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Mandatory Use of Open Standards In Hungary
qpeter writes "Hungarian Parliament has made the use of open standards mandatory by law in the intercommunication between public administration offices, public utility companies, citizens and voluntarily joining private companies, conducted via the central governmental system. The Open Standards Alliance initiating the amendment aims to promote the spread of monopoly-free markets that foster the development of interchangeable and interoperable products generated by open standards, and, consequently, broad competition markets, regardless of whether the IT systems of interconnecting organizations and individuals use open or closed source software. In the near future, in spite of EU tendencies the Alliance seeks to make its approach – interoperability based on publicly defined open standards – the EU norm under the Hungarian presidency of the European Union in 2011. To that end, it will promote public collaboration – possibly between every interested party, civil and political organization in the European Union. What do you think: what would be the best way to cooperate?"
Yes, but open standards mean that just about any open program can read them. For example, it doesn't matter if I choose to use the open WAV, FLAC or OGG Vorbis file format, the default media player in Ubuntu can play it. The more closed the file is, the fewer programs will open it.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
Of course, the major players just redefine their file formats to be "open standards". And then make those "standards" insanely complex to make sure only their products can render documents using that format, while competitors need to spend man-years implementing them, just in time for the "standard" to be improved for the next release by MS/Adobe.
Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
Don't forget the typos and "unintentional" omissions in the proprietary standards and of course the "reasonable fees" to purchase the standards documentation.
Nullius in verba
Well more to the point. You release a file format and say this is the format used by our tool. But because your tool is closed sourced nobody actually knows if you are telling the truth. Another way is to release a container format within which you encode your propitiatory format.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
Not yet. The original is here, we will publish if translated.
Well, then those software publishers finally have to compete on quality, not lock-in, and write software that is good at impementing the standard to win the bid.
Want to hear the voice of GOD? cat
I'm unable to understand the main post (too much legal and technical jargon for my largely forgotten Hungarian knowledge), but I can read many of the comments.
Someone specifically asked about docx and a comment reply said that docx would be allowed because of the ISO decision (in which Hungary supported making docx an ISO standard). Both the query and response were from ACs, but the response certainly seems plausible to me.
The story of Hungary's ultimate support for Microsoft in the ISO is a long and twisted tale which I was only able to partially follow.
Prime numbers are exactly what Alan Greenspan says they are -S. Minsky
Of course, the major players just redefine their file formats to be "open standards".
In Hungary, we have a standards body that decides which formats are actually "open". Oh, and it's made up of engineers, not politicians.
.... why are his arms like five feet away from his body? I would imagine that that is a far more pressing concern than whatever's whooshing overhead.