From andyo at oreilly.com Tue Dec 1 08:59:36 2009 From: andyo at oreilly.com (Andy Oram) Date: Tue, 1 Dec 2009 09:59:36 -0500 (EST) Subject: [acquisitions-wg] [report-card] Getting Started In-Reply-To: <4B13BB2E.9030709@canonical.com> Message-ID: <12326329.521711259679576513.JavaMail.root@ball.east.ora.com> We seem to skipped some steps in the traditional development of a working group: although OSA as a whole has a mission statement, the acquisitions working group could benefit from its own mission statement. These activities seem time-consuming and bureaucratic, but they do help to get people excited about the group and help everyone focus on what is really important. I'm willing to go along, whether we focus on open source software or on the larger openness goal in government. Andy From john.pugh at canonical.com Tue Dec 1 09:30:48 2009 From: john.pugh at canonical.com (John M. Pugh) Date: Tue, 01 Dec 2009 10:30:48 -0500 Subject: [acquisitions-wg] [report-card] Getting Started In-Reply-To: <12326329.521711259679576513.JavaMail.root@ball.east.ora.com> References: <12326329.521711259679576513.JavaMail.root@ball.east.ora.com> Message-ID: <4B1536A8.5070307@canonical.com> On 12/01/2009 09:59 AM, Andy Oram wrote: > We seem to have skipped some steps in the traditional development of a working group: although OSA as a whole has a mission statement, the acquisitions working group could benefit from its own mission statement. These activities seem time-consuming and bureaucratic, but they do help to get people excited about the group and help everyone focus on what is really important. I'm willing to go along, whether we focus on open source software or on the larger openness goal in government. > > Andy I strongly believe that we must align to what we want to accomplish in any task. You must have an end result in mind - like climbing a mountain or driving to a destination - there is an end result to are striving to accomplish. For starters the end result for the "report card" working group is to show the target audience how they are performing when it comes to the adoption of open source software. The path to that end result is through changing how open government occurs to the target audience. This is accomplished by using generative language to suggest or enroll them in new possibilities. I agree with Andy that the conversation is sided a bit too strongly on the side of open government without the proper correlation to generate the possibility mentioned earlier. Having not dug deeply into the acquisitions working group's role, I am not prepared to bring a message forward, but having read what Gunnar is attempting to accomplish I can intelligently describe a route I believe is appropriate. JP From Chris.Hankin at Sun.COM Tue Dec 1 11:08:36 2009 From: Chris.Hankin at Sun.COM (Chris Hankin) Date: Tue, 01 Dec 2009 09:08:36 -0800 Subject: [acquisitions-wg] [report-card] Getting Started In-Reply-To: <4B1536A8.5070307@canonical.com> References: <12326329.521711259679576513.JavaMail.root@ball.east.ora.com> <4B1536A8.5070307@canonical.com> Message-ID: <4B154D94.4070507@Sun.COM> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From andyo at oreilly.com Thu Dec 3 15:43:42 2009 From: andyo at oreilly.com (Andy Oram) Date: Thu, 3 Dec 2009 16:43:42 -0500 (EST) Subject: [acquisitions-wg] FSF: EC caves in to proprietary lobbyists on interoperability Message-ID: <8516422.591271259876622272.JavaMail.root@ball.east.ora.com> I haven't seen the EC report that the FSF criticizes, but it seems like Europe took a small step backward: http://www.fsfe.org/news/2009/news-20091127-01.en.html Andy From davidlopezberzosa at googlemail.com Fri Dec 4 04:15:05 2009 From: davidlopezberzosa at googlemail.com (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?David_L=F3pez?=) Date: Fri, 4 Dec 2009 11:15:05 +0100 Subject: [acquisitions-wg] FSF: EC caves in to proprietary lobbyists on interoperability In-Reply-To: <8516422.591271259876622272.JavaMail.root@ball.east.ora.com> References: <8516422.591271259876622272.JavaMail.root@ball.east.ora.com> Message-ID: <28c14eff0912040215g81abdc8j97f722d594fe07ee@mail.gmail.com> With regards to interoperability in Europe please find attached the English version of a Spanish law (2007) establishing a legal framework for accessible, interoperable eServices in public administrations. It is a long document but it contains important definitions of electronic services as far as administrations and citizenship are concerned: 1- It defines what's considered as open standards (page 27). 