfect. And Microsoft, like any business entities that is serious on keep making money, would do what it takes (legally and within reason, of course) to protect itself from harm.

Re:Not in their interest?

[kocsonya]

As any EU Council member would point it out, your problem is that you think about yourself as "taxpaying citizen".
Now that's completely wrong. Try "serf" instead.

The EU has been marching towards a new feudalism for a long time. It's no accident that when the EU Constitution (that would give the Council even more power and even less oversight) was voted down, it was quickly renamed to 'treaty' so that the people need not be asked about it (except that Ireland was not playing ball).

The EU serves the interests of a ruling elite, not the interest of the people. The people are there to serve the ruling elite, nothing more.

Re:Not in their interest?

[mpe]

The government has no business agreeing the NDA's over public expenditure on software.

Does government have any business having NDAs with respect to anything?

Re:Not in their interest?

[mpe]

At a govt client site for Share point server, we needed CALs for about 15K laptops and 45K desktops. The total cost without discount would have been approx. $2000000. with the discount it came to about approx $420,000. I think this is common with private enterprises too.

Thing is that the CALs are purely a money making scheme in the first place.

Re:Not in their interest?

[mpe]

Companies will simply stop selling your government the things it needs to be more efficient, or will insist on huge fees to compensate for loss of intellectual property.

Except that governments are, or at least should be, in a position of power in any negotiations involving companies. Both these companies and the concept of "intellectual property" only exist at the whim of governments.

Re:Not in their interest?

[theaveng]

We have NDAs at Lockheed Martin.

Of course we're just a government contractor who provides the Navy with missiles, and therefore Not the actual government. Perhaps the E.U. could use a similar hand-waving to justify non-disclosure? "It wasn't use bought the software; it was XYZ Computer Leasing and they don't have to divulge their contract with Microsoft."

Re:Not in their interest?

[Elektroschock]

The odd thing is that Cappato is a member of parliament. The legal base is EC/1049/2001 which grants citizens (and foreigners) a right of access to all EU documents (cmp. Art 255 EU Treaty)

Exceptions ...
2. The institutions shall refuse access to a document where disclosure would undermine the protection of:

- commercial interests of a natural or legal person, including intellectual property,

- court proceedings and legal advice,

- the purpose of inspections, investigations and audits,

unless there is an overriding public interest in disclosure.

Of course a request by an MEP can be perceived as an indication that there is indeed a public interest. And a public contract is probably nothing which affects the "commercial interests" of an external enterprise, you would rather insist on full transparency.

Article 2

Beneficiaries and scope

1. Any citizen of the Union, and any natural or legal person residing or having its registered office in a Member State, has a right of access to documents of the institutions, subject to the principles, conditions and limits defined in this Regulation.

2. The institutions may, subject to the same principles, conditions and limits, grant access to documents to any natural or legal person not residing or not having its registered office in a Member State.

3. This Regulation shall apply to all documents held by an institution, that is to say, documents drawn up or received by it and in its possession, in all areas of activity of the European Union.

4. Without prejudice to Articles 4 and 9, documents shall be made accessible to the public either following a written application or directly in electronic form or through a register. In particular, documents drawn up or received in the course of a legislative procedure shall be made directly accessible in accordance with Article 12. ...

Article 3

Definitions

For the purpose of this Regulation:

(a) "document" shall mean any content whatever its medium (written on paper or stored in electronic form or as a sound, visual or audiovisual recording) concerning a matter relating to the policies, activities and decisions falling within the institution's sphere of responsibility;

Have a look at the Document register of the Council

Re:Not in their interest?

[Elektroschock]

http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:32001R1049:EN:HTML
Article 4:

Article 4

Exceptions

1. The institutions shall refuse access to a document where disclosure would undermine the protection of:

(a) the public interest as regards:

- public security,

- defence and military matters,

- international relations,

- the financial, monetary or economic policy of the Community or a Member State;

(b) privacy and the integrity of the individual, in particular in accordance with Community legislation regarding the protection of personal data.

2. The institutions shall refuse access to a document where disclosure would undermine the protection of:

- commercial interests of a natural or legal person, including intellectual property,

- court proceedings and legal advice,

- the purpose of inspections, investigations and audits,

unless there is an overriding public interest in disclosure.

