I received a summary of the Dutch Open Source consultation document today. In the coming weeks I will make summaries of the individual contributions. I received also a general summary which calls upon the government not to drag its tail any longer.
The government has to set a date when the introduction and the use of open standards should be enforced, even in combination with sanctions. That is one of the most important conclusions of the public consultation about the government policy ICT & OS/OSS, organized by the Dutch chapter of the Internet Society (ISOC.nl), the foundation Livre, Media Update and foundation Holland Open. From the consultation round it has become clear that an overwhelming majority (86%) thinks that the government should oblige its contractors to fulfil a list of desirable, less desirable and absolutely undesirable database formats. A majority of 90% thinks that the Dutch government should contribute to the standardization work such as W3C, IETF and OASIS; the government should also play an active part in the development of relevant open source software for its own activities. Government should be reserve a percentage of its ICT budget to track, develop or have developed as well as stimulate open source software.
In education individual closed commercial applications should be stopped and the digital socialisation should be started up seriously. Many respondents think that the present ICT education consists of training people to execute tricks in certain software packages and not in the teaching of real skills.
The most important priority should lie in a clear choice in favour of specific open standards and open source software, where possible, so that software manufacturers can produce the needed software. Software which should be developed or new to install software should make use of open standards. Use of non-standards should be frozen and new closed formats should not be allowed. Besides, a multi-platform should be enforced. When this is not happen, robustness, safety, innovation power and economic interests of The Netherlands will be harmed.
Blog Posting Number: 782
Tags: OSS
Showing posts with label Holland Open. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Holland Open. Show all posts
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
Dutch Open Source consultation (1)
I am not in The Netherlands, but I wish I was there today. This afternoon a consultation document about Open Source was presented to the Dutch vice-minister of Economic Affairs. It is not the hottest thing on the list of the vice-minister, but he wanted to make time for it as he considers it an important subject.
And he better considers it an important subject as in the past years lip service was paid to the subject, but no real actions came about. So some months ago the idea came up to organise conference around the theme of Open Source. This was not new, but it would have been a great occasion to explore the opportunities in government and democracy. The idea of a conference was not very welcome with civil servants, who had received the task to write a document for parliament telling about the priorities and plans for the future.
This was in fact unbelievable. In an open source environment civil servant do not push citizens to participate in writing a policy document on Open Source and the future of it in The Netherlands and Europe. At that time the idea came up to use internet and start a open consultation and offer this to a cabinet minister. And thus the open consultation round came about. Together with the Dutch ISOC chapter, the foundation Livre and Media Update and foundation Holland Open a press release was sent out.
Of course the initiators were afraid that no one would jump to the opportunity, except for one lonely heart, deploring the negligence of the past cabinets. But to their surprise the anxious expectations were not met. More than 30 documents arrived with surprising proposals and potential policy measures. So the vice-minister of Economic Affairs - and not of Internal Affairs as planned - did accept the document.
So the ball is now in his court. He will have the document of the civil servants, but also a document of concerned and well informed citizens. In principle he has now everything in his hands in order to set out a policy for the coming cabinet period and execute it; for that was what was lacking since the policy document and motions of 2002.
It is too simple to say that Open Source would save the country a lot of money. But is is certain that Open Source would generate a lot of useful software for government, schools and libraries as well as for citizens.
Blog Posting Number: 781
Tgas: OSS
And he better considers it an important subject as in the past years lip service was paid to the subject, but no real actions came about. So some months ago the idea came up to organise conference around the theme of Open Source. This was not new, but it would have been a great occasion to explore the opportunities in government and democracy. The idea of a conference was not very welcome with civil servants, who had received the task to write a document for parliament telling about the priorities and plans for the future.
This was in fact unbelievable. In an open source environment civil servant do not push citizens to participate in writing a policy document on Open Source and the future of it in The Netherlands and Europe. At that time the idea came up to use internet and start a open consultation and offer this to a cabinet minister. And thus the open consultation round came about. Together with the Dutch ISOC chapter, the foundation Livre and Media Update and foundation Holland Open a press release was sent out.
Of course the initiators were afraid that no one would jump to the opportunity, except for one lonely heart, deploring the negligence of the past cabinets. But to their surprise the anxious expectations were not met. More than 30 documents arrived with surprising proposals and potential policy measures. So the vice-minister of Economic Affairs - and not of Internal Affairs as planned - did accept the document.
So the ball is now in his court. He will have the document of the civil servants, but also a document of concerned and well informed citizens. In principle he has now everything in his hands in order to set out a policy for the coming cabinet period and execute it; for that was what was lacking since the policy document and motions of 2002.
It is too simple to say that Open Source would save the country a lot of money. But is is certain that Open Source would generate a lot of useful software for government, schools and libraries as well as for citizens.
Blog Posting Number: 781
Tgas: OSS
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