2- It forces public administrations and large companies with relevant services for the society (gas, power, telcos, ) to provision interoperable && accessible services in the Internet. Point 2 is paramount as it breaks vertical integration of components (backend, middleware, frontend and user interface) thus creating new market opportunities. For instance last summer it was not possible to purchase a train ticket with Google Chrome, guess which browser was required ? 3- It raises telematic services to the same status as traditional channels to conduct administrative processes (regular mail, fax, etc). Point 3 gives citizens the right to use electronic services, again creating market opportunities by forcing administrations to move on into the digital era (and in doing so providing incentives for sofware companies and large contractors to "go along") In my humble opinion a market oriented approach focused on citizens' rights is the way to go rather than enforcing interoperability (or any other technical consideration) "per se". Keeping the discourse in terms of citizens and our rights to speak electronically no matter the gadget (expensive, cheap, adapted to my cognitive abilites) is simple, straight to the point and above all it avoids technical complexities which may not be properly understood by non-technical people. Some may claim that forcing administrations to adapt to a panoply of potential means of access imposes huge economist costs, in this case the option is simple:produce interoperable services and technologies ex-ante. I hope it helps to start the discussion up. Cheers PD: This mail has been suggested by a friend of mine who prefers to remain in the background (thanks him for the pointer) :) On Thu, Dec 3, 2009 at 10:43 PM, Andy Oram wrote: > I haven't seen the EC report that the FSF criticizes, but it seems like > Europe took a small step backward: > > http://www.fsfe.org/news/2009/news-20091127-01.en.html > > Andy > > _______________________________________________ > acquisitions-wg mailing list > acquisitions-wg at opensourceforamerica.org > http://opensourceforamerica.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/acquisitions-wg > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: LAW_11-2007_22Jun2007_eGov_Spain (1).pdf Type: application/pdf Size: 222354 bytes Desc: not available URL: From andyo at oreilly.com Tue Dec 8 11:02:05 2009 From: andyo at oreilly.com (Andy Oram) Date: Tue, 8 Dec 2009 12:02:05 -0500 (EST) Subject: [acquisitions-wg] Today's open government directive In-Reply-To: <25302775.656091260291538905.JavaMail.root@ball.east.ora.com> Message-ID: <25472401.656171260291725441.JavaMail.root@ball.east.ora.com> This is worth reading or at least skimming. Particularly relevant to this list is the brief reference to open formats (undefined): http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/microsites/ogi-directive.pdf There's also a progress report, etc., see http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2009/12/08/promoting-transparency-government. Andy From tim.ganter at studiotenfour.com Tue Dec 8 11:13:38 2009 From: tim.ganter at studiotenfour.com (Tim Ganter) Date: Tue, 8 Dec 2009 09:13:38 -0800 Subject: [acquisitions-wg] Today's open government directive In-Reply-To: <25472401.656171260291725441.JavaMail.root@ball.east.ora.com> References: <25302775.656091260291538905.JavaMail.root@ball.east.ora.com> <25472401.656171260291725441.JavaMail.root@ball.east.ora.com> Message-ID: Cool, thanks Andy. Do you happen to know if the date at the top of the directive is really 2008 or is it supposed to be 2009? -Tim On Tue, Dec 8, 2009 at 9:02 AM, Andy Oram wrote: > This is worth reading or at least skimming. Particularly relevant to this > list is the brief reference to open formats (undefined): > > http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/microsites/ogi-directive.pdf > > There's also a progress report, etc., see > http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2009/12/08/promoting-transparency-government > . > > Andy > > _______________________________________________ > acquisitions-wg mailing list > acquisitions-wg at opensourceforamerica.org > http://opensourceforamerica.