3. Access to a document, drawn up by an institution for internal use or received by an institution, which relates to a matter where the decision has not been taken by the institution, shall be refused if disclosure of the document would seriously undermine the institution's decision-making process, unless there is an overriding public interest in disclosure.

Access to a document containing opinions for internal use as part of deliberations and preliminary consultations within the institution concerned shall be refused even after the decision has been taken if disclosure of the document would seriously undermine the institution's decision-making process, unless there is an overriding public interest in disclosure.

4. As regards third-party documents, the institution shall consult the third party with a view to assessing whether an exception in paragraph 1 or 2 is applicable, unless it is clear that the document shall or shall not be disclosed.

5. A Member State may request the institution not to disclose a document originating from that Member State without its prior agreement.

6. If only parts of the requested document are covered by any of the exceptions, the remaining parts of the document shall be released.

7. The exceptions as laid down in paragraphs 1 to 3 shall only apply for the period during which protection is justified on the basis of the content of the document. The exceptions may apply for a maximum period of 30 years. In the case of documents covered by the exceptions relating to privacy or commercial interests and in the case of sensitive documents, the exceptions may, if necessary, continue to apply after this period.

as rnabffy said

[Anonymous Coward]

if they want to keep their spending quiet, they should pay for it out of their own pocket, not mine.

Re:Is the left hand even connected to the right ha

[Duckie01]

So let me make sure I understand ... this is basically the EU equivalent of a United States Senator [Marco Cappato, a Liberal member of the European Parliament] asking the House of Representatives [the European Council] for a contract the House negotiated on behalf of the government and getting denied?

Well yes at least to my understanding that would, unfortunately, be quite accurate.

I'm a EU citizen... I don't like this *at*all*.

Re:corepirate nazi legacy; death, debt, & dece

[khellendros1984]

....wut?

Stupidest possible excuse

[Spatial]

It's not in the public interest. Of course not! How would we know it was, since we can't see it? And since we can't see it, the problem doesn't exist!

Governments shouldn't be allowed to deny access to information of that sort. Oh, we're just signing this in your name and at your expense. What?! You want to see it? Hahaha!

Re:Stupidest possible excuse

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not in the public interest. Of course not! How would we know it was, since we can't see it? And since we can't see it, the problem doesn't exist!

Indeed... Only the public can say if something is in the public interest... so they're trying to hide something... and since it's worth hiding, it probably *is* in the public interest!

Governments shouldn't be allowed to deny access to information of that sort. Oh, we're just signing this in your name and at your expense. What?! You want to see it? Hahaha!

True that.

Re:Is the left hand even connected to the right ha

[Attila Dimedici]

So let me make sure I understand ... this is basically the EU equivalent of a United States Senator [Marco Cappato, a Liberal member of the European Parliament] asking the House of Representatives [the European Council] for a contract the House negotiated on behalf of the government and getting denied?

Actually, I think this is the EU equivalent of a member of the U.S. House of Representatives asking the U.S. Administration (the European Council) for information on how it is spending money.

Re:Is the left hand even connected to the right ha

[SwedishPenguin]

The European Parliament would be the equivalent of the House of Representatives. The European Council is a council comprising the heads of state of the member countries.

Its the kick back clause

[asamad]

The bit thats the most important is the kick back clause, the pollies don't want you to see how much they are getting for signing on the dotting line.

What happened to government for the people. sounds like government for the companies now

Re:Its the kick back clause

[Khisanth Magus]

This is something new?

Re:Its the kick back clause

[guruevi]

It's government for the people alright, their own and their closest friends that is.

More and more...

[NotQuiteReal]

Almost EVERYTHING governments do is not in the public interest.

Re:More and more...

[Anonymous Coward]

Almost EVERYTHING governments do is not in the public interest.

Cool your overheated rhetoric.
If you live in North America* or Western Europe, what you are saying is almost entirely false.
Government does millions of things every day that is in the public interest and they spend billions of dollars doing it.

*except for the Carribean

Ireland was right to say no ...

[The_Other_Kelly]

This is why Ireland said NO to the Lisbon treaty.

When you see the response of other EU nations,
you can *feel* the arrogance. Not just to the citizens,
but to smaller nations.

The EU is losing touch with basic democratic principles,
especially the concept of Accountability.

They have forgotten that they are servants of the people,
and need to be reminded.

