The Dutch Plan for Open Standards

There was a press release about Netherlands adopting ODF. Here is the English translation of the press release:

Obligatory use of open standards by the government

17/09/2007 Press release subject: ICT policy

The government has to use open standards software from April 2008. This will increase the openness and accessibility of the government for the public, decrease the dependency from ICT-suppliers and it will give innovation more chance to take place.

This is a plan posed by the Deputy Minister of Economics, Heemskerk, which he sent to the parliament on Monday 17^th of September 2007. The Deputy Minister of Domestic Affairs, Bijleveld, also supports this plan. On the very same day he gave a speech on the conference ‘Grenzeloos samenwerken’ (cooperation without borders) to further outline his plans.

Through open standards and the use of open source software, the dependency from ICT-suppliers will be decreased. Furthermore, more opportunities will be created for designers of this type of software. In addition, the exchange of information between citizens and the governments will become easier.

From April 2008 on, government entities have to consider software with open standards if they purchase or modernise their software. Only in exceptional cases, for example when operations are endangered, proprietary software can be considered.

From the 1^st of January 2009, all government departments need to have a strategy for the use and purchasing of open source software. According to the deputy minister it is good that politicians are looking into the ICT policy since it is not only a technological tool but also an important part of modern Dutch society.

Open source software is software of which the source code is freely accessible. A well-known example is the operating system Linux. The main features of open standards is that everybody can use it without paying for a license.

My only comment on this would be for those in Netherlands championing this initiative to look out for Comptia and other allegedly neutral vendor organizations who would probably have already started lobbying against such initiatives in the dubious interest of maintaining technology neutrality (in layman's terms, "technology neutrality" would basically mean to  "maintain the status quo of using proprietary software from a software vendor found guilty in the US and the EU of abusing its market monopoly").

Comments

[timheuer]

i wonder if it is in the translation but don't you think there is confusion in the last paragraph? they define open source software and then saying that the main feature of open standards is that everyone can use it without a license...i don't see that to be accurate. there are plenty of OSS software that don't implement open standards in the wild. and likewise there are plenty of software products that implement open standards but still require some type of license (even if it is GPL or whatever) to use/consume. i think that last paragraph is just a poor explanation of both.

[Ditesh Kumar]

Hi timheuer,

To the best of my knowledge, the translation is accurate.

My interpretation would be that this is two-pronged approach - first to ensure all software procured implements open standards (from April 2008), and second to procure open source software wherever possible (from January 2009).

[timheuer]

ok, i think the author should probably correct themselves then :-) -- for example, MPEG-4 is a standard but has a license fee. again, to me it just read wrong -- the paragraph could easily confuse those not in the tech industry that open source==open standard==no licenses or fees...which is not accurate all the time

[Gerrit]

They define open standards as "ICT standards that anybody can use and for which no licence fees need to be paid" (that's how I translate the relevant part of the last sentence, I'm a Dutchman).

It seems to me they use a definition of "open" that doesn't hinder implementation in FOSS software.

[ditesh]

Hi Gerrit,

I noticed as well that their definition/understanding of Open Standards seems to be fairly basic at this point in time.

Would you know of open standards lobby groups in The Netherlands that we can get in touch with?

[AndreR]

I assume that they adhere to the EIF definition of Open Standards. The Netherlands are part of the European Union.

[Gerrit]

Hi Ditesh,

Try http://www.vrijschrift.nl/

They represent FFII in the Netherlands, have ties with FSF-Europe, and are responsible for Project Gutenberg EU.

I'm not sure I agree that our Ministry of Economic Affair's definition and understanding of open standards is necessarily basic. It's just a press release with rather informal language.

They want to use open standards and open source, and to me it seems they use an open source friendly definition of what they consider to be open standards for their purposes. Sounds fine to me.

Gerrit

From MacWorld:

http://www.macworld.com/news/2007/12/10/dutch/index.php

"Dutch government threatens to sideline Microsoft"

“The choice in favor of ODF doesn’t exclude anybody. I fail to see why authorities cannot use Microsoft Office” said Ruud Vriens.... “We would like to encourage Microsoft to join our ranks by becoming a participating member of our society. That would enable us to work with them to ensure an innovative and durable future so they can remain open for business.”

[Vincent]

Makes me proud to live in The Netherlands :)

[kalingaraj]

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