Well, there you go...
The only way for Open Source to compete is to produce ONE software
suit strong enough to challenge the dominance and powerful
strangle-hold of the giants right across citizens, businesses, and
governments worldwide.
The tendency amongst Linux/Open Source developers is to compete
against one another for top spot of the very small OS/FOS market
instead of joining together to produce ONE suit capable of use by the
people who are stuck with the giants because, quite simply, the giants
are the ONLY ones producing common-use software suits capable of
widespread use.
As a long-time 'Windows power user' (MS Office) who is trying to break
free and use OS or FOS products instead, I have not yet found an Open
Source product that is good enough to use beyond a very small circle
of Linux enthusiasts. The lack of manufacturers producing Linux
drivers for their products is a straight indication that they do not
see Linux/OS/FOS as a viable market either, and the ever-changing
kaleidoscope of Linux/OS/FOS offerings isn't helping because it is not
producing a stable product for manufacturers to focus upon.
Some body, the ideal would be Linus Torvalds himself, needs to develop
a specification for the OS/FOS developer community to aim for as the
greatest product for the greatest common good. Quite simply, 'equal to
or better than MS-Office' would be a great start, and one that would
enable greatest numbers of users to inter-act with each other right
across the user spectrum. The government (civil servants who are
supposed to work for and represent us!) would come under greater
pressure to yield, and (hopefully) the giants would then wither down
to size. I feel sure that there are growing millions would gladly pay
a contribution toward development costs as the price for such a product.
Reflecting on the recent 'consultation', there is something
intrinsically wrong about the 'our' government using our collective
buying power to negotiate bulk-buy licences and then keeping the
benefit just for themselves while leaving citizens citizens and
business to pay much higher licence fees. A petition calling for the
UK government to negotiate a bulk-buy price for the entire nation (who
they purport to represent and who pay for the entire operation and
their wages!) instead of negotiating just for themselves would
indicate that they are 'our government' and really do have our best
interest at heart.
Meantime, keep a watch on farm animals for any sign of pigs preparing to fly.
Charles Miller
Quoting Terry Coles <[email protected]>:
On Saturday 31 Mar 2012 12:31:12 Terry Coles wrote:
On Tuesday 27 Mar 2012 11:10:27 [email protected] wrote:
> This 'Consultation' will support the lobbing giants as I am sure it is
> designed to do. I am keeping my eyes, and hopes, on developing Open
> Source offerings.
You could be right....
http://www.computerweekly.com/blogs/public-sector/2012/03/microsoft-redeploy
s- ooxml-in-o.html
Well you were right:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/apr/27/microsoft-government-
consultation.
Basically, it turns out that one of the public consultation meetings was
facilitated by a consultant who was also being paid by Microsoft to
'advise on
issues arising'. He never divulged the relationship and the results of his
meeting has now had to be dropped. To give you a flavour of his results (in
case you thought this might be co-incidence):
'he wrote that the "gut feel" among the majority of the 16 attendees was that
open standards would be "detrimental" to innovation and competition.'
If you visit the consultation website and follow the links to the questions,
you will see that most of the respondents to the web consultation were very
pro Open and in some cases openly anti Microsoft, so his findings are
completely at odds with the real world.
Elsewhere in the article, it is suggested that Microsoft are paying
lawyers to
stack the meetings. This is straight out of Microsoft's play book
and exactly
how they got OOXML through ISO.
The story about Microsoft's dirty tricks was started by Glyn Moody. His blog
is at:
http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/2012/04/how-microsoft-
lobbied-against-true-open-standards-i/index.htm
and here is the Government announcement:
http://digital.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/2012/04/26/open-standards-consultation-
important-update/
--
Terry Coles
64 bit computing with Kubuntu Linux
--
Next meeting: Bournemouth, Tuesday 2012-05-01 20:00
Meets, Mailing list, IRC, LinkedIn, ... http://dorset.lug.org.uk/
New thread on mailing list: mailto:[email protected]
How to Report Bugs Effectively: http://goo.gl/4Xue
--
Next meeting: Bournemouth, Tuesday 2012-05-01 20:00
Meets, Mailing list, IRC, LinkedIn, ... http://dorset.lug.org.uk/
New thread on mailing list: mailto:[email protected]
How to Report Bugs Effectively: http://goo.gl/4Xue