Re:Ireland was right to say no ...

[Anonymous Coward]

If there's only ONE country in Europe that is allied with Microsoft, it's Ireland. This is because Microsoft does all business in Europe from Ireland, to avoid paying local taxes in the other countries. Thus what is good for Microsoft, is good for Ireland, and is bad for all others countries of the EU.

With all this, it is no surprise that the Irish commissioner McCreevy is one of the strongest partisans of software patents.

Re:Ireland was right to say no ...

[mrdarreng]

Wow, that took even less time than it did for us Americans!

Re:Ireland was right to say no ...

[kocsonya]

About this reminding... Should we all just send them a postcard, with a big "1789" written on it?

By the way, the system used on Tranai (see Robert Sheckley) is pretty efficient to keep the people's opinion in mind: every public servant has a big seal hanging from the neck. Now every citizen can go to the Voting Booth at any time and press the "like" or "dislike" button by the name of any politician. If there are too many "dislike"-s, then the seal, well, undergoes a very rapid exothermic behaviour, thus making the position vacant for an eager, new and hopefully more popular politician.

Re:Ireland was right to say no ...

[CrimsonAvenger]

By the way, the system used on Tranai (see Robert Sheckley) is pretty efficient to keep the people's opinion in mind: every public servant has a big seal hanging from the neck. Now every citizen can go to the Voting Booth at any time and press the "like" or "dislike" button by the name of any politician. If there are too many "dislike"-s, then the seal, well, undergoes a very rapid exothermic behaviour, thus making the position vacant for an eager, new and hopefully more popular politician.

I prefer the system on New Texas (H. Beam Piper), where "criticizing a practicing politician" is only illegal to the extent that he didn't deserve the level of criticism based on his public acts as a politician. Note that "criticizing a practicing politician" can be done with a machete, if a pistol is not to hand....

Re:Ireland was right to say no ...

[Anonymous Coward]

The EU is losing touch with basic democratic principles, especially the concept of Accountability.

Losing touch? Can you tell me when the EU has ever been in touch with democratic principles?

europa, europa

[pejyel]

just pointing out :

the Council acts moreless like the House of Representatives, however it is not elected (the EU Parliament is) - it is sometimes called the Council of Ministers, as it is only composed by ministers ("secretary of states" if you want) of each 27 countries of the EU.

On a more general note, this is a bit a lot of fuss about not much. The EU Council does sometimes act in strange ways, but this is not enough for me to lose the trust I have in the other two big EU institution (the Commission and the Parliament)

For those curious people among you, here's the Parliament page of Marco CAPPATO
I particularly appreciate reading the "Parliamentary activities" of my MEPs (check the bottom of the page).

Re:europa, europa

[Keith_Beef]

At last! congratulations on explaining that this is the Council, whose members are not directly elected to that office but who are there by virtue of being elected in their own countries.

This might also be the place to point out that Cappato is not a Liberal, but a member of Rosa nel Pugno, a socialist party; more specifically, a party of the radical left.

Just go to http://www.rosanelpugno.it/rosanelpugno/ for more proof.

Beef.

Re:europa, europa

[theaveng]

The EU Council sounds more like the U.S. Senate (each minister represents their respective state).

The EU Parliament sounds like the U.S. House (direct representation of the people).

And what did you expect?

[rossz]

Years ago when the idea of the EU was starting to form into something real, I commented to friends that it had the potential to make something great. I also said that given how governments loved control, it was pretty much guaranteed that they would fuck it up beyond belief. I nailed it (unfortunately).

Re:European Parliament

[pejyel]

When has the European Parliament and the public interest ever coincided?

Hum let me think ...
When it voted against the 3-strikes law for downloaders?
When it voted against software patents?
When it voted for restrictions on the use of radioactive weapons?
The EU Parliament can really hardly be criticized, except for the fact that it doesn't have that much power, which in my opinion is a real pity. Go troll elsewhere.

US vs. EU interests?

[jonaskoelker]

What really fascinates me is that the people high up in the EU governance food chain think that the business interests of a US company is more important to the citizens of the European Union than information about what their money is being spent on.

Re:US vs. EU interests?

[gbjbaanb]

except that I think we can guess what some of Microsoft's money is being spent on here.....

Re:US vs. EU interests?

