On Sat, 15 Nov 2003 08:31, Kantor, Gary wrote: > industrialized world. Furthermore, none of these other > countries have utilized an open-source approach-instead, > they established standards for the EHR-for the underly-ing > data types, and for a reference information model. In > countries such as England and Australia, a small number of > vendors (typically 2 to 4) then established a major market > share.
Ah, but that's our doom. Currently we are wasting money and effort in horrible ways just in order to overcome this vendor lock in. Once you have a few fat cats, it is close to impossible to establish any form of interoperability or standards without legislation. A rough estimate on money the Australian government has wasted in countless projects that try to overcome the damages the vendor dominance created suggests that for less than half the money the perfect open source solution could have been financed. Horst -- A non-free program is a predatory social system that keeps people in a state of domination and division, and uses the spoils to dominate more. -- Richard Stallman
