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Long overdueLong overduePosted Mar 19, 2006 23:39 UTC (Sun) by man_ls (subscriber, #15091)In reply to: A proposal for an open source tax credit by zotz Parent article: A proposal for an open source tax credit Yeah, that would be fantastic -- and also a quite logical thing for a government to do. I would bet governments get comprehensive specs to everything they buy; building plans, electrical wirings, electronic circuit specifications. Why not for software, why buy opaque boxes? How could government procurement procedures allow this for so long? It's a long overdue move. And however when support for a open format for documents is required in a US state, they get into a big mess. It's incredibly blind.
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Long overdue Posted Mar 20, 2006 0:03 UTC (Mon) by vmole (guest, #111) [Link] I would bet governments get comprehensive specs to everything they buy; building plans, electrical wirings, electronic circuit specifications. Guess again. After all, that would be government confiscation of valuable intellectual property - might as well be Communists! Never mind if it was developed on government funding -- i.e. your money and mine. As an example, consider the uproar over voting machine software, and the objections of the companies that wrote it against letting anyone see it.
Long overdue Posted Mar 20, 2006 9:52 UTC (Mon) by butlerm (guest, #13312) [Link] The federal government (in the U.S.) does require source code to any critical software they buy. Of course even source code is of limited utility after a few years...
Long overdue Posted Mar 20, 2006 10:59 UTC (Mon) by man_ls (subscriber, #15091) [Link] If this source code is provided but cannot be disseminated then it is certainly of limited use. It is hard to imagine anything similar happening to e.g. government buildings -- that the government receives the blueprints but cannot provide them to other contractors.
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