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft pays taxes in every country where it has headquarters... that's at least France, the UK and Germany, and probably most of the other European countries.

Re:US vs. EU interests?

[Anonymous Coward]

But Americans have no idea where Hanky Panky Paulson is spending their trillions.

Re:US vs. EU interests?

[mrmeval]

I may be misinformed but in the US, goverment contracts are public except in very narrow situations such as classified military projects and intelligence agencies.

Re:US vs. EU interests?

[denobug]

I would bet you there is no exact public information on how much is Microsoft's contracts with the federal and state agencies (including public universities). You might find a few specific figures, but not every one of them (defense already excluded).

Re:US vs. EU interests?

[theaveng]

So much the European theory that a Socialist government will work for the people, not the corporations. That does not appear to be the case.

The fact is any government will work for whoever has the most money, regardless of its makeup. (Which is why government power needs to be strictly limited so as to minimize the damage.)

Re:US vs. EU interests?

[Elektroschock]

There is a clear problem that US companies have too much influence, in particular companies like Microsoft which don't adapt to the fact that the European Union is no domestic market. The feel very much at home and bully officials and throw lobby money around. Citizens have an access problem and parliament not complete budget control rights.

Re:US vs. EU interests?

[chrb]

True, MS will pay some small amount of tax in those countries, but the vast bulk of tax will be avoided through redirecting business through subsidiaries operating in low or zero tax regions. The European single market then allows these subsidiaries to supply any goods or services throughout Europe, whilst paying tax only to the low-tax rate country the subsidiary is registered in. For example, see Microsoft to hide Irish Tax Haven data of subsidiaries that have saved it billions of dollars in US taxes. Note their comment "Up to 50% of Irish corporate tax revenue may relate to taxes paid on income earned by US multinationals outside Ireland. Microsoft's effective global tax rate fell to 26 percent in its last fiscal year from 33 percent the year before. Nearly half of the drop was attributed to 'foreign earnings taxed at lower rates'"

For more examples of the fun corporations can have with cross-border EU trade and taxation, have a look at the practices of Tesco - they are a notorious tax avoider.

Re:US vs. EU interests?

[chrb]

Florian Mueller: "A local subsidiary like Microsoft UK or Microsoft Germany doesn't officially sell products. Those subsidiaries in the other 24 EU member states than Ireland only function as "marketing agencies". They get their costs reimbursed by the Irish operation but the profit itself is generated in Ireland where the tax rate is low. If they had any substantial profit in the UK or Germany, they'd pay a lot more than 10% on that."

Re:US vs. EU interests?

[Walter Carver]

That US company pays them.

That might explain

[Colin Smith]

Why systems keep failing, buildings keep costing hundreds of millions more than estimated...

It's like 700 million's worth of protection for corruption, incompetence, nepotism etc etc etc.

 

Hammers

[girlintraining]

This, from an authority whose Constitution is 349 pages long... Maybe they're afraid that if they release the terms to the public half the amazonian rain forest will disappear. Either that, or they followed the US strategy for government contracts; $500 for a hammer, $38 for an LED... God only knows what Microsoft bilked 'em for. Well in either case, it's a good thing our european friends learned how to manage their government from us... If they'd decided on transparency and openness in government, the terrorists would have won. /sarcasm

Putting Corporate Interests ahead of the People

[jvschwarz]

Did the Republicans move to Europe?

Re:Putting Corporate Interests ahead of the People

[Khisanth Magus]

You say that is if the democrats were any better. Both parties are just corporate patsies.

Re:US vs. EU interests (who cares?)

[Zarluk]

(...) here, there and also a (big) bit everywhere...

"Follow the money!". That's the (polititians) rule, both in EU and US (as in the rest ot the world, I'm afraid).

EU is a farce

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah you are so right!

The EU is a democratic farce. The parliament is democratically chosen but has bottomline no power. The EU commission is appointed by the EU country leaders. Oversight of EU is only internal.

And the EU "thing" (not sure what to call it otherwise) is pulling more power from the individual countries every year. Very worrisome.

But the old saying is "The people get the leaders they deserve"...

Re:EU is a farce

[Anonymous Coward]

Except that the EU constitution (Lisbon Treaty) was supposed to change that. Voting No was exactly the bad reaction for more democracy.

They're not talking about BIDS anyhow.

