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On Fri, Dec 04, 2009 at 08:42:57PM +0000, james kilty wrote: > Hello > > I mentioned I had written to my (Lib Dem) MP about the Conservstive > response to Labour Government IT policy and reminded him that previous > replies from ministers about things I had asked about suggested they had > little understanding of IT and the politics of proprietary software. I > suggested we as a LUG might at least give an outline of an ideal > Government policy on IT, which he would forward to Don Foster who is > Shadow Secretary for Culture, Media and Sport. > > He said that the Party has a proud tradition of consideration for the > productive use of modern IT. > > Is anyone willing to start this off? This would be a chance to summarise > the ways you would solve the major issues in respect of IT in the UK and > promote best practices for the present and future. > I have had a series of emails with DCC: no reply to the latest. Email me off list if you want to see the latest. I am still surprised that when increasing numbers of organisations around the world use FLOSS, so few UK organisations do. For example while your MP says that the liberal party has a proud consideration for the productive use of modern IT: my liberal candidate uses proprietary software and shows no inclination to try FLOSS. The major parties are all short of funds: I do not understand why they do not ask one of the major IT companies for assistance to upgrade to FLOSS. Finally after reading the comments from Simon, Neil and Adrian; I still cannot understand why the UK government does not mandate the Dutch model: - If public funds are used for software then approval requires GPL - If the required software is not GPL, then additional separate approval must be obtained from Central Government. My suspicion is that public bodies do not want to switch to FLOSS for one of the following reasons: - Our contracts specify proprietary software. - The current system works (aka the devil we know is better that the devil we don't) - When we have looked at it, we have looked with a view to seeing how it will not work. We have not tried to think how we can make it work. - We do not know our current software will run on it. - We have data sharing agreements that run on proprietary models -- Henry Photocopies or faxes of my signature are not binding. This email has been signed with an electronic signature in accordance with subsection 7(3) of the Electronic Communications Act 2000. Digital Key Signature: GPG RSA 0xFB447AA1 Mon Dec 7 17:14:39 GMT 2009
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