Open Source for America launches

[Posted July 22, 2009 by corbet]

A group called Open Source for America has announced its existence. "The mission of Open Source for America is to serve as a centralized advocate and to encourage broader U.S. Federal Government support of and participation in free and open source software. Specifically, Open Source for America will: help effect change in policies and practices to allow the Federal Government to better utilize these technologies; help coordinate these communities to collaborate with the federal government on technology requirements; and raise awareness and create understanding among federal government leaders about the values and implications of open source software." In other words, we finally have a lobbying organization in the US. There's a fairly high-profile board of advisors (Ghosh, Moglen, O'Reilly, Peters, Phipps, Shuttleworth, Tiemann, Zemlin, ...), some case studies, and, inevitably, a Twitter feed.

The four freedoms

Posted Jul 22, 2009 17:20 UTC (Wed) by coriordan (guest, #7544) [Link]

Nice that on their principles page they list FSF's four freedoms.

Their stance is weaker than FSF's position since OS4A "supports" the four freedoms rather than saying that everyone has a right to them. But still, it's an indication that OS4A might sometimes help spread the idea of software freedom to the USA govt. Principle #4 reads a bit funny.

Open Source for America launches

Posted Jul 22, 2009 18:03 UTC (Wed) by jordanb (guest, #45668) [Link] (4 responses)

I'm suprised Moglen would have anyting to do with Douchebag O'Reilly.

Open Source for America launches

Posted Jul 22, 2009 18:36 UTC (Wed) by BrucePerens (guest, #2510) [Link] (1 responses)

The funny thing is that the web 2.0 people wonder why he's "the patron saint of Web 2.0", just as we wondered just what he ever had to do with Open Source other than trying to capitalize on it for his own purposes.

Open Source for America launches

Posted Jul 23, 2009 4:35 UTC (Thu) by flewellyn (subscriber, #5047) [Link]

Just to be clear, we're talking about Tim O'Reilly here?

I don't know about "patron saint", but the fact that his company has published a lot of good books about free software is not exactly insignificant.

coalitions

Posted Jul 22, 2009 18:39 UTC (Wed) by coriordan (guest, #7544) [Link]

To make a coalition that big, everyone has to make concessions. About naming, about principles, about who else is a member, etc.

The board of this group looks much better than the board of some other groups that I worry could try to do lobbying on "our" behalf.

Open Source for America launches

Posted Jul 24, 2009 3:21 UTC (Fri) by tseaver (guest, #1544) [Link]

The obvious trollishness of such comment doesn't justify a response.

The O'Reilly folks, including most definitely Tim O'Reilly, have done
a lot to make the FLOSS community more viable / sustainable over the
years. What have you done to compare?