[Chas]

They're talking about contracts. Signed and sealed deals between MS and the EU. That gives zero competitive advantage to ANYONE, because the deal already went through, and the next time you have to compete with Microsoft on a completely different project.

Re:They're not talking about BIDS anyhow.

[pbhj]

[...] next time you have to compete with Microsoft on a completely different project.

Because providing an operating system license for 12000 computers is so completely different to providing an operating system license for 7600 ...

Re:They're not talking about BIDS anyhow.

[Chas]

If you're talking a site license that's 58% than another HELL YES.
What they lose on a per-seat basis, they make up for in bulk.

Not to mention other considerations. Nobody said these contracts were STRICTLY for OS licenses. That was just YOUR assumption, and an indicator that you haven't thought this through, let alone without anti-"Micro$chlock" bias.

Return when you're a little better armed informationally.

Re:They're not talking about BIDS anyhow.

[pbhj]

If you're talking a site license that's 58% than another HELL YES.
What they lose on a per-seat basis, they make up for in bulk.

Like duh. That was kinda assumed knowledge - all companies in the software field offering similar software will have similar scaling models for reducing per-seat cost for increased total, however. That was my point - knowing what MS offer for 12000 what-ever-me-things allows you to infer (as a competing business) the approximate price for 7600 (63%) and adjust your bid to be more "competitive" (which usually just means lowest in Governmental organisations where I am). And yes anyone with half-a-brain (such as myself) realises it matters how many sites those what-ever-me-things are across and the possibilities for upgrades, co-sales, etc..

Nobody said these contracts were STRICTLY for OS licenses. That was just YOUR assumption,

Nope. That was my example.

I'm not especially anti-microsoft (I use Vista occasionally, repair friends comps with MS without telling them zomg-you-must-get-teh-L1nu><-2b-leet and realise that most software has it's place). I'm anti government hiding what they do with our money.

This is why I voted no to Sweden joining EU

[Anonymous Coward]

Before Sweden joined EU, all Swedish authorities was required by law to give all information not protected because of personal integrity(*) to anyone who asked for them. They where, and still is, forbidden by law to even ask who the person is or how the information will be used (an official who ask these questions or try to investigate the requestee commit a crime). They can only require a small "copy fee", or if the data required is composed from several sources, the cost of assembling the data. To exclude information from being public, authorities had to specifically classify it and when they did, the classification in it self was public information and usually attracted media attention.

Now we are part of EU, where all information is automatically classified and only released to the public if it is deemed suitable. Because EU is involved in A LOT of things in Sweden, you can't expect authorities to give you any information you ask for anymore.

Worse yet, a lot of Swedish politicians use this to delegate things, where they don't want details to be known to the Swedish public, to EU. Where the political process is obscured. (Another reason to bring things up to EU level, is that EU allow "ministerstyre" of Swedish authorities, which is forbidden in Sweden, but legal, and common practise, in EU and all countries outside Scandinavia (there isn't even a word for it outside any Nordic country).)

(*) You can, for instance, require statistics from our public healthcare, but you can't ask for personal data unless it can be processed so that the patients can't be identified (and you have to pay for the cost of anonymising the information).

just a reply

[Anonymous Coward]

If EU disclosed what it's paying for their MS software everybody would want that deal. If everybody got that deal you should REALLY say godbye to any alternative :)

Military targets

[andersh]

So, tell me, where is the public information on military targets in the US? Or how about some information about the contracts with the military or the CIA? I'm not saying they have the right to hide everything, they do however have a certain discretion not to publish everything all the time.

If the terms stated that the contract was not to be made public - perhaps they had to stand by it?

Re:Military targets

[jcnnghm]

What does IT spending have to do with military targets? Before you go spouting off about how much you Europeans value "openness" and how superior you are, you should understand that this would never fly in the US, unless it was specifically related to national security. For example, I wanted to understand how government makes large software acquisitions, so I contacted my local public university, and asked for details about their Blackboard procurement. I met with the procurement team that bought the software, and we went over why they chose Blackboard, who bid, how much they bid, what options were presented, and how they defined value. That's open.

Re:Military targets

[Weedlekin]

"Before you go spouting off about how much you Europeans value "openness" and how superior you are, you should understand that this would never fly in the US, unless it was specifically related to national security."

http://www.motherjones.org/news/update/2004/05/05_401.html

By turning the responsibility for collecting, storing, and disseminating information on government contract details over to a private company, the Bush administration has effectively sealed them away from public scrutiny. So this sort of thing does indeed "fly in the US".