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/acquisitions-wg > -- Studio Ten Four, LLC www.studiotenfour.com -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From andyo at oreilly.com Tue Dec 8 11:43:43 2009 From: andyo at oreilly.com (Andy Oram) Date: Tue, 8 Dec 2009 12:43:43 -0500 (EST) Subject: [acquisitions-wg] Today's open government directive In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <31320214.657481260294223104.JavaMail.root@ball.east.ora.com> Looks like an embarrassing typo. The blog, dated today, said that the directive was being released today--and it couldn't have been done in 2008. And ----- Original Message ----- From: "Tim Ganter" To: acquisitions-wg at opensourceforamerica.org Sent: Tuesday, December 8, 2009 12:13:38 PM GMT -05:00 US/Canada Eastern Subject: Re: [acquisitions-wg] Today's open government directive Cool, thanks Andy. Do you happen to know if the date at the top of the directive is really 2008 or is it supposed to be 2009? -Tim From andyo at oreilly.com Thu Dec 24 10:41:55 2009 From: andyo at oreilly.com (Andy Oram) Date: Thu, 24 Dec 2009 11:41:55 -0500 (EST) Subject: [acquisitions-wg] Univ. of Massachusetts, Amherst puts out RFP on "The politics of open source" In-Reply-To: <14672281.98601261672881129.JavaMail.root@ball.east.ora.com> Message-ID: <7662366.98621261672915645.JavaMail.root@ball.east.ora.com> Someone who's in New England or willing to travel may find it worth submitting a paper. In fact, I think OSA should collaborate on submitting a paper and choose someone to present it: http://www.umass.edu/jitp/ Andy From andyo at oreilly.com Tue Dec 29 21:39:02 2009 From: andyo at oreilly.com (Andy Oram) Date: Tue, 29 Dec 2009 22:39:02 -0500 (EST) Subject: [acquisitions-wg] Preparations for conference presentation and other OSA work Message-ID: <6130640.111821262144342573.JavaMail.root@ball.east.ora.com> After participating for a few weeks on several OSA lists, I felt that the volunteers on these lists needed some guidelines for moving forward. I'd like to ask for all your help in making some basic definitions and plans. I'm posting this message during a holiday period (a bad time to ask for help from some people, but an especially good time for others) because I want to put together a proposal to present a session about OSA's work at an upcoming conference (which I already posted to this list: University of Massachusetts, Amherst, May 6-7, http://www.umass.edu/jitp/) and the deadline for submissions is January 10. I think some definitions around which we need clarity include: * What is an open standard? To illustrate the importance of this question, just look at the confusion around OOXML, which I trust would not be considered an open standard or even a viable standard by the members of this list. * How do government agencies evaluate free software for adoption? There are certainly precedents in both government and business. * Is it useful to acquire free software in a context that imposes restrictions, such as Red Hat's contracts (which restrict changes and installations of new software), mobile devices that are locked down (remember that mobile devices are growing in importance in many organizations), or trusted computer systems (also likely to become mainstream)? * Given that conventional TCO and ROI calculations don't account for many of the potential benefits and costs of migration to free software, what financial and qualitative guidelines can we offer for making the decision? I now have some questions for organizers who are close to the OSA center: * Have the questions I've asked been answered already? * Are there people on these mailing lists who work in government and deal directly with the issues I've talked about, such as acquisition? Are there advisors or lobbyists on these lists who interact closely with such government staff? * Are there people in OSA officially tasked with making presentations such as the one I mentioned ? Regarding recent documents circulated on these lists about transparency in government: I think these are fine, and I don't want anyone to doubt that I see the value of transparency. In fact, I can show my commitment to it through a series I wrote on that topic last summer: http://radar.oreilly.com/2009/06/personal-democracy-forum-ramp-.html http://radar.oreilly.com/2009/06/personal-democracy-forum-ramp--1.html http://radar.oreilly.com/2009/06/personal-democracy-forum-ramp--2.html I just think we can be most helpful by starting at square one with background on open source, such as the questions I listed at the start of this email. I ask you all to help with that, and I ask the organizers of OSA to enhance the organization's transparency by answering the questions I asked concerning the organization. -- ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Andy Oram O'Reilly Media email: andyo at oreilly.com Editor 10 Fawcett Street, Fourth Floor voice: 617-499-7479 Cambridge, MA 02138-1175, USA fax: 617-661-1116 identi.ca/twitter:praxagora http://www.praxagora.com/andyo/ ----------------------------------------------------------------------