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The return of Citizens Against Government Waste
Citizens Against Government Waste has sent out a press release complaining about the plan in Massachusetts to standardize on open document formats. "'It is bad procurement policy for any state to unilaterally lock itself
into one set of technologies,' CAGW President Tom Schatz said. 'Agencies
should be able to accept bids from any company that can provide the desired
product or service. Government earns the best value for taxpayer dollars
through a competitive, transparent, and accountable bidding process.'"
Presumably it is just fine for the state to lock itself into proprietary formats. For those who don't remember, these are the folks who have been accused of recruiting dead people to the anti-Linux cause in the past.
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If you add up what they say... Posted Sep 21, 2005 15:47 UTC (Wed) by leonbrooks (guest, #1494) [Link] ...it amounts to "the ideal method is to let vendors lock you in to one document format".It appears that "wasted" is defined by CAGW as "any resource not filtered through our $upporter$". Sounds familiar. Shills Against Government Reform would be a more accurate self-title.
If you add up what they say... Posted Sep 21, 2005 21:38 UTC (Wed) by smitty_one_each (subscriber, #28989) [Link] The thought of resources filtered through supporters (athletic or otherwise) is simply horrible.
The return of Citizens Against Government Waste Posted Sep 21, 2005 16:24 UTC (Wed) by rev (guest, #15082) [Link] According to 'Citizens Against Government Waste' itis bad when these 'one set of technoligies' are an Open Standard that all vendors, including Microsoft, are free to implement and are thus able to provide the market with multiple, competing, compatible offerings. (Does this sound like free market, open competition, capitalism, or what?).
However, accroding to the 'Citizens Against Government Waste' it is NOT bad when these 'one set of technoligies' are Microsoft formats. (single vendor, does this smell like comunnism, or what?)
Here we have a reiteration of the usual FUD: non exclusive Microsoft solutions are bad.
This is definite proof that 'Citizens Against Government Waste' is just a propaganda machine.
The return of Citizens Against Government Waste Posted Sep 22, 2005 4:06 UTC (Thu) by jtc (subscriber, #6246) [Link] "...
Here we have a reiteration of the usual FUD: non exclusive Microsoft solutions are bad.
This is definite proof that 'Citizens Against Government Waste' is just a propaganda machine."
No - that's not it, and I'm surprised no one has noticed this. All the confusion people are experiencing trying to understand their complaint is due to a simple, small error. Obviously, these poor people have been so busy working to support their noble cause that they haven't noticed, or haven't had the time to correct, the error - just one word - a little preposition: When naming themselves, in their haste to get to the real work, they accidentally used the word "against" when they meant to use the word "for". Just make this substitution in their name and it will become clear that their complaint is justified.
The return of Citizens Against Government Waste Posted Sep 21, 2005 17:24 UTC (Wed) by kirkengaard (subscriber, #15022) [Link] More like "The process of allowing the usual paid contract bidding to go on, and determine the de facto standard of government through monetary pressure, is being circumvented, and the citizens of Massachusetts will pay for it in the end."
There isn't "a competitive, transparent, and accountable bidding process." In government, there hardly ever is, even though it's designed that way. The system just gets gamed by the best, and Microsoft is one of the best when it comes to that sort of game.
The return of Citizens Against Government Waste Posted Sep 21, 2005 18:10 UTC (Wed) by wilreichert (subscriber, #17680) [Link] Lets not forget the 'millions its going to take to convert docs & retrain all the employees on the new systems'. 'But they are shooting for 2007, wouldn't that mean a Windows / Office upgrade or 2 in there anyway? Do those magically not need training / converting?
Meh, Lame.
The return of Citizens Against Government Waste Posted Sep 21, 2005 18:46 UTC (Wed) by epeeist (guest, #1743) [Link] > Lets not forget the 'millions its going to take to convert docs & retrain all the employees on the new systems'. 'But they are shooting for 2007, wouldn't that mean a Windows / Office upgrade or 2 in there anyway? Do those magically not need training / converting?