Re:Military targets

[jcnnghm]

It's so closed that a government website doesn't exist that lists every open non-security related active procurement in the federal government, along with all the related information (i.e. rfp, rfq, amendments, attachments) so that every citizen and business has the opportunity to review what the government is buying, how they are going about buying it, and to bid on selling it to them. I was unfamiliar with Mother Jones, but a quick glance at their front page makes it pretty clear where they stand. But do continue to froth at the mouth regarding the Bush administration, it makes it considerably easier to spot your bias and ignorance.

And by the way, outsourcing with oversight isn't a problem. In fact, Goddard Space Flight Center, the largest NASA space research laboratory, houses only 3,186 actual government employees, whereas the other 7,590 that report there work for the companies that NASA contracts to perform the work.

Here's what NASA has to say about it:

As the forthcoming National Academies panel report will note, industry has the flexibility to move engineers and managers among programs depending on customer needs, a key advantage for NASA in a constrained budget environment. Work contracted to the private sector also offers the agency the benefit of civil-military integration since so many aerospace companies maintain research and production lines in both sectors. Access to the people and technology in the companies that support the Department of Defense and Transportation will deliver significant benefits to NASA. We can summarize the third benefit of NASA contractor work in one word: relevance. Private sector work in the realm of aeronautics will ensure that federal research has relevance to engines and aircraft planned for public use. Research with product and application potential subsequently increases the nation's return-on-investment at several levels, such as job creation, increased tax revenue, new services, and technology spin-offs.

Private industry is also much more efficient than even an open government.

Re:Military targets

[Weedlekin]

"It's so closed that a government website [fbo.gov] doesn't exist that lists every open non-security related active procurement in the federal government, along with all the related information (i.e. rfp, rfq, amendments, attachments) so that every citizen and business has the opportunity to review what the government is buying, how they are going about buying it, and to bid on selling it to them."

None of which has anything whatsoever to do with the topic being discussed, which concerns the ability to view _existing contracts_ between suppliers and publicly funded national governments or supra-national organisations such as the EU. If you want to use straw men instead of actually answering the points, then you should be aware of the fact that I will (a) call you out when you do, and (b) regard it as indicating that you're resorting to a base debating tactic because you're not capable of coming up with any valid refutations.

" I was unfamiliar with Mother Jones, but a quick glance at their front page makes it pretty clear where they stand. But do continue to froth at the mouth regarding the Bush administration, it makes it considerably easier to spot your bias and ignorance."

So now we can add shooting the messenger when you can't handle the message to the list of your cheap debating tricks.

"And by the way, outsourcing with oversight isn't a problem."

It is a problem when said outsourcing is used to put public data into the hands of private corporations, where it isn't subject to freedom of information laws.

"In fact, Goddard Space Flight Center, the largest NASA space research laboratory, houses only 3,186 actual government employees, whereas the other 7,590 that report there work for the companies that NASA contracts to perform the work."

Which again has no relevance to the topic, because paying private companies or individuals to do jobs with public money is a very different proposition from giving them a gatekeeper role for information that was gathered with that public money and concerns how said public money is being spent on non-security related projects. Whichever way you try and argue it, the effect of this is that a central information database which was previously accessible to anyone under freedom of information laws is now in the hands of a private corporation that is exempt from those laws, and can either refuse to divulge certain pieces of information, or place such a prohibitive price on accessing them that the effect is the same as a refusal.

"Private industry is also much more efficient than even an open government."

That statement might have carried a lot more weight before governments all over the world had to use huge amounts of public money to pull a whole bunch of private industries out of some disastrous holes they'd dug themselves into.

Re:Military targets

[jcnnghm]

My god this was difficult to find. Your argument amounts to nothing more than liberal pontificating.

Re:Military targets

[Weedlekin]

"My god this [contractdirectory.gov] was difficult to find [google.com]."

You could have avoided embarrassing yourself yet again if you'd actually bothered to read the single paragraph Slashdot topic summary (which is, somewhat unusually, fairly accurate) instead of repeatedly shooting your mouth off from the hip. You would then be aware of the fact that the MEP was asking to _see the contracts_ between MS and the European Council, not 4 lines of text telling him what any EU citizen can find out for themselves from publicly available sources.

