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[News] Major Wins for Free Software in British Public Sector

Is This the Season of Porcine Aerobatics?

,----[ Quote ]
| Two of the darkest moments for open source in the UK involved the loss of 
| major public projects. The first was Newham Borough Council, which ran a 
| high-profile trial of open source only to ditch it at the last moment, after 
| magically receiving an offer it couldn't refuse from Microsoft – which cynics 
| suggested was the main motivation for the open source exercise in the first 
| place.     
| 
| This was bad news for free software, because it enabled Microsoft to do two 
| things. First, it could claim that an independent body had tried open source 
| and found it wanting, and secondly, it was able to use Newham as a showcase 
| for its public sector technology.   
| 
| In some ways, the second defeat was even worse. It involved a massive 
| contract with the NHS that was far-reaching in scope... 
`----

http://www.computerworlduk.com/toolbox/open-source/blogs/index.cfm?blogid=14&entryid=728


Recent:

NHS launches open source development

,----[ Quote ]
| The NHS is a major Microsoft customer, and last year signed a large deal to 
| upgrade to Windows Vista. But, it always maintained it would continually 
| evaluate open source.  
`----

http://www.computerworlduk.com/toolbox/open-source/open-source-business/news/index.cfm?newsid=8620


London council dumps Microsoft, may go open source instead

,----[ Quote ]
| NEWHAM LONDON Borough Council has scrapped the controversial 10-year 
| Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) it signed with Microsoft in 2004 and drawn 
| up a new agreement with a new set of deliverables.  
`----

http://www.theinquirer.net/gb/inquirer/news/2008/04/18/microsoft-flagship-flounders


EU: Europarlement testing Ubuntu, OpenOffice and Firefox

,----[ Quote ]
| The European Parliament's IT department is testing the use of GNU/Linux 
| distribution Ubuntu, OpenOffice, Firefox and other Open Source applications, 
| the British MEP James Nicholson explained last week in a letter to Italian 
| MEP Marco Cappato.   
`----

http://ec.europa.eu/idabc/en/document/7565


Is Microsoft Now Banned from EU Contracts?

http://www.computerworlduk.com/toolbox/open-source/blogs/index.cfm?entryid=697&blogid=14


Euro MP thinks Microsoft should be banned from government contracts

http://www.theinquirer.net/gb/inquirer/news/2008/04/10/member-eu-parliament-asks


Green MEP says Microsoft should be excluded from EU contract awarding procedure

http://www.heise.de/english/newsticker/news/106338/from/rss09


MEPs Question Microsoft's Eligibility for Gov't Projects

,----[ Quote ]
| The Commission, which has not responded yet, is allowed a few weeks to reply.
`----

http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/144591/meps_question_microsofts_eligibility_for_govt_projects.html


Government faces crunch on Microsoft mega-deal

,----[ Quote ]
| Rumour has it that Microsoft hasn't been feeling appreciated in the public 
| sector, thinking its customers don't know what a good deal they've been 
| getting since the MOU was first negotiated in 2002. BECTA, the procurement 
| quango for the education sector, has recommended schools don't upgrade to 
| Microsoft Vista and Office 2007.    
| 
| [...]
| 
| "There's a big anti-Microsoft lobby growing on the green agenda" he said, 
| especially among local councils who were beginning to realise that PC's were 
| power hungry and expensive to maintain. They were taking interest in 
| think-client computers instead.   
`----

http://www.theinquirer.net/gb/inquirer/news/2008/04/15/uk-gov-faces-crunch-microsoft


