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Economic Impact of FLOSS and The Power of Lobbyists
EC rebuffs Microsoft over open-source report
This piece from ZDNet Europe paints a fascinating picture of the heavy
pressure Microsoft brings to bear on governments and other bodies that dare
highlight the advantages of open source software. I haven't had a chance to
read the report yet (it is 287 pages), but it is obviously a must read for
anyone in the open source community. Some interesting kernels from the
Executive Summary:
This existing base of FLOSS software represents a lower bound of about
131 000 real person-years of effort that has been devoted exclusively by
programmers. As this is mostly by individuals not directly paid for
development, it represents a significant gap in national accounts of
productivity. Annualised and adjusted for growth this represents at least
Euro 800 million in voluntary contribution from programmers alone each year,
of which nearly half are based in Europe.
Defined broadly, FLOSS-related services could reach a 32% share of all
IT services by 2010, and the FLOSS-related share of the economy could reach
4% of European GDP by 2010.
Proprietary packaged software firms account for well below 10% of
employment of software developers in the U.S., and "IT user" firms account
for over 70% of software developers employed with a similar salary (and thus
skill) level. This suggests a relatively low potential for cannibalisation
of proprietary software jobs by FLOSS, and suggests a relatively high
potential for software developer jobs to become increasingly FLOSS- related.
FLOSS potentially saves industry over 36% in software R&D investment
that can result in increased profits or be more usefully spent in further
innovation.
The notional value of Europe's investment in FLOSS software today is
Euro 22 billion (36 billion in the US) representing 20.5% of total software
investment (20% in the US).
Europe faces three scenarios: CLOSED, where existing business models are
entrenched through legal and technical regulation, favouring a passive
consumer model over new businesses supporting active participation in an
information society of "prosumers"; GENERIC, where current mixed policies
lead to a gradual growth of FLOSS while many of the opportunities it
presents are missed; VOLUNTARY, where policies and the market develop to
recognise and utilise the potential of FLOSS and similar collaborative
models of creativity to harness the full power of active citizens in the
information society.
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/software/0,1000000121,39285848,00.htm?r=5
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