Already done

[andersh]

Really? So the public should be able to view your tax returns?

We already have that in Scandinavia, you can search them online or visit the tax office and request them.

The newspapers usually make quite a deal out of it, showing the highest earners for each county and so on.

Yeah whatever

[Nicolas MONNET]

This has nothing to do with the Lisbon treaty; and in fact the treaty would have made the parliament more powerful over the council, so you're just wrong.

Compared to what's going on

[Nicolas MONNET]

This is a pretty minor setback. The Parliament and then the Commission have, for example, rejected the three strike BS, as well as software patents in the past, for example.

And on top of that this is just an isolated story without any context. Don't make a mountain out of it. This is probably something that needs looking into though.

Re:Well that's just a load of BS, lemme tell you..

[Ihmhi]

It's okay. We all learned about this kinda stuff back in primary school - context clues.

Judging from the information at hand, I would say that the message somehow relates to chilled urine.

"Agreed"????

[Joce640k]

This is taxpayer money, all bidding on IT contracts should be open. How else can we ensure the best deal for the taxpayer?

Protection of Commercial Interests

[PPH]

I wonder if Tony Soprano could use this same defense.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Is the left hand even connected to the right ha

[Yvanhoe]

Almost. The European Council is comprised of the heads of state of all the EU countries. In practice, they all send non-elected representative there. It is notoriously the most corrupt part of the EU bureaucracy. They have tried to sneak a software patent law in EU law for a long time and often favored MS. While I am quite proud of the cleanliness of the European Parliament and its elected members, I am ashamed at the stupidity-driven thing that is the European Council.

Re:Is the left hand even connected to the right ha

[Anonymous Coward]

Not exactly :
  - EU parliament US Congres (Senate + House)
  - EU Council (EU heads of state + the President of the EU Commission) sort of presidential administration in US

Re:European Parliament

[emj]

But the processes of getting those decisions are nerve wrecking, and you really feel like you have no chance of affecting their decision.

Zero Price? Try bribe

[CarpetShark]

Microsoft have been involved in a number of government-level bribes, so saying that their "prices [likely] dipped to near-zero" is a bit of an understatement.

Re:Is the left hand even connected to the right ha

[theaveng]

The EU Council doesn't sound any worse than how the U.S. Senate operates. Although each Senator is elected, in practice they represent the interests of the State Legislature.

Re:Is the left hand even connected to the right ha

[theaveng]

In the U.S. the administration cannot refuse that request, because the House would then stop providing the money.

Re:Zero Price? Try bribe

[rbanffy]

Actually, I wouldn't be at all surprised if their prices dropped below zero. I gather they have, in certain circumstances, dropped far below that point.

Secretariat denies access

[Anonymous Coward]

The Nazi state rises again -- but now it's all of EU!

Direct Democracy

[mahadiga]

Wouldn't it be prudent to engage http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_democracy in such non-trivial issues

Re:Is the left hand even connected to the right ha

[Anonymous Coward]

It's even worse... The EU fined Microsoft for abusive monopolistic position, yet they contarct with them and do all they can to maintain this monopoly... http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/02/27/1152208

Re:Is the left hand even connected to the right ha

[Yvanhoe]

Comparing any parliament to the US senate is a very pessimistic bias...

Re:Is the left hand even connected to the right ha

[Duckie01]

Appears that my understanding was wrong :) See the other comments.

Still don't like it though.

Openness

[andersh]

What does IT spending have to do with military targets?

I didn't say they had. However it's a perfectly good example of why they might have the right to keep some information secret. I also ended my post with a reference to the contract and it's terms. I see you chose to ignore that?

I love how you "struck" back by calling my attitude arrogant and superior. That's about what I expected, or you would denounce my "socialist" ways.

I did not claim superiority, simply that we often are open in ways the US might not be.

For example you can search online and look up all tax forms for every citizen in my country. Or how about the email of the prime minister? All the incoming and outgoing documents for each and every public office?

I'm sure you have access to public information in the US too, but can you accept my claim that in some ways we do things differently?

Promoting Collusion

[jawahar]

I read this in some forum
Closed source software businesses promote Collusion
Open source software businesses promote Competition