Office 12 - totally new interface. The only good thing about it seems to be that Clippy is dead.
The return of Citizens Against Government Waste Posted Sep 21, 2005 18:34 UTC (Wed) by dwheeler (guest, #1216) [Link] For more about OpenDocument, see the Wikipedia article about OpenDocument.
The return of Citizens Against Government Waste Posted Sep 21, 2005 19:44 UTC (Wed) by jonth (subscriber, #4008) [Link] 'It is bad procurement policy for any state to unilaterally lock itself into one set of technologies' Fair enough: so stop using Office! I can't think of a better way of locking yourself into one office suite than using Office.
For example, my sister helps out with her church's accounts. She's a Windows user, and has Office installed on her home PC, so she duly set up an Excel spreadsheet to keep track of things, which she then emailed to her Church. Unfortunately, her church only had Works on their PC, and despite everything she tried, she could not get Works and Excel to talk. That's right, two proprietary products from the same company which do the same thing, can't talk to each other. How stupid/mean can you get? (Hilariously, Microsoft's own advice for this is to use a DBase format to exchange documents.)
She was all ready to tell her church to buy the cheapo version of Office, but just before she did, she asked me if there was a way to do what she wanted. Half an hour later, we'd downloaded and installed OpenOffice, read in the old Excel spreadsheet, saved it as a .sxc file and emailed it to her church. Half an hour more at church to install at the other end; job done. Hopefully, that's one less victim of a proprietary format lock-in...
Jonth
The return of Citizens Against Government Waste Posted Sep 21, 2005 20:24 UTC (Wed) by geohump (guest, #27792) [Link] We may also want to be aware of the fact that the last time this little group of "money whores" poked its tiny head out of the sand, it was discovered that, (Shock! Surprise!), Microsoft is one of their major funders.
I'm not even going to bother looking at their web site this time. By now they've probably hidden their funders page.
Its clear that this "Consumer's interest" group has no interest in consumers at all. Slimebags, every one of them.
The return of Citizens Against Government Waste Posted Sep 21, 2005 21:43 UTC (Wed) by jre (guest, #2807) [Link] Those who are inclined to give CAGW the benefit of the doubt may want to read up on an earlier episode of this drama.Tom Schatz and CAGW gave up any credible claim to being an impartial citizens' watchdog group years ago. Don't waste your time trying to point out to them the error of their ways; they already know perfectly well who underwrites their paychecks. Rather, if you are in a letter-writing mood, take a minute to inform the media of who these people are and who they work for.
The return of Citizens Against Government Waste Posted Sep 21, 2005 23:16 UTC (Wed) by neoprene (guest, #8520) [Link] Defending an Undefendable Position is always going to sound strange.[i.e. bizarre, stupid, funny, twisted etc.]
recruiting dead people Posted Sep 22, 2005 0:32 UTC (Thu) by pjm (subscriber, #2080) [Link] The linked-to article does say at the end According to the Times, family members crossed out the names and signed for them. which suggests merely an out-dated mailing list rather than fraud on the part of CAGW. The article does mention Tuscon, Utah among an unspecified number/proportion of invalid return addresses, which is more suspicious (I'd have expected the signatory to have corrected the address), though these too are adequately explained by bad data and an inattentive etc. signatory rather than a made up signatory. The actions reported of ATL (deliberately giving the false impression that their letters were written individually) are deceitful and wrong; though I see no suggestion that CAGW were even knew of those actions, let alone were in any way responsible for them. In the interest of LWN credibility, I suggest (and indeed request) either removing the claim about recruiting dead people (perhaps replacing with funded in part by Microsoft), or link to some better evidence.
recruiting dead people Posted Sep 22, 2005 1:07 UTC (Thu) by corbet (editor, #1) [Link] I just reworded it a bit, thanks.
