Beyond the Code
or, how to win friends, influence people and make a living by writing open source software. It's not just about the code.
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Friday 26 June 2009, 12:28 PM
Government attitude to open source improving?
There was some concern at the time that this would merely end up funding the purchase or creation of proprietary software whose value was lost to the taxpayer after creation. A petition was created at the Number 10 web site on the subject.
Now the Government has responded, and the news is good. While not everything that's being funded will be written from scratch, there's a commitment to using existing open source software where possible, and that most councils receiving funding will release any new code under an open source licence. Number 10 claims to be working on the remaining few councils.
PreviousComments on this post
Labour are just paying lip service to FOSS. All UK gov-encouraged council daliancies with open source have been scams - e.g. Birmingham City Council, Newham. Only where councils have quietly done their own thing are there successes - e.g. Bristol, Carmarthenshire, Powys, Oldham.
The Tories are far more together when it comes to FOSS and Open Standards. The Greens are also very progressive.
Sadly, the incumbents have run out of ideas, morals and desire. Nevermind, I'm sure they'll be lots of new Non-Exec Directorships next year at BT, EDS, Fujitsu, Capgemini, HP, IBM, Capita, Dell, Serco and CSC for ousted government grandees to fill.