UK: Major cost reduction result of Bristol's switch to Open Standards

,----[ Quote ]
| Bristol City Council's switch to StarOffice in 2005 has led to a major 
| reduction of IT costs, says Gavin Beckett, the council's ICT Strategy 
| manager.  
| 
| StarOffice is Sun Microsystems' proprietary suite of office applications, 
| which is based on the Open Source OpenOffice. In 2006 Bristol took the 
| further step of adopting the ISO-approved Open Document Format (ODF).  
| 
| Speaking at a conference on ODF in the Netherlands last month, Beckett said 
| that implementing StarOffice for 5,500 desktops in Bristol saved 1.1 million 
| GBP (1.4 million euro) in comparison to the total cost of implementing 
| Microsoft Office. "The licences for StarOffice cost us 186,000 GBP (243,000 
| euro), in comparison to 1.4 million GBP (1.8 million euro) for MS Office."    
| 
| These major savings were offset slightly by extra time needed for 
| implementing StarOffice. Implementation cost the city council 484,000 GBP 
| (632,000 euro), double the estimate for MS Office. This was due to document 
| conversion and training, said the IT Strategy manager. Explaining and 
| troubleshooting the new office applications took several months more than 
| planned.     
`----

http://ec.europa.eu/idabc/en/document/7409


Is Becta loosening Microsoft's grip on UK schools?

,----[ Quote ]
| Capita-SIMS, the powerful and dominant schools database provider, has been 
| instructed by Becta to comply with the new interoperability framework. This 
| move potentially opens up a large and growing market to solutions based on 
| Open Source databases such as MySQL and PostgreSQL.   
| 
| [...]
| 
| Moving away from Microsoft SQL
| 
| The school database market has been a closed shop for many years. Products 
| from Capita and Serco, both based on MS-SQL, account for well over 90% of 
| market share. In the case of Capita-SIMS.net, not only does it use Microsoft 
| SQL , requires schools to use MS Office 2003 and has a MS IIS web server but 
| it also has a non-interoperable API.    
`----

http://www.siriusit.co.uk/myblog/is-becta-loosening-microsofts-grip-on-uk-schools.html


Interview: Tim Pearson, CEO at RM plc on interoperability and software patents

,----[ Quote ]
| John Spencer talks to Tim Pearson Chief Executive of RM. RM is the largest 
| most successful supplier of ICT to the UK education market and, for good 
| measure, is British too. Tim has been there from the start and so is really 
| now Mr RM. This autumn he gave the school ICT world a jolt when RM announced 
| its Asus miniBook. It retails to schools for only £169 and runs Open Source 
| software throughout. The miniBook has preceded an avalanche of new products 
| and new thinking.      
| 
| [...]
| 
| More seriously, it's been hard to forecast when we have no real experience 
| selling at this price point before, neither have we ever sold a machine with 
| a Linux-based client OS before.  
`----

http://www.siriusit.co.uk/myblog/is-becta-loosening-microsofts-grip-on-uk-schools.html


Lawmaker blasts U.K. government on Microsoft policy

,----[ Quote ]
| "A member of Parliament of the United Kingdom has launched a stinging
| attack on the U.K. government's IT strategy, saying that it has given
| Microsoft too much control.
| 
| John Pugh, who is a member of Parliament, or MP, for Southport and a
| member of the Public Accounts Committee, was speaking in an
| adjournment debate on Tuesday that he had called. The aim of the
| debate, he said, was to explore the alternatives to using Microsoft
| software, including open source."
| 
| [...]
`----

http://www.news.com/Lawmaker-blasts-U.K.-government-on-Microsoft-policy/2100-1012_3-6212721.html
http://tinyurl.com/2ashm2


Interview with Richard M. Stallman

,----[ Quote ]
| It is important to know this because we will always face pressure, from those 
| who are powerful and would like to take away our freedom, to surrender our 
| freedom—and they frequently offer us something attractive in exchange. For 
| instance, B’liar wanted to abolish the Rights of Englishmen, and to serve his 
| American master, Bush, faithfully; so he offered Britons “protection” from 
| this or that, plus the imagined idea that he influences his master on their 
| behalf through the “special relationship”.      
|                    ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
`----

http://www.freesoftwaremagazine.com/articles/interview_with_richard_stallman

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