recruiting dead people : the original Los Angeles Times Posted Sep 23, 2005 23:26 UTC (Fri) by NZheretic (guest, #409) [Link] Read the original Los Angeles Times ArticleThe Microsoft campaign goes to great lengths to create an impression that the letters are spontaneous expressions from ordinary people. Letters sent in the last month are on personalized stationery using different wording, color and typefaces, details that distinguish Microsoft's efforts from lobbying tactics that go on in politics every day. To quote Minnesota Attorney General Mike Hatch : "It's sleazy, This is not a company that appears to be bothered by ethical boundaries."
recruiting dead people : the original Los Angeles Times Posted Sep 24, 2005 13:12 UTC (Sat) by pjm (subscriber, #2080) [Link] Clarification: the block that NZheretic quotes refers to the letters written by Americans for Technology Leadership (ATL), whereas the letters of Citizens Against Government Waste (the group under discussion here) were identical except for the signature. Neither article claims that Citizens Against Government Waste were aware of or responsible for ATLs (reprehensible) letters. We can say that CAGW and ATL are each funded in part by Microsoft.
How much? Posted Sep 22, 2005 3:02 UTC (Thu) by bojan (subscriber, #14302) [Link] It would be interesting to know how much would it cost MS to actually implement OpenDocument format within Office. Let's say 100 programmers need to work on this project for 1 year and each gets paid US$250,000 per year. That's US$25M. Surely, a hundred highly paid MS programmers could pull this off in one year... And a company with US$50G+ in the bank and 80%+ margins on Office can afford such an expense. You reckon?
And given that Office is the best office suite by far, this would then mean that MS gets to keep Massachusetts account and potentially other similar renegades. But maybe they think it's not worth the effort?
How much? Posted Sep 22, 2005 11:23 UTC (Thu) by beoba (guest, #16942) [Link] Now what would be the fun in that?
How much? Posted Sep 22, 2005 19:33 UTC (Thu) by zblaxell (subscriber, #26385) [Link] MS thinks that if they take a stand and make the transition to OpenDocument as painful as possible, MA will give in, nobody will follow MA's path, and OpenDocument will go back into the "obscure freeware (sic) that nobody important ever uses" corner. MS can easily survive without the licensing revenue from MA, and they probably will pay that price even if it is more expensive than the technical modifications to Office to support OpenDocument. Why?
If MA succeeds we will probably see more governments and maybe some large corporations coming up with similar policies; however, if MA fails, we won't hear anything like this for a few more years, long enough for MS to shore up their customer lock-in.
If the population of MS-free users ever gets large enough to get through a year using only OpenDocument for their office applications, MS's circular sales pitch--"you have to use MS because everyone has to use MS"--falls apart. MS office software is too expensive for low-end general consumer use and insufficient for high-end specialized uses.
In a free market with actual, existent competitors, MS could be decimated by a single healthy competitor (although 10% of $50G is still a lot of money); however, the damage to MS's intangible assets (things like stock analyst opinions, trademark value, and consumer opinion) could do more damage to MS than a competitor ever could. When you're a monopoly, the only place to go is down, especially if your users already regard your product as more of a necessary evil than a useful tool that enriches their working lives.
Therefore, we can expect Microsoft fight this until they either crush OpenDocument, or become irrelevant. MS will fight both actively (through political manipulation and tying attractive new products to new versions of their existing ones), and passively (they'll refuse to implement any feature or fix any bug that helps a user use anything other than MS).
How much? Posted Sep 24, 2005 23:27 UTC (Sat) by rjw (guest, #10415) [Link] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decimate
It means reduce by one tenth, not to one tenth.
I think we want multiple competitors to ...erm...10/9-inate them.
How much? Posted Sep 25, 2005 1:01 UTC (Sun) by zblaxell (subscriber, #26385) [Link] Correction noted.
I guess that means we need 9 competitors to emerge at the same time, to make the math right. :-)
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